Construction of “Men's National Language" in Japan (1868‐1926)

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This paper demonstrates that the notion of “national language (standard Japanese)," established in the early twentieth century in Japan, was, in fact, “men's national language." The first chapter analyzes the arguments for the unification of spoken and written languages. It shows that the notion of “national language" was conceptualized as “men's national language," which could be established by unifying (middle‐class) men's spoken and written languages. The second chapter analyzes how school readers and grammar books incorporated feminine and masculine linguistic features in their descriptions of standard Japanese. The analysis indicates that masculine features were vigorously adopted as standard Japanese, while feminine features were excluded. When feminine features were referred to, they were presented as inappropriate to standard Japanese. In conclusion, I will argue that the notion of “national language" was a gendered ideology constructed by academic metapragmatics.
関東学院大学経済学部教養学会の論文