On The Special Classifiers In Japanese Proverbs

In Japanese,such sentences as "さめ,この一冬をここでしっかり頑張るぞ。(新田次潤を与えてくれたものはその時の悲しさでした。(《心》)"exist,among which "一冬","一刺し","一滴" and other classifiers are included."冬","刺し"are a noun and renyoukei of a verb separately and are occasionally used as classifiers.Though "滴" is a classifier,it is mainly used to measure liquid,for example,"一滴の水".It's uncommon for it to be used with "潤" in the above sentence.These classifiers such as "冬","刺し", "滴"are called the special classifiers which comprise two types:the abnormal usage of regular classifiers and occasionally borrowing words from other part of speech.Through sorting out special classifiers in KotowazaDaijiten,the dictionary with highest authority in Japan and analyzing their classifications,structure features,rhetoric functions,causations and cognition mechanisms,this paper finally finds out the nature of the special classifiers, namely,their cognition mechanism and causation.In general,the special classifiers can be classified into two types,among which one is transformed from regular classifiers and the other comes from non-classifiers.The special classifiers come from regular classifiers are called the specialization of regular classifiers, that is,classifier which is used with certain word is occasionally used to collocate another word in some context.This kind of classifiers must have semantic connection with words that used with them,which can make the collocation of the two words natural,harmonious and expressive.The second type is come from non-classifier.Here,non-classifiers refer to nouns,verbs and adjectives with certain qualifications.There are two special structure features of the special classifiers in the proverbs.First, there are two or more than two special classifiers in one proverb;second,there are only two special classifiers,which can form a yojijukugo in one proverb.Generally speaking,measuring function of the special classifiers is weakening,while the rhetoric function is strengthening,which are mainly represented in the use of simile, exaggeration,移就,metonymy,contrast in semantics and antithesis and parallelism in form. The produce of the special classifiers is first due to history development and culture spreading.From the perspective of history development,the special classifiers comprise three types:Chinese,Japanese and foreign special classifiers.Culture spreading includes domestic and foreign culture spreading.China's history development has a great influence upon the special classifiers in Japanese.In addition,the need of transmitting information and language expression and the psychological need to know things are other two reasons.The most remarkable cognition mechanism reflected by the special classifiers is metaphor.Though they also have a function of measuring,large quantity of examples demonstrate that their functions of visualization are emphasized while their function of measuring is weakening,the essence of which is to visualize images with quantity.In terms of structure,phrases contains the special classifiers are simple and effective in expressiveness with little words.In terms of characteristic,when normal classifier and non-classifier are used as special specifies,reader's aesthetic interest are attracted to these special classifier,making things more vivid and strengthening their function of visualization.In nature,the special classifiers are outcomes of the mechanism of metaphor. When there is a similarity between two things,metaphor exists.Metaphor is also the result of interaction between the noun and the special classifiers.When the original meaning of the special classifiers is weakened by syntax and part of the meaning is transferred to nouns that they modified,metaphor then can be produced.Through the research,it's hoped to fill the gap of systematic research on the special classifiers and to make due contribution to the language study field.It's also hoped to arouse the interests and attention of Japanese researchers and learners so as to make a more complete,thorough and specific research on Japanese classifiers.