Japanese Learners Research Articles

Analisis Ungkapan Sumimasen dalam Anime Bungou Stray Dogs Karya Kafka Asagiri

Japanese has the concept of apologizing, because in Japanese there are levels of language. There are also various apologies in Japanese, one of which is the sumimasen expression. In learning Japanese, especially in basic learning, sumimasen expressions are often found. This is because the expression sumimasen means formally apologizing or is included in learning aisatsu which is basic learning in Japanese. The purpose of this research was carried out because the expression sumimasen does not have a meaning as an expression of apologizing only, but can be used in different situations according to the context. This study used a qualitative descriptive method using a pragmatic approach. The technique used in this research is note tapping technique, in which the researcher himself acts as an observer in processing the data contained in the data source. This research focuses on the meaning of the sumimasen expression in the anime Bungou Sray Dogs by Kafka Asagiri. The results of this study are that although the expression sumimasen has 4 different meanings according to the context and situation of the speech, the meaning that is widely available and used is the meaning of apologizing. From these results, it can be seen that in Japanese the meaning of the expression sumimasen is used more as apologizing than the meaning of expressing gratitude, asking for help, or attracting attention or expressions of excuse.

Verbal aspect in the acquisition of Latvian as a foreign language

The article addresses verbal aspect in the acquisition of Latvian as a foreign language. Latvian textbooks both in Latvian and in other languages, as well as Japanese learners’ writings are analysed to explore this topic. The main issue is the use of verbs expressing the aspectual opposition perfective / imperfective, as well as the opposition inchoative / stative, and other Aktionsart prefixed verbs. Verbal aspect in Latvian is an implicit category. It is one of the few categories described in Latvian grammars but less frequently addressed in the textbooks of Latvian as a foreign language. The analysis shows that in the initial stage learners may use mostly imperfective non-prefixed verbs when denoting habitual situations in the present tense. The necessity of perfective prefixed verbs arises in the preterit, when learners describe a concrete, single situation that has taken place in the past. Without knowing the notion of aspectual opposition and corresponding perfective prefixed verbs, learners often use imperfective verbs. A similar situation is observed for the inchoative prefixed verbs, which learners replace with the imperfective stative verbs that they have already acquired. The use of other Aktionsart prefixed verbs seems difficult for learners and requires a higher, “native-like” level of proficiency.

Translation and Linguistic Strategies of English Oxymora into Japanese by Japanese Language Learners

An oxymoron is a complex term as it contains inherent contradictions. This often results in confusion and miscommunication. In translation studies, despite the existence of quite a rich body of research on figurative language, the dearth of research that focuses on oxymoron further compounds this complexity. The objectives of this research are two-fold. First, is identifying whether or not the Japanese language learners are aware of the existence of oxymoron, whereas the second objective is to determine strategies used in translating English oxymoron into Japanese. This study used written translation tasks and follow-up online interviews as the methods. The study utilises purposive sampling technique and the respondents are 12 undergraduate students from the Universiti Malaya majoring in Japanese Language and Linguistics. Six of the respondents are Malay and six are Chinese. The oxymora are taken from the corpus of English texts at english-corpora.org/iweb. Data were manually collected and analysed using Aixelá’s Culture-Specific Items classification as the framework for analysing translation strategies. The research found that the respondents have difficulties translating some English oxymora and the challenges lie in finding correct words to describe, if not similar oxymoron in the target language. Other than their existing knowledge, the respondents refer to online resources to help them with translation such as Google Translate and online dictionaries. However, with some unfamiliar oxymora, this strategy is insufficient as most online dictionaries directly translate figurative language. This study is intended to raise interest in the translation of oxymoron, because this topic is not often the subject of study and application in practice. This study will help language instructors in understanding the process of translation of oxymoron and in implementing this subject as a syllabus in the translation studies.

