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Article published In:
The Rise and Development of Evidential and Epistemic Markers
Edited by Silvio Cruschina and Eva-Maria Remberger
[Journal of Historical Linguistics 7:1/2] 2017
► pp. 213–244

Miratives in Japanese

The rise of mirative markers via grammaticalization

| University of Tsukuba
| Tohoku University

The notion of mirativity as a grammatical category separate from evidentiality is controversial, but a certain amount of cross-linguistic evidence speaks for its validity. The aim of this study is to investigate this notion in contemporary and earlier Japanese, which is shown to have mirative constructions: (i) no miratives, (ii) koto miratives, and (iii) lexical miratives. The particles no and koto are polyfunctional, and they have recently gained a mirative function. Lexical miratives are uttered by the younger generation. These findings raise a diachronic issue regarding the emergence of the three mirative constructions. Adopting Cruschina’s (2011) cartographic approach to discourse-related phenomena and the notion of “emotional vocative” offered by Yamada (1936), we argue that what binds the three constructions together is the involvement of the IFocP (Information Focus Phrase) and that their emergences are all explained by grammaticalization paths starting from nominals.

Keywords: information structure, sentence-final particles, formal nouns, semi-lexical categories, grammaticalization
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Mirative constructions in contemporary Japanese
    • 2.1 No miratives and koto miratives: Comparison with evidentials
    • 2.2Lexical miratives as nominal predicates
  • 3.A cartographic approach to Japanese mirative constructions
    • 3.1 Cruschina’s (2011) cartographic approach
    • 3.2Application to Japanese miratives
    • 3.3Summary
  • 4.Diachronic development of Japanese mirative constructions
    • 4.1Grammaticalization of no miratives and koto miratives
    • 4.2Grammaticalization of the lexical mirative based on a copula-less bare adjective
  • 5.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • Abbreviations
  • References
Published online: 23 November 2017
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https://doi.org/10.1075/jhl.7.1-2.09shi
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