日本語とジェンダー第11号(2011)【 研 究 ノ ー ト 】 	
 You Can’t Just Hang Up—Differences in Japanese Family Phone Conversations
Emiko Kamimoto
Abstract
In studies of phone conversations (Schegloff and Sacks, 1973; Clark & French,1981), where individuals are visually restricted and can only rely on audio signals,
reaching closure is shown to be much harder than in a face-to-face conversation.
Participants cannot simply hang up when they have nothing more to say. They must agree
that they have no more topics to raise. In order to have a smooth conversation ending, we
subconsciously devise ways of reaching proper closure. The purpose of this study is toshow that, in comparison with existing analyses, including studies of English language
phone conversation endings (Schegloff and Sacks, 1973), Japanese data seem to fall in a
general gender pattern, in which men’s closures are more abrupt than women’s closures.
Through analysis of mother-daughter and father-daughter phone conversation endings,
which have not previously been examined in studies of Japanese phone conversations, thispaper shows that while mother-daughter conversations (MDC) and father-daughter
conversations (FDC) exhibited similar patterns in ending conversations, they were
contrastively different in the way each conversation was closed. A mother and daughter,sharing the same gender value pattern, tended to co-construct conversation more easily,
but took longer to reach a closing, as both the mother and her daughter seemed toexperience difficulty in directly moving from “pre-closure” to “closure” in order to bringthe conversation to an end. FDC’s, on the other hand, demonstrated differences in gender
value patterns and were ended by moving from “pre-closure” to “closure” with little
hesitation.
Key Words
Gender, Phone conversation, Conversation ending, Japanese,
1. Introduction
This study explores certain characteristics of Japanese family phone conversations with aparticular focus on the closure.

Specifically, it will compare mother-daughter andfather-daughter conversations recorded on phone calls for approximately one month. The data
indicate three points: (1) Japanese phone conversations are somewhat different from English
conversations; (2) Father-child conversations tend to be shorter than those involving mother-child;(3) Closing sequential patterns are different for the male and female parent.
This study is only exploratory and tentative in its conclusions: it attempts to provide somenatural data of phone conversations between native speakers of Japanese exhibiting differences in86

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日本語とジェンダー第11号(2011)

conversation ending patterns 1 ; it observes several facts referring to analytical categories offered inrecent studies; And finally, it proposes an interpretation that the gender of the participants is amajor factor in phone conversations.

Although this is a limited case study, I believe it is unique

it closely observes Japanese family phone conversation endings and there are a limited number ofJapanese phone conversation ending studies.
2. Review of Literature
2.1. Conversation ending
After

Schegloff

and

Sacks

(1973)

conducted

pioneeringstudiesontelephoneconversations, which examined English telephone conversation data and gave a sequential
organization of talk-in-interaction patterns, much research has been done on phone conversations.
A number of researchers have attempted to examine telephone conversations in other languages
and cultural settings (Pavlidou, 1997, 1998; Luke & Pavlidou, 2002). However, closings of phone
conversations are not as widely studied as conversation openings.
Schegloff and Sacks (1973), Clark and French (1981), and Button (1987, 1990) have eachdeveloped the categorization of conversation closings. Schegloff and Sacks pointed out thatparticipants cannot simply hang up even when they had nothing more to say. They must first agree
that there are no more topics to discuss. Murata (1994) noted that the closing of conversations is“co-operative work” in that it needs both parties’ agreement (p. 91). Indeed, participants in phone
conversations typically construct endings to telephone talk—or, the “closing section” (Schegloff& Sacks, 1973)—by instantiating two sets of closing remarks: pre-closing statements (one foreach interactant) and closing statements (one for each interactant; cf. Clark & French, 1981;
Hashiuchi, 1999). Example 1 is a simple example of a typical telephone conversation closing
section with pre-closing and closing statements.
Example 1: Closing section
A: Well (pre-closing statement)
B: OK (pre-closing agreement)
A: Bye (closing)
B: Bye-bye (closing)As seen in example 1, the closing sequence proceeds as follows: One person (A) initiates
the closing with a pre-closing statement (e.g., “We-ell,” “Okay,” “So-oo,” or “Well, I've got to runnow”); the other person (B) responds to (A) with some signal of consent (e.g., “Okay”). If
agreement is reached, the conversation will be closed. However, the pre-closing statement can be
responded to with the opening of a new topic instead (Clark & French, 1981, p. 3). Therefore it is1

