Title An analysis of なんか in Japanese conversation Sub Title Author Kim, Angela A-Jeoung Publisher 慶應義塾大学日本語・日本文化教育センター Publication 2011 year Jtitle 日本語と日本語教育 No.39 (2011. 3) ,p.1- 35 Abstract Notes 論文 Genre Departmental Bulletin Paper URL http://koara.lib.keio.ac.jp/xoonips/modules/xoonips/detail.php?koar a_id=AN00189695-20110300-0001 Powered by TCPDF (www.tcpdf.org) 慶應義塾大学 日本語(cid:3)日本文化教育センタ(cid:4)紀要 (cid:5)日本語と日本語教育(cid:6) 39: 1(cid:2)35(2011.3) An analysis of なんか in Japanese conversation Angela A-Jeoung KIM 1. Introduction As a part of cross-linguistic contrastive analysis, the current study examines the functions and meanings of the Japanese marker なんか in conversation. Aswillbenotedshortly,なんかhasafewmeaningsandusagesascribedtoit in the dictionaries and grammar books. Unlike its most frequent definition being an informal form of both など(cid:2) ‘or, etc., such as’ and なにか(cid:2) ‘something,anything’, なんかdoesnotalwayscarrysuchameaninginareal conversation. This paper examines the function of なんか in conversation data. Although なんか has also been described as a filler (Maynard 1990: 259), and as a hedge (Lauwereyns 2002), Tagliamonte points out that when usedinconversation,fillers,hesitationmarkers,orhedgesare“nothaphazard, random or indiscriminate. Instead, their patterns of use are quite circum- scribedandlinguisticallydefined”(Tagliamonte2005:1896). Thisimpliesthat suchmarkersserveaspecificfunctioninconversationdiscourse(seeSchi#rin 1987; Clark and Fox Tree 2002; Tagliamonte 2005; Schourup 1985;»Ostman 1981). Inthispaper,IwilldemonstratethatなんかinJapanesealsoexhibits the specific environments where it is used. By identifying the particular environment where なんか is likely to occur, as well as its collocation with othermarkersandexpressions,thecurrentstudyattemptstoshedlightonthe discoursefunctionofなんかashavingafunctionbeyondthatofmerefilleror hedgeandameaningthatdeviatessignificantlyfromthatgivenindictionaries. 2 The data used for this study consists of approximately 30minutes of audio-tapedface-to-faceconversationbynative speakers.1 Theconversations were between friends, both male and female, and were recorded in a casual setting. Alltheparticipantsintherecordingwereintheirtwentiesatthetime ofrecording,andhadeithercompletedanundergraduatedegree,orwerestill studying at undergraduate or postgraduate level. The participants were born and raised in Japan, and had received formal education in Japan at least up until the age of seventeen. The data was collected in Canberra through a network of friends.2 The 30minutes of data contained a total numberof93 cases ofなんか(cid:2) 2. Backgroundandpreviousstudies According to Japanese-Japanese dictionaries, なんか is found under two separate entries (cid:3)三省堂国語辞典 1982: 814; 国語大辞典 1980: 1858; 広辞 林1991: 1493(cid:4) orunderoneentrywithtwodi#erentusages (cid:3)岩波国語辞典 1982: 828; 国語大辞典言泉1989: 1745; 新明解国語辞典2007: 1118(cid:4)(cid:2)One is as an informal spoken form of など(cid:5) ‘and so forth, and (or) the like, et cetera’, which is an adverbial particle, used to present an example among a groupofthings. Theotherisas aninformalspokenformofなにか(cid:5) ‘some, any, something, anything’, whichisacompoundwordofaninterrogativeな に(cid:5) ‘what’andか(cid:5) aquestionmarker. (1)and(2)belowareexamplesofthe two entries of なんか(cid:2)Unless otherwise stated, all the examples are in Japa- nese. Thetranslationswere addedbythisauthor. (1) 卵ななんんかかお好きですか(cid:6) (cid:3)国語大辞典言泉1989:1745(cid:4) ‘Doyoulikesomethinglikeeggs?’ 3 (2) ななんんかか食べる(cid:2) (cid:3)国語大辞典1980:1858(cid:4) ‘(Doyouwant to) eat something?’ In addition to the above, detailed meanings, functions and usage of なんか foundindictionariesandgrammarbooksincludeitsfunctionasatopicmarker (cid:3)益岡(cid:5)田窪 1998: 50; メイナ(cid:6)ド2005: 329(cid:4) especially used for belittling (cid:3)Martin 1987: 161; 国語大辞典 1980: 1858; 国語大辞典言泉 1989: 1745; 日本語大辞典 1989: 1458; 庵 2001: 367; Kaiser et al. 2001: 264(cid:4) or emphasizing(Maynard1990:30;Kaiser et al. 2001:264). Closely related to thismeaningofなんかisameaningofhumblingoneselfwhenusedaboutthe speaker (cid:3)友村2007: 281; Kaiseretal.2001:264(cid:4)(cid:7)(3)and(4)representthe use of なんか as a topic marker, used in a belittling sense, and showing the speaker’smodesty,respectively. (3) こんなくだらない本ななんんかか読むな(cid:8) (cid:3)仁田1982:408(cid:4) ‘Don’tread suchatrashybook’ (4) わたしななんんかか何もお手伝いできなくて(cid:8)すみません(cid:8)(cid:3)友村2007:281(cid:4) ‘Sorry. Someonelikemecannotdoanythingtohelp’ Further,なんかhasbeendescribedascarryingthemeaningofなんとなく(cid:9) ‘somehow’ (cid:3)砂川1998: 413; Kaiseretal.2001:264(cid:4)(cid:9)orなぜかわからない が(cid:9) ‘withoutknowingwhy’ (cid:3)砂川1998:413(cid:4) when“modifyingapredicate” (Kaiseretal.2001:265)orexpressingastateofa#airs (cid:3)砂川1998:413(cid:4)(cid:7) It has also been claimed as functioning as “a filler in conversation” (Maynard 1990: 129), meaning ‘uhh(cid:10)’ (Maynard 1990: 259). Examples (5) and (6) showthe use ofなんかto mean‘somehow’and‘uh’(cid:7) 4 (5) あの人の言ってること(cid:2)ななんんかか変だと思いませんか(cid:3) (cid:4)砂川1998:413(cid:5) ‘Don’tyouthinkwhat heissayingissomehowstrange?’ (6) いいねえ(cid:2) ななんんかか(cid:2) キャンディ(cid:6)とか出るんでしょ? (Maynard1990:421) ‘That’sgood,uh,candies orsomethingare served,right?’ Summarizingtheabove,itcanbesaidthatなんかisaspokenformthatisused asatopicmarkerthatexpressesabelittlingorhumbling,asin‘such(aperson, thing etc.) as’, and other meaning such as ‘and so forth, and (or) the like, et cetera’,‘somehow’,‘something,anything’,‘withoutknowingwhy’,and‘uhh(cid:7)’. Inadditiontotheaforementionedstudies,Maynard(2000)hasdescribed thefunctionsofnan(i)extensively,as (cid:8)an‘anti-sign’referringtounspeakable moments of language” (Maynard 2000: 1209) with various functions in discourse. Alsotreatingなにasawhole,メイナ(cid:6)ド(2009:10)positsthatな にmaybeusedbythespeakertoexpressdissatisfactionordisagreementwith theinterlocutor,butalsotoexpressdependencyoraninterpersonalcloseness. Elsewhere,メイナ(cid:6)ド(2001:302)hashintedatthepossibleuseofなんかas a discourse strategy for a softened or indirect expression. However, these studiesdonotdiscussthe functionsofなんかperse. Anintriguingfactisthattherearemarkersinotherlanguagesthat seem toshareanumberofsimilaritieswithなんかinJapanese. Intermsoflocation, aswellaswithregardtosomeofthefunctions,なんかissimilartomarkersin English such as just, like, and you know, as well as mak ( ) in Korean. AmongtheseIfoundsuchstrikingsimilaritiesespeciallybetweenthefunctions of English like claimed bySchourup(1985) andなんか(cid:9) My analysisinthe current paper owes much to Schourup (1985). Schourup mentions that like 5 hascaseswhichcannotbeadequatelycharacterisedwithdictionarymeanings providedforthemarker. Schouruphasfoundcasesoflikeprecedinganexact numeral expression as well as like preceding obviously inexact formulations. Hepointsoutthatthefunctionoflikeforthe formeris“to constitute akind of hedge, attenuating the overexactness ofthe speaker’s chosenformulation” (Schourup1985:42). Whilesuggesting‘approximately’asaplausiblereading oflikeforthelatter,Schourup(1985:42)notesthatitistoindicatethat“the speakerisawarethatwhatfollowsisanimpreciserenderingofwhats/hehas