Application and Research of Cognitive Linguistics Theory in Japanese Teaching in Colleges and Universities

The traditional scattered teaching mode based on generative grammar in college Japanese teaching can help students find the connection between scattered knowledge, but due to the lack of context influence, students’ Japanese learning efficiency is not high. The theory of cognitive linguistics provides a new way for Japanese teaching, emphasizing the cultivation of students’ cognitive thinking. Its application in the teaching of Japanese vocabulary, grammar and communication will help students more deeply remember and understand the complex knowledge of Japanese vocabulary and grammar, and lay a solid foundation for skilled use of Japanese in the future. This paper mainly introduces the theory of cognitive linguistics, points out the shortcomings of cognitive linguistics theory in research, and discusses and studies the practical application of cognitive linguistics theory in Japanese teaching in colleges and universities from many aspects, so as to improve the level of Japanese teaching in colleges and universities.

Japanese English Learners’ Perceptions of Filipino Teachers’ Online English Lessons: Implications for Global Englishes Research

Situated in the domain of Global Englishes research, this study explores a question of how far the issue of the English model for Japanese learners is complicated by the hierarchical coexistence of regular English courses taught by Anglophone English teachers and extracurricular online English lessons taught by non-Anglophone instructors. A questionnaire survey was administered to 100 Japanese English learners aged 18–34 who have taken such lessons. This study provides both hopeful and challenging suggestions for Global Englishes research and practice, that is, Japanese English learners’ favourable perceptions of Filipino teachers’ affordable and flexible lessons that, they believe, would not interfere with their subsequent or concurrent study of ‘real’ English taught by native Anglophone teachers. This study indicates future directions of research and practice regarding the legitimate positioning of in-class or online English classes taught by Association of Southeast Asian Nations and other non-native English-speaking teachers in East Asian English classrooms that remain bound by native English norms.

L2 English Speakers’ Perception of Their English Accent: An Investigation of European and Asian Attitudes

According to previous studies, Japanese learners of English (JLEs) have a negative perception of their own variety of English along with a strong desire to sound native-like. Language attitudes toward L2 (second language) English accents may affect their active participation in English communication situations. The present study is cross-national and investigates whether other L2 English learners from different L1 (first language) backgrounds negatively perceive their own variety of English and English pronunciation as JLEs do. A total of 290 college students in Austria, Germany, Denmark, Malaysia, China, Japan, and Kazakhstan evaluated their own accent by responding to 10 statements on a 6-point scale. By comparing the responses as percentages and the binomial test, the analysis revealed that the Japanese perceived their accent most negatively, followed by the Chinese, whereas the Europeans, Malaysians, and Kazakhs perceived their accents positively to varying degrees. Among the seven countries, the L1 Danish group perceived their own variety as native-like most and non-native accent least, where the JLEs showed the opposite results. On the other hand, the endorsement for native accent was recognized across the countries. Based on the results, I claim that individual socio-contextual settings could have a critical impact on developing distinct attitudes toward one’s own accent among EFL speakers. 

Learning Japanese: observations from a lifelong experience

This paper discusses the author’s first encounter with the Japanese language at the age of 23 and documents his continuing response to it up to the present time. At first, the language learning methodology he had used before failed and proved to be inappropriate for learning Japanese. Then came the realization that learning a foreign language needs some previous knowledge to build on. The search for the most efficient way to master Japanese brought the author to receptive multilingualism, which by chance opens up new vistas for the aspiring learner to improve listening skills. The physicality of speech and the consequent importance of some form of outside stimulation for its development are discussed. Mention is made of how he came upon the idea of adapting childhood techniques in learning how to read to the acquisition of reading competence in the Japanese language. In connection with this, the author makes another digression on the relationship he perceives as existing between active and passive language skills, and from this proceeds with the mention of how this might be applicable to his progress to date in learning Japanese and why, for better or worse, this would not normally apply to classroom acquisition of Japanese either inside or outside of Japan today

Implementation of the course Practice Teaching of the Japanese Language and Culture

