2017/2018 Semester I JS2203 Sound, Grammar and Meaning

Venue: AS6/0212
Time: Monday 10:00-13:00
Lecturer: Dr. Emi Morita
Email: jpsme@nus.edu.sg
Office: AS8/05-10
Tel: 6516-6641
Consultation hour: by appointment

Pre-requisite:
LAJ2201 or pass in JLPT level N5 (the old Level 4) or placement test

Course objectives:
This course examines the linguistic structure of Japanese, and in particular, its phonetics (sounds),
phonology (sound structure), morphology (word structure), syntax (sentence structure) and writing
system. The goal of the course is to gain an in-depth understanding of how the Japanese language is
structured through the detailed investigation of different aspects of Japanese.

Textbooks:
Iwasaki, Shoichi (2013). Japanese. Revised Edition. Amsterdam, John Benjamins.
Tsujimura, Natsuko (2007). Introduction to Japanese Linguistics. Oxford, Blackwell.

Assessment and Grades:

Participation (5%), Homework (15%), Quizzes (30%), Project (20%), Final Exam (30%)

Requirements:
1. Each class will consist of a combination of lecture and exercises. Students are required to read all
the assigned materials prior to the beginning of each days class and participate in class
discussions actively. Active participation on IVLE discussion forum is also a part of your
participation grade.

2. For the exercise sections, we will discuss the problem sets that have been given as homework.
You should bring 2 copies of your homework. You will need one to discuss the homework, and
one to submit to the lecturer at the beginning of the class. Late submission is not accepted.

3. There will be two quizzes during the semester.

Quiz 1 (Sep 11) covers from Writing System up to Phonology (1)
Quiz 2 (Oct 9) covers up to Word (1)

4. In addition, students will conduct a project on Japanese linguistics. The focus of the project will
be some aspect of the Japanese language that we discuss in this course that has been shown to
be difficult to acquire for foreign students (and other non-native speakers of Japanese who are
not linguistics majors!). Your task is to design a lesson to help Japanese language learners to
improve their skills in this selected area. You will then present your project to the class.
Depending on the size of the class, you may work in pairs.

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 Submit your group project topic and focus on IVLE by Sep 29. The project topic must be
approved by the instructor by Oct 9.

Presentation (Nov 6 & 13) Each group has 20 minutes to present (it may vary according to
the class size).
--- explain the linguistic problem and provide exercises to overcome this problem.
The purpose of your lesson can be to:
Improve perception of some linguistic feature
Improve production of correct form
Increase awareness of a certain linguistic phenomenon

Written report (due on Nov 15, 5 pm) Length: max.1500 words. Use font size 12 of Times or
the equivalent. The report is about your findings, i.e., usable knowledge, explanation, rules
for the problem. The intended audience is your fellow classmate of this module. It should
increase their existing knowledge of issue and has practical applications.

Each project will be graded based on the following criteria:

Lesson presentation
Organization Presentation logically structured
Main points made clear
Good time management
Content Helpful information and tips for the class
Good explanation using linguistic terms correctly
Effective exercises
Helpful hand-outs, visual aids and/or multimedia
Communication Interesting and engaging manner
Skills Involving the whole class
Good management of discussion (avoiding long silence)

Written Report
Main content Description of the problem is clear
Proper analysis
Applicability of the solution to the practice
Originality Includes original research
Strength of arguments
Mastery of Uses linguistic terms correctly
subject matter Degree of mastering the topic
Style & Structure Grammar and spelling
Paper has an appropriate title and is logically structured
Follows academic writing style (reference, citation, etc.)

Topics and Readings (Subject to change):

Week 1 (Aug 14) Introduction / Writing Systems
Reading: Iwasaki: Chapter 1 Overview pp. 1-17
Chapter 2 Writing system pp. 18-28

2
Week 2 (Aug 21) Phonetics
Reading: Tsujimura: 2 Phonetics pp. 5-22
Iwasaki: Chapter 3 Sounds pp. 29-39

Week 3 (Aug 28) Phonology (1)

Reading: Tsujimura: 3 Phonology pp. 23-63
Iwasaki: Chapter 3 Sounds pp.39-42

Week 4 (Sep 4) Phonology (2)

Reading: Tsujimura: 3 Phonology pp. 64-80
Iwasaki: Chapter 3 Sounds pp. 42-49

Week 5 (Sep 11) Quiz 1

Phonology (3)/Intonation
Reading: Tsujimura: 3 Phonology. pp. 90-124
Iwasaki: Chapter 3 Sounds pp. 49-53

Week 6 (Sep 18) Phonology (4)/Word (1) Onomatopoeic expressions

Reading: Tsujimura: pp.93-98
Iwasaki: Chapter 4 Words pp. 68-72

(Sep 25) Mid-term break

Week 7 (Oct 2) Words (2)

Reading: Iwasaki: Chapter 4 Words pp. 54-68, 72-77
Email your project topic (topic and focus) to the instructor by Sep 29

Week 8 (Oct 9) Quiz 2

Morphology (1)
Reading: Iwasaki: Chapter 5 Morphology pp. 78-90

Week 9 (Oct 16) Morphology (2)

Reading: Iwasaki: Chapter 5 Morphology pp. 90-103

Week 10 (Oct 23) Group Project Consultation

Week 11 (Oct 30) Syntax

Reading: Iwasaki: Chapter 8 passive, spontaneous, potential pp. 153-168

Week 12 (Nov 6) Student Presentation (1)

Week 13 (Nov 13) Student Presentation (2) Written report due: Nov 15, 5:00pm

November 28 9 am Final Exam