Educated Japanese young women's diverse linguistic and social behaviors during the Meiji and Taisho periods (1868--1926) with implications for Japanese language pedagogy

This dissertation takes an historical perspective on so-called "Japanese women's language" (joseigo/onna kotoba) which has been widely categorized as the stereotypical female speech style in Japanese language, as antipodal to "men's language" (danseigo/otoko kotoba). In addition to this historical work, I consider current perspectives of gendered speech styles including "Japanese women's language," investigating how Japanese language learners and instructors perceive these styles and how their perceptions impact upon language pedagogy.;Recent micro-sociolinguistic studies, in contrast to the categorization of gendered speech styles, highlight the within-gender diversity in Japanese women's use of language, focusing particularly on the linguistic innovation associated with non-normative femininity. Moreover, recent studies with macrosociological analysis have focused on power and dominant ideology, identifying a "Japanese women's language" as a media product informed by the creation of a modern women's image during the Meiji government's modernization and language standardization in the early 20th century. During the Meiji and Taisho period (1868-1926), however, what is today considered normative "Japanese women's language" was regarded as unconventional or innovative and was criticized as being coarse and unladylike by educators and linguistic norm-holders.;Taking micro-and macro-social analyses into consideration, this dissertation reveals a discord between the Meiji educators' perceptions of young women's use of innovative language and the media representations of this language. This dissertation focuses on educated young women's real linguistic practices, and therefore takes a different approach from recent studies that have used macrosociological analysis. Specifically, this dissertation investigates educated young women's linguistic innovation and performance of non-normative femininity during the Meiji and Taisho periods (1868-1926), by analyzing their letter-writing in readers' correspondence columns of three women's magazines: Jogaku sekai 'The World of Women's Learning,' Fujin sekai 'The Women's World,' and Reijokai 'Ladies' World.' Through a linkage between micro- and macro-social analyses, this dissertation reveals that innovative language plays a significant role in educated young women's self-expressions and their construction of a subculture through friendship practices, and identifies the similarities in linguistic innovation and performance of non-normative femininity between contemporary young women and educated young women of the Meiji and Taisho periods. In addition, by comparing how innovative language is presented in novels and fiction, I propose dual functions of innovative language; as an expression of a writer's identity as a young and modern female writer, and as a yakuwari-go 'language that fits to a particular character' (Kinsui 2003), including the use of the sentence-final expressions, da wa and no yo, which have been categorized as stereotypical feminine forms in current literature. Furthermore, I present a possible process of the spread, maintenance, and transformation of the sentence-final expressions, da wa and no yo from being viewed as coarse to become the stereotypical women's language, by proposing four social factors: young women's school and dormitory life, mimicry performance, the influence of female students and their culture, and the popularity of female students' use of these forms in public.;This dissertation consists of five chapters. The first chapter provides an outline and introduction of the dissertation. The second chapter looks at previous studies of Japanese language and gender, focusing on how women's use of language has been viewed in both Japanese and Western society. The third chapter is divided into two sections. The first section investigates the historical process of the formation and maintenance of linguistic and social norms by analyzing conduct books, textbooks used in co-educational elementary schools, and readers used in girls' high schools from the late eighteenth to the early part of the twentieth century. The second section examines educated young women's diverse use of language in letter-writing and social behaviors presented in three women's magazines. The fourth chapter investigates, through the use of a questionnaire, how gendered speech patterns, including stereotypical women's language, are perceived by current Japanese language learners and instructors. Based on the analysis of the findings of the questionnaire, this chapter has implications for Japanese language pedagogy. The final chapter presents a summary of this dissertation.