Considering the global increase in the number of Japanese language learners, the need to establish educational institutions (primary, secondary, higher education, non-school education) for Japanese language learning also arose in Croatia and, subsequently, the necessity to foster a new generation of qualified teachers with sufficient theoretical and practical background in teaching Japanese as a foreign language. The purpose of this paper is to examine and describe the process of implementing the graduate course Practice Teaching of the Japanese Language and Culture, along with its challenges such as online classes due to the Covid-19 pandemic. The paper discusses the role of teachers as facilitators, the role of students as trainees and the role of learners, i.e. the participants of an intensive two-week Japanese language course, which is part of the abovementioned graduate course. Furthermore, the paper discusses the learner survey and the trainee self-evaluation report with respect to the improvement of their knowledge.

Learning Japanese Using Marugoto Japanese Online Course Site (Minato)

A public university has shifted the Japanese language teaching method from using full textbooks to the application of combining textbook and online platforms. This shift is in lieu of the transition in teaching and learning patterns initiated by the rapid development of IT and the effects of pandemic. What motivates the researchers to embark on this study is that with the change of learning face-to-face to online learning, foreign language instructors need to prepare more interesting online materials to ease online teaching and learning. Generally, this study is aimed to introduce yet another online teaching materials for the teaching and learning of Japanese. Specifically, this study is to explore how the students learned Japanese online with the assistance of Minato, employing quantitative methods. A forty-seven-item questionnaire, with questions related to behaviour (13 items), situational (20 items) and cognitive (14 items) factors was administered, and 37 students participated in the survey. Based on the findings, it had been illustrated that out of 47 item questions; eleven (11) items recorded the highest score of 4.6 mean points. Eight (8) of the highest means are items from Situational Factors and three items from Cognitive Factors. The sub-factors for Situational Factors consist of learning about culture and learning about lifestyle. Out of eight (8) items with the highest means; three (3) items from culture and five items from lifestyle. The sub-factors for Cognitive Factors are learning vocabulary, learning pronunciation and learning grammar. Out of three (3) items with the highest means consists of two (2) items from learning vocabulary and one item from learning pronunciation. The lowest mean of 3.5 points is from Cognitive Factors and the item is learning grammar. Therefore, this study has proven that teaching and learning using videos and photos are the most effective methods for learning Japanese culture and lifestyle through an online platform, whilst learning grammar still need teachers-students’ face-to-face interactions in class.

“Makam” nasi: Language interference of a Japanese young learner in Indonesia

In acquiring the second language, children will use their first language knowledge as a base in their attempt of using a new language. This phenomenon is called language interference. This study aimed at identifying specific instances of language interference conducted by a bilingual child during her study in an international school. The subject was a 5-year-old Japanese child who was acquiring Indonesian as her second language. This study was a case study using a descriptive qualitative research method. Data collection was done through observation, interview and note-taking. Furthermore, the data in the form of utterances in Indonesian interfered by Japanese were analyzed descriptively. The results showed that the most common type of language interference that occurred was phonological interference (16 examples), followed by lexical error (4 words) and grammatical error (5 sentences). In short, in this case, Japanese phonological interference with Indonesian pronunciation occurred more frequently than lexical error and grammatical error.

An Errors Analysis in Using Diathesis (態) in Written Text of Japanese Language Department Senior Students at Universities in Medan

The grammatical category that shows the relationship between the subject is diathesis. From the researcher’s observations, it was found that Japanese students used diathesis errors in the city of Medan. Therefore, this study discusses what forms of errors are and how Japanese universities students in Medan make the error in using diathesis forms. The specific purpose of this study is to analyze and determine the forms and patterns of errors in using the diathesis (態/tai) that it becomes a consideration for Japanese language lecturers to provide more effective teaching for Japanese learners, especially universities students in Medan. The types of diathesis sentences analyzed are judoutai (passive diathesis), Shieki (causative), kiboubun (wish form), and jujubun (expression of give-take). This research is descriptive qualitative research with error analysis. The data were sentences using diathesis (tai), sourced from written text made by 30 senior students of the Japanese department at the Universitas Sumatera Utara and the Universitas Harapan Medan. In conclusion, the form of error has been found in passive (受 身), a causative (使役), and the expression of the give-take action (授受表現) diathesis, which is realized grammatically and lexically. Errors include changing verbs, using particles (joshi), and assigning word unit functions to sentences. This study concludes that understanding and practice on the ukemi, shieki, and jujubun diathesis is needed in Japanese language learning among university students in Medan to improve student skills

