We will meet on Wednesday, November 18, 1:30-2:30pm in Herbst 338. We are pleased to announce a talk by Satoshi Tomioka (University of Delaware):

Anaphoric bare nouns: Not all of them are definite descriptions

In some of the languages in which (in)definiteness is not obligatorily marked, bare common nouns can be used anaphorically. Such an instance of bare noun is commonly regarded as an anaphoric definite description — e.g., During my office hours, a student came to see me. I asked the student to wait for a couple of minutes. Contrary to this general consensus, I argue, inspired by the intuition reported in Minjoo Kim’s 2023 JEAL paper, that some instances of anaphoric bare nouns, ones in Japanese in particular, are used as if they were proper names. More concretely, anaphoric bare nouns are directly referential based on the speaker’s private naming conventions. I will demonstrate the distributional patterns of anaphoric bare nouns in Japanese that would be left unaccounted for under the definite description thesis. I further hypothesize that the availability of anaphoric bare nouns is tied to the lack of ‘repeated name penalty’.

We will meet on Wednesday, November 11, 1:30-2:30pm in SSH 338. Yurie Hara (University of Hokkaido, Japan) will present her work on the language of manga.

Title: Who Speaks Like a Manga Character? A Game-Theoretic Account of Role Language in Japanese Manga and Anime

Abstract: Why can a few words make a fictional character sound like a wise old man, an aristocratic lady, or a macho man? Japanese manga and anime offer a striking case: linguistic forms known as yakuwarigo ‘role language’ evoke recognizable personae even when uncommon among their real-world counterparts. Fiction may facilitate these associations because creators and audiences share an understanding that language contributes to characterization, while visual and narrative cues help audiences learn form–persona pairings. The following expressions all convey ‘Yes. I know that.’, while evoking different personae:

I propose a two-stage account combining social representativeness with repeated signaling. Representativeness explains why a less frequent form can be selected over more frequent alternatives: it distinguishes the intended persona more clearly. Repeated coordination between creators and audiences can then strengthen this association. Kinsui’s historical account of elderly male role language—from conservative western Japanese forms associated with older scholars to their use in eighteenth-century kabuki and fiction—is qualitatively consistent with these stages. A signaling-game model illustrates this amplification; an extension predicts that established conventions are especially useful with limited narrative exposure, whereas greater exposure can support individualized voices. The account explores how social meaning
becomes convention, using Japanese fiction as a case study of a broader process.