in mind”. According to Schourup (1985: 48) the approximative meaning of likeisalsoapplicablewhenlikeisusedafterquestions. Schourup(1985)goes on to show the instances of likewhichare usedtointroducedirect discourse andpointoutthatsuchfunctionoflikeisthespeaker’sexpressionof“whatI amabouttoreportislikewhatIorsomeoneelsehasinmind”(Schourup1985: 44). Inadditiontotheuseoflikeasahedge,mentionedabove,mostrelevant tothecurrentstudyisSchourup’s(1985)examinationofthecaseswherelike means‘forexample’andwherelikeisusedasaninterjection. Schourup(1985: 49) comments that the ‘for example’ reading is “strongly reinforced by context” and presents examples which contain expressions such as ‘oh’, ‘for instance’,and‘orother(cid:2)uhthingslikethat’inadditiontolike. Hecontinues that the ‘for example’ reading suggests “anaccurate butselective representa- tion”,arguingthatthisreading“shouldbepossibleinanycasewhereselectiv- ity of report is conceivably the nature of the discrepancy” (Schourup 1985: 50). Finding cases where ‘for example’ meaning are inadequate, Schourup isolates the use of like in specific distributional environments and calls those forms as pausal interjection. He points out that like as a pausal interjection occursbeforeproblematicdescriptiveterms,restart,filledandunfilledpauses, andalsoatthebeginningofaclauseaftersomeprefatorymaterial. Schourup 6 believes that where like is a pausal interjection a substantial contribution is madetotheutteranceasitsuggest (cid:2)thematerialabouttofollowisdi$cultto formulateappropriatelyorprecisely”(Schourup1985:56),whileat the same timeindicating“anattemptatexpressionratherthanafailureofcommunica- tion” (Schourup 1985: 63). All in all, the meaning and function of like according to Schourup (1985) serve to indicate a “possible discrepancy be- tweenwhatthespeakerhasinmindandwhatisovertlysaid”(Schourup1985: 62). Thefrequencyoftheoccurrenceoflikewiththesefunctions,heargues, canbeexplainedbythespontaneousnatureoftheconversationwherespeakers “frequently find themselves in the position of having to formulate what they havetosaywithouttimefortheconsideredeloquence”(Schourup1985:61). The function of なんか seems similar to some extent to the function of like mentionedabove,as willbe presented below. 3. Analysis If なんか is a filler and used frequently in a spoken discourse, it may be assumedthatなんかisusedasadelaysignal. Assumingthatなんかisadelay signal, it is reasonable to consider that the use of the marker indicates some kind of problem on the part of the speaker, one specific to spontaneous language. Assumingthatなんかindicatesthespeaker’sdi$cultyinformulat- ingutterance,Iexaminedthepositionofなんかwithrespecttopauseorother signs that indicate delay. Interestingly but unsurprisingly, the data showed that59%(55occurrencesoutof93intotal)ofなんかweredirectlyrelatedto delays. As(a)and(b)inTable(1)showなんかwasfoundtobeimmediately preceded by or immediately followed by either afilledand/orunfilledpause. Unfilled pauses here include markers such as あの and まあ(cid:3)あ(cid:4) which are knownas fillersinJapanese (Backhouse1993;ano:Cook1993). Therewere 7 also cases where なんか was both preceded, and followed by filled and/or unfilledpausesasin(c). Ascanbeseenin(d),なんかwerealsofoundwith fillersthatare‘multi-worditems’(Backhouse1993:180)andexpressionsthat explicitly indicate the speaker’s problematicstate inchoosingaword/phrase. According to Clark and Fox Tree (2002: 82), prolonging syllables by the speaker can be understood as a sign of delay. なんか was also found