RESEARCH ON THE USE OF JAPANESE TEXTBOOKS AND LEARNING MATERIALS ON JAPANESE STUDIES

This study aims to clarify the use of Japanese learning materials and textbooks on specialized subjects in or oriented to Japanese studies. The data was collected through questionnaires from 530 learners and interviews of 05 lecturers of the courses in Japanese studies, along with statistics of Japanese textbooks at online libraries of 05 universities that offer this program. The study reveals: 1. Other than the materials provided by lecturers directly during the lesson and according to the course's requirements, learners rarely use reference books and materials in Japanese; 2. Reference books and supplementary materials in Japanese available at libraries are still eminently limited, and have not been updated for a long time, while their content is too academic and not suitable for most learners; 3. There are not many books and materials in Japanese by Vietnamese scholars and Japanese language teachers; furthermore, both the teaching and learning materials are provided by the teachers themselves. Given this situation, learners want to update their knowledge regularly through a larger number of materials on a variety of topics, which are easier to understand and more attractive in terms of content, and they should be in both Japanese and Vietnamese languages. On the other hand, lecturers all aspire for solutions to curate quality resources for classes such as access to more supplementary materials, and facilitation to the publication of teaching and learning materials in Japanese compiled by the teachers themselves.

The Usage of 'Otsukare' among Japanese Students

Greetings are one of the keys to strike a conversation. The relationship between the speakers could be measured through the greetings used. Therefore understanding greeting usage is necessary for maintaining an interpersonal relationship. Nevertheless, there seems to be a difference between greetings thought within Japanese textbooks and greetings in daily usage. Thus, this study will discuss the usage of ‘otsukare’ in Japan, especially amongst Japanese university students. The textbook "Minna no Nihongo" will be used to comprehend how aisatsu is taught to Japanese language learners. In this research, Japanese university students will answer a questioner regarding the usage of ‘otsukare’. A questionnaire was designed based on sociolinguistics concepts to discover how Japanese university students use ‘otsukare’, such as when to whom, and in what manner. 40 university students of native Japanese participated and as the result, four points were discovered regarding the usage of ‘otsukare’ First, ‘otsukare’ is used to greet seniors, juniors, and friends. Second, native Japanese speakers prefer to use ‘otsukare’ on departing. Third, nevertheless, some people also use ‘otsukare’ to greet people as an opening greeting. Native Japanese speakers consider the usage of ‘otsukare’ in the morning as opening greetings is not against the rule of greetings. Finally, the gap between Japanese teaching abroad is that ‘otsukare’ is not proper to be used as an opening greeting.

Can Japanese Learners Pass the JLPT N3 by Reading A3! Visual Novel?

A visual novel is a reading media in the form of conversations between characters shown in a static anime style that attracts readers to continue reading it. Equipped with audio in Japanese and translation in English, it is estimated that visual novels can be used as an exciting learning media for students. This study aims to determine the possibility of visual novels, which are usually used as a game for entertainment purposes, as a medium for learning Japanese to pass the JLPT (Japanese Language Proficiency Test). The method used in this stusdy is a quantitative method to find the matching vocabularies, with a listening and note-taking method for data collection. The data analyzed here is a conversation transcript of some chapters of A3! visual novel and JLPT 2018 questions ranging from N5 to N3 level. The A3! visual novel data are grouped according to the JLPT's four linguistic aspects: Moji goi, bunpou, dokkai, and choukai, at each level (N5 to N3). The analysis results show that the visual novel A3! can be used as a strengthening medium for students to pass the JLPT from N5 to N3.