While conversing with my parents back in Japan every week, I became curious about the difference
between phone conversations with my mother and those with my father (“Why is the conversation
with my father always so much shorter than my conversation with my mother?”), and began torecord the conversations. The study is a response to the question that arose from my initial curiosity.

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日本語とジェンダー第11号(2011)

necessary that the first turn (the first pre-closing statement) is also positioned as “closing down a
topic” (Pavlidou, 2002) or “at the analyzable to participants end of a topic” (Schegloff & Sacks,
1973).

In other words, it has to be a sequence in which one person offers to close down the topic

and the other accepts the attempt.
The process of conversation closing can be difficult, particularly for Japanese speakers.
There is no specific research indicating typical differences of sequential closing statements
between English and Japanese as far as I know. However, some researchers have indicated English
and Japanese phone conversation endings are somewhat different. Tanaka (1982) found verbal andnon-verbal differences between English and Japanese parting such as nodding, distance of speakerand expressions used in the closing section. Okamoto (1999) also claimed four differences
between Japanese and English phone conversations: (1) Japanese speakers use punch lines, such as
jokes and humor, as a start of closing sequence; (2) Japanese speakers often leave messages suchas “please say hello to your family”; (3) English speakers express their joy of talking such as “It
was pleasure to talk with you”; (4) Japanese speakers do not use “sayonara” or “good-bye” butEnglish speakers often say “good-bye” as the terminal exchange. Moreover, Takagi (2002)
mentioned that the Japanese often used “hai (yes)” in closure. “Hai” is typically used as a positive
answer to a yes-no question, it has various pragmatic functions in conversational interactions.
Murata (1986) reported inhibition in closing conversations in Japanese.

In her study, half of thenative Japanese speakers and Japanese learners experienced some difficulty in closing
conversations. Eighty percent of native Japanese speakers were afraid to be rude by taking theinitiative in ending a conversation, and sixty percent of Japanese learners mentioned their lack ofknowledge of idiomatic expressions as preventing them from being able to end conversations.
Differences in age and status between speakers were especially relevant to this inhibition. Other
researchers have investigated Japanese phone conversation endings and have similarly foundJapanese speakers to have certain difficulties (Murata, 1989; Takagi, 2002; Tanaka 1982 Okamoto,1999). Takagi (2002) focused on three features of Japanese conversation endings, including
leave-taking, pre-closing and terminal exchange. She suggested that closing a telephone
conversation is a delicate and complicated process. Her participants were very careful to allow
each other to save face when they were finishing their phone conversations, and most of themwere not good at abrupt endings. It seemed the Japanese people in her study needed longleave-taking with repetitions of closing expressions to effectively show that they did not have
topics to talk about and that they cared about their relationships. These studies show the difficultyin Japanese phone conversation closings due to Japanese social norms of interaction (Gumperz,
1972). My study will further demonstrate this unique difficulty through an examination ofJapanese phone conversation closings from gender perspective.

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日本語とジェンダー第11号(2011)

2.2. Gender
2.2.1. Japanese gender differences in conversations
The Japanese language has been characterized as holding distinct male and female speech
registers or “languages”. The gender differences in Japanese are usually deemed more extensive
and more rigid than English. The gender differences are limited in formal Japanese, but there aremany differences in casual Japanese (Maynard, 1997). The most prominent differences of female
and male speech are the use of different interactional particles, uses of self-reference, honorifics,
pitch ranges, and intonation. Japanese female speeches are more associated with polite, gentle,
empathetic, and soft-speech while males’ are described as rougher, aggressive, direct, and blunt(Ide, Hori, Kawasaki, Ikuta and Haga, 1986; Ide, 1993; Reynolds, 1985). The data in this study istaken from family conversations, that is, casual or informal styles of communication. Therefore
the gender differences are expected.
2.2.2. Tannen’s gender differences
Tannen (1990) sheds light on gender differences in ways of speaking and conversational
styles.