to be preceded by the lengthening of the last syllable of a word (which are not interjections)andarestart. Aswillbeshownwithexamples,theseinstancesof なんか were found in contexts where the speaker appeared to be facing di$cultyinformulatingutterancesinanappropriateway.However,onemajor di#erence between なんか in the current data and like in Schourup’s (1985) dataisthatitwasrareforliketobeprecededbyapause,whereasforなんか itappeared to be preceded byapause as often asit was followedbyone. Table1 なんかco-occurringwithdelays Numberof Positionofなんか Details Occurrences (a) なんか(cid:2) (a)-1 なんか... 19 filled/unfilledpauses (a)-2 なんかあの 5 (b) Filled/unfilledpauses (b)-1 ...なんか 13 (cid:2)なんか (b)-2 まあ(cid:3)あ(cid:4)なんか 2 (c) Filled/unfilledpauses (c)-1 ...なんか... 1 (cid:2)なんか(cid:2)filled/unfilled (c)-2 まあなんかあの 1 pauses (c)-3 ...やなんかまああ 1 (d) なんかwith (d)-1 (...)explicitexpressionsof 2 expressionsthatexplicitly probleminformulation/multi-word indicatethespeaker’s filler(cid:2)なんか problematicstatein (d)-2 なんか(cid:2)explicitproblematic 2 choosingword/phrase expressions (e) Lengthened (e) Lengtheningoflastsyllableofa 8 word/restart(cid:2)なんか word(whicharenotinterjections)/ restart(cid:2)なんか 8 Note that (c) was extracted foravoidingdoublecountingforcategories (a) and (b). Sincethe instances in(c) are bothpreceded andfollowedbya pause, they could, in fact, have been categorized into either (a) or (b), had therebeenonlyoneexistingcategory. Inadditiontotheabove,therearecases of なんか which are not immediately associated with a pause. It seems that these cases of なんか may be used to say ‘for example’ and to hedge as summarizedinTable(2). Table(2) alsoincludesthe occurrences ofなんか withitscontextual meaningasdescribedindictionaries. Table2 Instanceswhere なんかisnotimmediatelyprecededorfollowedbya pause. Numberof Useofなんか Details Occurrences (f) ‘Forexample’use Reinforced by the context, often used 12 with other expressions to reinforce the interpretation (g) Hedge Softeningtheexactnessofaword/ 16 phrase (h) Dictionarymeaning (h)-1 など 2 (h)-2 なに(cid:3)か 4 (h)-3 (cid:4)(cid:5)と(cid:6) かなんか 5 In the examples below, where more than one なんか occurs in one example,thetargetinstanceofなんかisunderlinedinboththetranscriptand the translation. ((aa))--11 ななんんかか...... (7) (Talking about gaining weights while studying overseas, A was being asked whether other students around her were saying they had also gainedweight) A: あ(cid:2)ななんんかか......やっぱり いちキロぐらい増え いち にキロぐらいみ 9 んな増えてるのかな ‘Yeah. Nanka... one kilo, one or two, everyone has probably gained oneortwo kilos’ (8) (Talkingaboutcheese andwine) E: うん(cid:2) だからななんんかか......その日によっ(cid:3) その日に 自分で味わって も違うんだろうけれども やっぱ(cid:4) あの(cid:5)チ(cid:6)ズによっ(cid:3) を食べる とこう味がちょっと変わって感じられることがある(cid:7)かもしれま せん ‘Yeah.Andsonanka(cid:8)dependingonthe(cid:3),evenifonetastesitonthe same day, the taste (of wine) could be di#erent, but well, cheese, dependingon(cid:3)ifcheeseiseatentogether,maybethewinecouldonce againtaste di#erent’ (9) (Afterhearingthattheinterlocutor,whoisattendingagraduateschool oflinguistics,didhistoryat anundergraduatelevel) M: あ(cid:5)それ(cid:3)でもななんんかか......なんで言語学 ‘Oh(cid:5),that(cid:3) butnanka(cid:8)whylinguistics?’ (10) (After finding out that the interlocutor, who has been talking much aboutwine sofarhadattended awineschoolinthe past) A: わ(cid:5)すごいななんんかか......ワインスク(cid:6)ルっていどれぐらい通うとそ れぐらいの知識が((utterances omitted)) ‘Oh(cid:5), great. Nanka...howhowlongdoyouhave toattend awine school(to gain)suchknowledge?’ As seen from (7) to (10), these are the cases in which なんか is directly