日英語対照研究 : 英語の語順に関する一考察

概要

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In this paper I intend to make clear the characteristics of word-order in English and Japanese. In present English, inflections have almost disappeared and other means of expressing grammatical relations have been devised. This means of expression is called "analysis" and is used to state the relations once expressed by verbal terminations by separate words of an abstract character. As a result of this, the fixed word-order of "actor-action-goal" construction in statements -the most common sentence type in English- was established in early English. It is well known that the basic structure of modern English is SVO, where-as Japanese is SOV and that there is a mirror image in the basic word-order between English and Japanese. But we can not find a complete mirror image between them, because English word-order is basically SVO, but, it still preserves some ancient characteristics of SOV. As a general rule, old English had the verb after its object. As the inflections of English faded, the English word-order became more and more fixed. This shows that the verb of English in SVO construction is nearer its subject than its object and that the use of the English verb for the object is more "subjective" although that of the Japanese verb for the object is "objective". Therefore, we may say from this evidence that the use of the English verb in SVO construction is more "dynamic" and that that of the Japanese verb is "static".
東海大学の論文
2000-03-10