For example, for men, conversation is often a way to negotiate their status in a group andto keep people from pushing them around. In other words, they use talk to preserve their
independence. On the other hand, for females, conversations are a tool to negotiate closeness andintimacy. Further, men consider a complaint as a challenge that requires a solution, whereas
women show understanding and offer emotional support. Men do not often talk about theirinnermost thoughts but speak in order to exchange information and get attention, whereas women
express their feelings in words. Tannen uses the word “genderlect” to indicate men and women’s
different speaking styles.
Tannen (1999) pointed out the linguistic differences in genderlect between men andwomen in English by observing daily conversations around her and in stories sent to her. For
example, women tend to talk at length about one topic, but men tend to switch topics, which gives
the impression that men do not listen. Another difference involves back channeling (e.g., “mhm,”“uhuh,” “yeah”), which is more frequent in women’s speech and used to show they are listening.
By contrast, men more often give “silent attention.” Women who expect back channeling interpretthe silence as their interlocutor not paying attention. Finally, another aspect of genderlectindentified by Tannen relates to “participatory listenership”: when women talk to each other, theyoften finish each other’s sentences and anticipate what the other is about to say. This practice isoften considered by men as an intrusion and lack of attention (Tannen, 1999). Although Tannenbases her idea of genderlect on observations of English conversations, the Japanese data of thisstudy, especially the FDC data, showed mis-communication caused by “participatory listenership”
and “silent attention”.

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日本語とジェンダー第11号(2011)

2.2.3. Mother-daughter conversation and father-daughter conversation ending
Some researchers claim mother-daughter conversations are more successful thanfather-daughter conversations. Often daughters talk with their mother more frequently and longer
than their fathers (Kasuga, 2000; Tsuji, 2003). Mothers exhibit a high level of consideration in
MDC, and do not interrupt or speak at the same time as their interlocutor (Barumont, 2000). In
other words, mothers use high-considerateness speech with their children (Beaumont, Vasconcelos,& Ruggeri, 2001). The reason for that could be conversation style. According to Tannen (1984),
successful conversations occur among speakers with the same conversation style. The speakers
who share the same conversation style are able to share expectations for the pace of turn taking
and the use of simultaneous speech. Japanese young adults often talk to their mothers as if they
are speaking to their friends (Tsuji, 2003).

The mother and daughter may share a more similar

conversation style than the father and the daughter. Although the research referred to uses English
data, it may apply to Japanese family as well.
3. Data Collection and Analysis
3.1. Participants
The participants of this study are a Japanese mother, father and daughter. It is a middle
class family living in Tokyo, Japan. When the data was collected, the daughter was studying
abroad and lived separately from her parents. The daughter is a graduate student (in her mid-20’s)
temporarily living in the U.S. She is a native speaker of Japanese and speaks English fluently
enough to live in the U.S. The mother (in her mid-60’s) is not a traditional Japanese stay-at-homehousewife but is a very independent, successful woman. The father (in his mid-50’s) is also not a
traditional Teisyukanpaku type of father (a husband who is at the top of the family structure andhas the most power in the family, sometimes translated as “bossy husband” or “chauvinistic
husband”). Both of them are native speakers of Japanese and cannot speak English. The family
power structure is basically horizontal.

