The alternation of desu/-masu with plain form speech and the constitution of social class in Japanese high school English lessons
This article explores the alternation of honorific language (desu/-masu) and plain form language within English language lessons in Japanese high schools. It argues that, within such educational contexts, alternation of these different ways of speaking are perspective-shifting routines, to which their indexical meanings are related. I suggest that in a liberal arts high school, the alternation of forms amounts to an analytical practice within which desu/-masu highlights abstract knowledge and plain form frames participants’ involvement in imaginary event situations within which the contingent use of English can be theorized. In contrast, in a technical high school, the alternation of forms amounts to an identity problematizing practice, in which desu/-masu indexes a speaker’s intrapersonal distance from typical “school-like” roles and activities, and plain form indexes an authentic, Japanese insider identity in the face of learning English. These different perspective-taking routines socialize very different relationships between self and school, and, in particular, between self and resources such as second language proficiency, and are thus an arena for the reproduction of social class distinctions.
References
Agha, Asif
(
1993)
Grammatical and indexical convention in honorific discourse.
Journal of Linguistic Anthropology 3.2: 131-163.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Bachnik, Jane M., and Charles J. Quinn
(
1994)
Situated Meaning, Inside and Outside in Japanese Self, Society, and Language. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
BoP![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Bernstein, B
(
1971-75)
Class, codes and control, 3 vols. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
BoP ![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Blommaert, Jan
(
1992)
Codeswitching and the exclusivity of social identities: Some data from campus kiswahili.
Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development 13.1-2: 57-70.
BoP![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Brown, Penelope, and Stephen Levinson
(
1987)
Politeness: Some Universals in Language Usage. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Capps, Lisa, and Elinor Ochs
(
1995)
Constructing Panic, The Discourse of Agoraphobia. Harvard University Press.
BoP![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Cook, Haruko Minegishi
(
1996)
The Japanese verbal suffixes as indicators of distance and proximity. In
M. Putz, and
R. Dirven (eds.),
The Construal of Space in Language and Thought. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, pp. 3-27.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Cook, Haruko Minegishi
(
1997)
The role of the Japanese masu form in caregiver-child conversation.
Journal of Pragmatics 281: 695-718.
BoP![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Cook, Haruko Minegishi
(
1998)
Students’ use of the impersonal style in a Japanese elementary school classroom.
Crossroads of Language, Interaction, and Culture 11: 43-58.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Cook, Haruko Minegishi
(
1999)
Situational meanings of Japanese social deixis: The mixed use of the masu and plain forms.
Journal of Linguistic Anthropology 8.1: 87-110.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Cummings, William K
(
1980)
Education and equality in Japan. Princeton University Press.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Dunn, Cynthia D
(
2005)
Pragmatic functions of humble forms in Japanese ceremonial discourse.
Journal of Linguistic Anthropology 15.2: 218-238.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Duranti, Alessandro
(
2009)
The relevance of Husserl’s theory to language socialization.
Journal of Linguistic Anthropology 19.2: 205-226.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Giroux, Henry A
(
1981)
Ideology, Culture and the Process of Schooling. Philadelphia: Temple University Press.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Giroux, Henry A
(
1983)
Theory and Resistance in Education: A Pedagogy for the Opposition. Westport, Connecticut: Bergin & Garvey.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Goto-Butler, Yuko
(
2005)
Comparative perspectives towards communicative activities among elementary school teachers in South Korea, Japan and Taiwan.
Language Teaching Research 9. 4: 423-446.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Husserl, Edmund
(
1989)
Ideas Pertaining to a Pure Phenomenology and to a Phenomenological Philosophy.
Second Book: Studies in the Phenomenology of Constitution.
R. Rojcewicz and
A. Schuwer (trans.), Dordrecht: Kluwer.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Ichikawa, Shogo
(
1991)
Distinctive Features of Japanese Education. NIER Occasional Paper, National Institute for Educational Research.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Ike, Minoru
(
1995)
A historical review of English in Japan (1600-1880).
World Englishes 14: 1.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Ikuta, Shoko
(
1982)
Speech level shift and conversational strategy in Japanese discourse.
Language Sciences Volume 51: 1.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Jones, Kimberly, and Tsuyoshi Ono
Kinsui, Satoshi
(
2002)
The influence of translation upon the historical development of the Japanese language. The UCLA Center for Japanese Studies Colloquium, April 29, 2002.
Kondo, Dorinne
(
1990)
Crafting Selves, Power, Gender, and Discourses of Identity in a Japanese Workplace. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Makino, Seiichi
(
1983)
Speaker/listener-orientation and formality marking in Japanese.
Gengo Kenkyuu 841: 126-145.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Maynard, Senko K
(
1991)
Pragmatics of discourse modality: A case of da and desu/masu forms in Japanese.
Journal of Pragmatics 151: 551-582.
BoP![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Maynard, Senko K
(
1997)
Shifting contexts: The sociolinguistic significance of nominalization in Japanese television news.
Language in Society 261: 381-399.
BoP![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Meacham, Sarah S
(
2004)
Ideological complexity, national subjectivity, and the cultures of English in Tokyo high schools.
Texas Linguistic Forum 471: 97-108, Proceedings of the Eleventh Annual Symposium about Language and Society. Austin.
Meacham, Sarah S
(
2007)
The educational soundscape: Participation and perception in Japanese high school English lessons.
Mind, Culture, and Activity 14.3: 1-20.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Mehan, Hugh
(
1979)
Learning lessons: Social organization in the classroom. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
![DOI logo](https://benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Ochs, Elinor
(
1993)
Indexing Gender. In
B.D. Miller (ed.),
Sex and gender hierarchies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Ochs, Elinor, and Bambi B. Schieffelin
(
1984)
Language acquisition and socialization: Three developmental stories. In
R.A. Shweder, and
R.A. LeVine (eds.),
Culture theory: Essays on mind self, and emotion. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Rogoff, Barbara
(
1990)
Apprenticeship in Thinking, Cognitive Development in Social Context. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Sapir, Edward
(
1924)
Culture, genuine and spurious.
Journal of Sociology 291: 401-429.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Shibatani, Masayoshi
(
1990)
The Languages of Japan. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Willis, Paul
(
1977)
Learning to Labor, How Working Class Kids Get Working Class Jobs. New York: Columbia University Press.
![Google Scholar](https://benjamins.com/logos/google-scholar.svg)
Cited by
Cited by 2 other publications
Garcés-Conejos Blitvich, Pilar & Maria Sifianou
2017.
(Im)politeness and Identity. In
The Palgrave Handbook of Linguistic (Im)politeness,
► pp. 227 ff.
![DOI logo](//benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
Xue, Qianwen
2023.
Exploring the Causes of "Mother Tongue Shame" When Watching Mandarin Dubbing of Non-Native Language Films and TV Programs.
Journal of Education, Humanities and Social Sciences 13
► pp. 152 ff.
![DOI logo](//benjamins.com/logos/doi-logo.svg)
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 14 june 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers.
Any errors therein should be reported to them.