‘Did You See That?’—The Role of Repetition and Enhancement on Lexical Bundle Processing in English Learning Materials

Abstract For second-language learners, the use of formulaic language can benefit processing. Previous studies have explored the development of a ‘processing advantage’ for lexical bundles and investigated whether learning materials can be optimized via repetition or enhancement in order to facilitate it. However, studies have tended to consider these factors in isolation, and little is understood about how repetition and enhancement interact as learning occurs. This is the focus of the current study. Japanese learners of English read a series of short stories repeating enhanced or un-enhanced, low-frequency lexical bundles. After each reading, participants performed a phrasal judgement task (PJT) including these lexical bundles, as well as control lexical bundles not presented in the story. Responses were faster to items repeated in the stories, and there was an initial benefit from input enhancement. A post-test indicated that students retained some knowledge of the lexical bundles from both the stories, as well as from items that only appeared in the PJTs. This study shows that including high-frequency lexical bundles in such texts is beneficial to learners.

Using Tasks in Second Language Teaching: Practice in Diverse Contexts

I teach a course on task-based language teaching (TBLT) to future EFL teachers at a university in southern Hungary, so I was particularly happy for the opportunity both to read—and to own a copy of—this important book. Most of my students will neither have experienced TBLT nor heard of it, and thus, while they are certainly open to the topic, they also approach it with a healthy scepticism. ‘Where has TBLT been implemented successfully?’ they typically ask. ‘Is there a place for grammar within TBLT?’ ‘How can we make any of this work with the systemic constraints we’ll be facing as teachers?’ and so on. The seventeen fascinating studies in this book are an excellent source of answers to these and many other questions. The participants and contexts covered in these studies are diverse: low-proficiency EFL learners in Vietnamese primary schools, EFL beginners in primary school in southern Brazil, Aboriginal vocational students developing their standard Australian English for the workplace, Chinese university students learning Korean as a third language in the United States, US Foreign Service Officers learning Japanese, students in neoliberal educational environments, and learners across the world linked by technology-mediated tasks. The range of educational environments also includes Vietnam, Iran, Ukraine, Spain, Mexico, and Chile. The book is further marked by an inclusive diversity of outstanding authors, including PhD students, full professors, methodologists, educators, applied linguists, materials designers, theoreticians, and empirical researchers.

The Use of Popular Cultural Products in Language Learning: A Case Study of Japanese Language Students in Malaysian Public Universities

Language teaching and learning has become easier with the advent of the internet and the rapid pace of information technology. If in the 1990s, teachers or instructors still used face-to-face medium in language teaching, but little by little, the function of educators is declining in the classroom or lecture room. Some students have already learned this language and can communicate in Japanese by watching anime and reading manga. They have already gained the skills to listen and understand the meaning of some catchy vocabulary and phrases. When they take Japanese language courses at university, learning to recognize writing, pronunciation, grammar, and conversation become more accessible and more exciting. This paper aims to identify Japanese popular culture products that can be used for learning purposes. Two surveys distributed through Google Form were involved in this study, namely 2020 and 2021 and one hard copy survey in 2018. The findings show that in addition to anime and manga, students also use computer games, Seiyu and VTuber as Japanese language learning tools. The students can minimize conventional face-to-face learning hours with the teacher and use their own space and time without reducing learning Japanese.