The mother and the daughter are like friends who chat a

lot, and go out together. While the daughter is away from her parents, the family has phone
conversations and exchanges emails at least three times a week. On the other hand, phone
conversations and emails are not exchanged between the daughter and the father as often as withthe mother. The daughter calls him only when the call is necessary and for family occasions.
However, they talk a lot, play tennis, and drive around the Tokyo area together when she is backhome in Japan.
In fact, I am simultaneously a participant and an observer of the conversation, the objectof the study, and that may be viewed with criticism. Although my knowledge of philosophies of“science” is too limited to defend my position, in view of the difficulty inherent in gathering
natural data (cf. “observer’s paradox,” Labov, 1972) refers to the difficulty of extracting natural
speech from participants in order to analyze real world phenomena where the observation of anevent or experiment is influenced by the presence of the observer/investigator), attempting togather data this way should be worthwhile. My method can be considered to be a useful strategy
for conversational analysis as well: I view it as a type of so-called “observer-participation,” which90

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日本語とジェンダー第11号(2011)

is widely used in many studies. The participant-observer is in an advantageous position to reportwhat is happening in the deeper level of the discourse.
3.2. Data
The data for this study were audio recorded phone-Skype Japanese conversations of MDCs
and FDCs. The parents used a phone and the daughter used an Internet phone system through a
Macintosh computer.

Ten phone conversations (five phone conversations each with the motherand father) were recorded over a month using a Microsoft Word notebook layout recording system.
This recording system was chosen because it could record the sound with better quality thanregular digital recording devices. All conversations were done in Japanese and subsequently
transcribed and coded.
4. Findings: Length and Endings
4.1. Length of conversations
One important difference between Mother-Daughter conversations and Father-Daughter
conversations was conversation length. I recorded five conversations each for FDC and MDC. The
total length of MDCs was 1:43:51 (1 hour 43 minutes and 51seconds) while the total for FDCs was
34:42 (34 minutes and 42 seconds) (see Table 1.)
Table 1: Lengths of conversations (minutes)
Conversation

1

2

3

4

5

Mean

Total

MDC

33:21*

19:19

13:12

18:29

19:30

21:17

103:51

FDC

7:50

2:10

2:26

4:01

8:15

7:34

34:42

Note: *Cells include length of time for a conversation
There was a large time difference between the mean of MDC (21:17) and that of FDC(7:34). The difference between the means was 13:43. Why are FDCs shorter than MDCs?

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日本語とジェンダー第11号(2011)

4.1.1 General sequence of FDC and MDC
FDC often had pauses and topic changes, and utterances were rather short. These
components made FDC shorter than MDC. Let’s see an example from FDC. (D in the extracts
means “Daughter”, F means “Father”, and M means “Mother”. The numbers on the left are line
numbers for reference.)
Extract 1 (FDC from conversation 1):
1.

D:

Hikihajime ni dounika shinai to.
‘I have to do something before it goes bad.’
(1.0)

2.
3.

F:

Souda ne.
‘I agree.’4.

D:

Ato ga deru. Dame ni naru.
‘It will get worse later.’

5.

F:

un. (1.0) ima wa nanji nano?
‘Yes. (1.0)What time is it now? ’

6.

D:ima [wa jyuuni ji yonjyuppun.
‘Now [is 12:40.’

7.

F:[sottchi wa.
‘[how about you.’

8.

F:

ohiru?
‘Afternoon?’

9.

D:iya, yoru.
‘No, night.’
(1.0)

10.
11.

F:

yoru?[yoru ka.a::‘Night? night (I see)’

12.

D:

[un.
‘[yes.’

There were three pauses in this extract (in line 2, line 5, and line10), and topic change(from line 4 to line 5.) Utterances were rather short (in line 3, line 7, line 8, line 9, line 11, andline 12.) After a pause in line 2, the father said, “I agree” to keep the conversation going.
“Dounika shinai to” in line 1 may sound incomplete, but the daughter was actually expressing her
opinion expecting her father to respond according to either the “participatory listenership” rule orback channel. The same sequence was observed from line 10. These can be interpreted as
examples of Tannen’s “silent attention.” Women who expect back channeling interpret silence as
their interlocutor not paying attention.

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日本語とジェンダー第11号(2011)

Topic changes are often observed in FDC. After the father shows agreement in line 5,
there is a pause. To get out of this awkward moment, her father initiates a new topic here insteadof giving his opinion. As Tannen (1999) indicated, frequent topic changes by men give theimpression that men do not listen. The same thing is happened in the FDC: the fathers topic
changes make the daughter think he is not listening.

