The Fifth Tohoku Conference on Global Japanese Studies
KOMORIYA Satone
This presentation investigates Learning occurs in social practice through interactions with a variety of things such as community, practice, and people. Learning is not just about memorizing knowledge or improving knowledge-processing skills. Instead of considering the knowledge acquired by the learner as learning. This study focuses on the process of learning. In this study, participants learning in an
online community is considered as the process of identity formation shaped by the interactions with other participants and the community itself. This study aims to reveal participants learning based on (a) how they interacted with one another during the activities and (b) how their participation was shaped throughout the activities. An online community platform was designed for Japanese language learners where they can interact in Japanese with native speakers of Japanese and learners of Japanese languages from other countries. Each session primarily consisted of the following two activities: topics (e.g.,Culture) and games (e.g., The word association game). The activities were conducted online and were recorded with participants consent. In addition to the recorded data, the researcher's observation of the participants, questionnaire survey, transcription of interview survey was also used to analyze participants learning. The analysis used ethnographic research and a case study method was implemented to describe the learning process in detail. The analysis revealed that the participant was learning while changing his attitude of participation. This study will present a case study on how the
participant changed his identity and describe his learning through the activities in the community.
online community is considered as the process of identity formation shaped by the interactions with other participants and the community itself. This study aims to reveal participants learning based on (a) how they interacted with one another during the activities and (b) how their participation was shaped throughout the activities. An online community platform was designed for Japanese language learners where they can interact in Japanese with native speakers of Japanese and learners of Japanese languages from other countries. Each session primarily consisted of the following two activities: topics (e.g.,Culture) and games (e.g., The word association game). The activities were conducted online and were recorded with participants consent. In addition to the recorded data, the researcher's observation of the participants, questionnaire survey, transcription of interview survey was also used to analyze participants learning. The analysis used ethnographic research and a case study method was implemented to describe the learning process in detail. The analysis revealed that the participant was learning while changing his attitude of participation. This study will present a case study on how the
participant changed his identity and describe his learning through the activities in the community.
An Anthropological Study on Contemporary Representations of Emishi: Local Museums, Civil Groups, and Literary Works
QIU Shijie
In the past, the Tohoku region was considered the outland of Japan, and the people living in the region were associated with the derogatory term "emishi," meaning savage, uncivilized people, and were even represented as "oni(demon)" who harmed
people. Although in the end, Emishi did not become an independent ethnicity, the heterogeneity associated with the Emishi is linked to the Tohoku region and projected into contemporary Japan society. After World War II, historians from local Tohoku, trying to overcome the emperor-centered view of history, began to reevaluate history from the local perspective. From the 1980s, a movement to honor “Aterui”, the leader of the Emishi began, and the history of Aterui as well as the Tohoku region during the Emishi period gradually became known.
This study will focus on the organizations and people involved in the Emishi honoring project, this study will use a variety of research methods, including fieldwork at local museums and civil groups, and analysis of related literary works. This study aims to reveal how is Emishi, as an ancient historical concept, represented in modern Japan, and find out the driving force behind the revival of Emishi.
people. Although in the end, Emishi did not become an independent ethnicity, the heterogeneity associated with the Emishi is linked to the Tohoku region and projected into contemporary Japan society. After World War II, historians from local Tohoku, trying to overcome the emperor-centered view of history, began to reevaluate history from the local perspective. From the 1980s, a movement to honor “Aterui”, the leader of the Emishi began, and the history of Aterui as well as the Tohoku region during the Emishi period gradually became known.
This study will focus on the organizations and people involved in the Emishi honoring project, this study will use a variety of research methods, including fieldwork at local museums and civil groups, and analysis of related literary works. This study aims to reveal how is Emishi, as an ancient historical concept, represented in modern Japan, and find out the driving force behind the revival of Emishi.
The fast activation of phonological information in processing of Katakana: An ERP investigation using masked priming.
