Are There Ambiguity in Japanese? Focusing on Japanese Learning Materials

DOI

10.2991/978-2-38476-152-4_69How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Ambiguity; Meaning Relation; Polysemy; Minna no Nihongo

Abstract

This article seeks to identify the form of ambiguity in Japanese language learning materials and the factors that contribute to meaning ambiguity. The data source was taken from compulsory Japanese language books in universities in Indonesia. It took the two volumes of the book Minna no Nihongo Shokyu Nihongo I and II. The findings indicate that ambiguity in the Japanese language emerges due to words possessing polemic characteristics, leading to multiple possible interpretations. Ambiguity in the Japanese language can develop from the presence of words with many meanings and variations in the interpretation of grammatical structures. Therefore, it may be inferred that multiple instances of semantic ambiguity are present in Japanese language learning resources, particularly in Minna no Nihongo Shokyu 1 and 2. The study's findings encompass five distinct categories that contribute to ambiguity. These categories are identified as follows: syntactic structure variations leading to ambiguity, polysemy as a source of ambiguity, the utilization of specialized expressions resulting in ambiguity, ambiguity arising from cultural context, and ambiguity stemming from pragmatic expressions.

Copyright

© 2023 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

Download article (PDF)

TY  - CONF
AU  - Didik Nurhadi
AU  - Subandi Subandi
AU  - Masilva R. Mael
PY  - 2023
DA  - 2023/12/19
TI  - Are There Ambiguity in Japanese? Focusing on Japanese Learning Materials
BT  - Proceedings of the International Joint Conference on Arts and Humanities 2023 (IJCAH 2023)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 716
EP  - 728
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-152-4_69
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-38476-152-4_69
ID  - Nurhadi2023
ER  -