The Illusion of Progress in Students’ Fluency - A Longitudinal Study of Students’ Monologic Speech over an Academic Year

This paper takes on the issue of student’s monologic speech, examining differences in fluency, production over levels of proficiency (as represented by TOEIC scores), as well as how this speech improves over an academic year. The data, which is based on the speech of 12 participants, was taken from the corpus Monologic and Dialogic Corpus 2019 has 20,368 words, and 42 subjects, whereas the second corpus Monologic and Dialogic Corpus 2020 has 16,997 words and 29 participants. Research questions focused on describing the speech in monologues of higher and lower proficiency Japanese EFL learners in regards to the fluency variables of speaking time, articulation rate, mean length runs (MLRs), number of words and percentage of silence, as well as investigating how acoustic, lexical and syntactical dysfluency might change over the year. Results showed that the mean time of monologue speech was higher in the high-proficiency group than in the low proficiency group in 2019 and 2020, but this difference was not statistically significant. In the high-proficiency group there was a significant difference between 2019 and 2020 in meaningless syllables whereas all the other acoustic, lexical, and syntactical dysfluency variables showed no significant difference over the academic year 2019/2020. Further research will be conducted on how direct feedback might impact students’ output.

How Prior Knowledge Affects Visual Attention of Japanese Mimicry and Onomatopoeia and Learning Outcomes: Evidence from Virtual Reality Eye Tracking

According to the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 4, “achieving inclusive and quality education for all”, foreign language learning has come to be seen as a process of integrating sustainable development into the socio-cultural aspects of education and learning. The aim of this study was to employ virtual reality (VR) eye tracker to examine how students with different levels of prior knowledge process visual behaviors for Japanese Mimicry and Onomatopoeia (MIO) while learning Japanese as a second foreign language. A total of 20 students studying at the Department of Applied Japanese at the university of Southern Taiwan were recruited. Based on the Japanese language proficiency test (JLPT) level, 20 participants were divided into high prior knowledge group (levels N1–N3) with 7 participants, and low prior knowledge group (level N4 or below) with 13 participants. The learning stimuli materials were created by Unreal Engine 4 (UE4) development tool to design a 3D virtual MIO paradise, including 5 theme amusement parks. Through a VR eye tracker, participants’ visual behaviors were tracked and recorded based on 24 different regions of interest (ROIs) (i.e., ROI1–ROI24). This was done to discuss the distribution of visual attention in terms of different ROIs of each theme amusement park based on four eye movement indicators, including latency of first fixation (LFF), duration of first fixation (DFF), total fixation durations (TFD), and fixation counts (FC). Each ROI of the two groups were then compared. In addition, a heat zone map was also generated to show the overall visual distribution of each group. After the experiment, based on the eye movement indicators and test scores in the pre-test and post-test phases, statistical analysis was used to examine and evaluate the differences in visual attention and learning outcomes. The results revealed that the gaze sequences of the two prior knowledge groups gazing at the ROIs in theme parks were different, except for the gaze sequence in the circus theme park. Different prior knowledge groups exhibited differences in visual attention in the ROIs fixated on in each amusement park. Additionally, in terms of TFD and FC of different groups in each amusement park, there was no significant difference except in ROI10, ROI16, and ROI18. Moreover, after receiving cognitive comprehension processes introduced in the VR-simulated MIO scenes, students from both groups achieved higher post-test scores compared with pre-test scores, and such differences had statistical significance. In conclusion, the implications of VR eye movement analysis on developing students’ competence related to learning Japanese and cross-cultural aspects, compatible with sustainable development, were presented.

Structure Mapping in Second-Language Metaphor Processing

ABSTRACT This study investigated metaphor processing in a second language (L2) by considering both analogy and categorization. Previous studies found that forward metaphors (e.g., “Some babies are angels”) were judged as to be more comprehensible than reversed metaphors (e.g., “Some angels are babies”) only when the sentences were presented for a long time. Based on this finding, structure mapping theory (SMT) was proposed, which posits that metaphor processing in a first language (L1) requires both the analogical alignment of nouns and categorization of the second noun. To assess SMT in L2, we tested Japanese learners of English using the following three experiments: an on-line comprehensibility judgment task, an on-line self-paced reading task, and an off-line rating task. We replicated SMT by observing a significant interaction between the viewing duration and sentence type (forward and reversed). We also identified the possibility that bilingual speakers rely on analogical alignment more than native speakers.