KATO Shiori
Contribution of phonological information in reading has been shown by many studies using alphabetic scripts. They have proposed a model of visual word processing in which phonological information is activated after orthographic information. The present research investigated whether the same pattern of relative speed of activation of orthographic and phonological information is observed
in processing of Kana (hiragana and katakana), using priming paradigm and event-related potentials (ERPs) components as indicators. In a paradigm called priming, preceding presentation of a word (prime) influences processing of succeeding word (target). If the prime is the same word as the target, the processing of the target is facilitated and gets easier (repetition priming effect). This is supposed
to be due to the shared information between a prime and a target pre-activates the lexical representation of the target. The present study examined repetition priming effect in two script conditions: samescript and cross-script. In same-script condition, a prime was presented in the same script as the target, so the repetition prime shared orthographic and phonological features with the target. In cross-script
condition, a prime was presented in different script than the target, so the repetition prime and the target shared only phonological feature. In addition, duration of primes was varied (17/33/50 ms), which made it possible to manipulate the progress of activation of orthographical and phonological information induced by primes. This design enabled comparison of activation speed of orthographic
and phonological activation in kana. As a result, the same-script repetition priming effect was not significant at any prime duration, whereas the cross-script repetition priming effect was significant at prime durations of 33 and 50 ms. These results suggest that although phonological information is activated during the processing of Kana, the time course of orthographical and phonological information activation is significantly different from that of alphabets.
in processing of Kana (hiragana and katakana), using priming paradigm and event-related potentials (ERPs) components as indicators. In a paradigm called priming, preceding presentation of a word (prime) influences processing of succeeding word (target). If the prime is the same word as the target, the processing of the target is facilitated and gets easier (repetition priming effect). This is supposed
to be due to the shared information between a prime and a target pre-activates the lexical representation of the target. The present study examined repetition priming effect in two script conditions: samescript and cross-script. In same-script condition, a prime was presented in the same script as the target, so the repetition prime shared orthographic and phonological features with the target. In cross-script
condition, a prime was presented in different script than the target, so the repetition prime and the target shared only phonological feature. In addition, duration of primes was varied (17/33/50 ms), which made it possible to manipulate the progress of activation of orthographical and phonological information induced by primes. This design enabled comparison of activation speed of orthographic
and phonological activation in kana. As a result, the same-script repetition priming effect was not significant at any prime duration, whereas the cross-script repetition priming effect was significant at prime durations of 33 and 50 ms. These results suggest that although phonological information is activated during the processing of Kana, the time course of orthographical and phonological information activation is significantly different from that of alphabets.
WU Xiaofang
Across cultures people construct spatial representations of time. Among the three spatial axes (i.e., sagittal axis, vertical axis, and later axis), sagittal axis is the most frequently employed one to represent past-future temporal relationship across languages. In English, one can “look forward into the future ahead” or “look back on the past behind”, which shows the explicit future-in-front/past-at-back mapping. However, in Japanese, it appears that there are contradictory space-time mappings when analyzing temporal expressions referring to sagittal words (“mae”, “ato”).
In this research, we study how Japanese people conceptualise time on the sagittal axis to find out the influence of spatio-temporal metaphors on their mental time reasoning. An examination of Japanese speakers’ co-speech gestures shows that most Japanese speakers spontaneously perform future-in-front/past-at-back (besides past-in-front/future-at-back) gestures, especially when gestures are accompanying sagittal spatio-temporal metaphors (only a hypothesis at this stage).
In this research, we study how Japanese people conceptualise time on the sagittal axis to find out the influence of spatio-temporal metaphors on their mental time reasoning. An examination of Japanese speakers’ co-speech gestures shows that most Japanese speakers spontaneously perform future-in-front/past-at-back (besides past-in-front/future-at-back) gestures, especially when gestures are accompanying sagittal spatio-temporal metaphors (only a hypothesis at this stage).