These topic changes make FDCs shorter. In

MDCs, the mother and the daughter make many comments and co-construct the conversation very
easily, leading to longer conversations. Extract 2 is one of MDCs. They could kept talking about
one topic (cold weather in Tokyo) for 1 minute and 23 seconds (17 lines in total), and smoothly
move to next topic (how much cats likes their warm beds).
Extract 2 (MDC from conversation 2):
1.

D:

Samuindesyo? Kyo.
‘It’s cold isn’t it? Today.’2.

M:

Sa::mukute [XXX.
‘Co::ld and [XXX.’

4.

D:[Yuki futtandesyo?
‘You had snow right?’

5.

6.

(1.0)

M:

Kinou ne. un to. Kaki o hoshitetara sa, mizore futtekita yo. Yo[ru (0.2) a:: mizore ka::..
‘Yesterday. Well. When I was hanging persimmons, it starts sleeting. Ni[ght (0.2) oh:: sleet:: .’7.

D:[Fu:::n. e. teiuka kyou sa ima nyu:su miteta no.
‘[I see. oh. well today now I was watching news.’

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日本語とジェンダー第11号(2011)

4.2. Conversation ending
The most significant difference between MDCs and FDCs was the conversation endings.
Japanese phone conversation closings are a unique and difficult speech acts, involving inhibition
to keep face and Japanese social norms of interaction (Murata, 1989; Takagi, 2002). As previous
studies have noted, long closing sections and repetitions of “hai” (“yes”) were also observed in
my data.

Two main features of family phone conversation endings were found: repetition

phenomena of closing sections in MDC endings (extract 2), and the same pattern of confirmation
and agreement to end conversations in both MDCs and FDCs. The next two extracts are typicalconversation endings with my mother (Extract 2) and with my father (Extract 3). There are threeclosing sections from Extract 2 and one closing section from Extract 3 in the data.
Extract 3 (MDC from conversation 3):
Closing section 1
1.

:D: Beru (name of energy drink) nonde neru no desu.
‘You should drink BERU (name of the energy drink), and go to bed.’

2.

M:

Sooshimasu. Honjyaba.[ XXX‘Yes, I will. Bye [XXX’3.

D:[hai. Baiba::i.
‘[ OK Bye-bye’

4.

M:Genki da ne. Emiko ne. nett. nett. Ii, dewa yoi syuumatsu o.
‘You sound good. Emiko right. right. Good then have a nice weekend.’

5.

D:

Genki dayo datte amarini tukarete kaettekitara neteta mon. kiduitara.
‘I am good. Because I took a nap when I came back home because I was exhausted. I did not
realize (that I fell a sleep.)’

6.

M:(laugh) a::‘(laugh) well::

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日本語とジェンダー第11号(2011)

This conversation continues and leads to the following section.
Closing section 2
34.

M:

35

36.

ne:::honto dayo ne. honto. Osowaru to ii ne::: kaette kitara to‘yah right. You should learn once you come back.’
iuu kaiji de gozee masu dayo. Honjyaba ne. [Emiko.
‘That’s all. All right then. [ Emiko.’

D:

37.

[Honjyaba ne.
‘[All right then.’
(1.0)

38.

M:

ano. kaette kita battkari datta no. ugai suru kara.
‘Well. I just came back. I will gurgle so.’

39.

D:

nett. Nanka ne. [dekakeru tte itteta kedo tsunagattcyatta to omotte.
‘Well.[ Although you said you would go out, you picked up the phone.’

40.

M:

[un?
‘[what?’

41.

M:

42.

iya,ima kaette kita battkari datta no daka[ra kaette kite(.)‘No. I just came back so I came home and’uwagi nuida tokoro datta no. dakara cyoudoyokatta.
‘I just took off my jacket. It is good timing.’

This conversation continues and leads to the following section.
Closing section3
60.

D:

un. Ikanakute ii. Mata renraku ga atte kara ni shite.
‘Yes. You do not have to go. (Could you do) after she contacts me.’

61.

M:

un. Sontoki renraku cyoudai.
‘OK. Tell me once she contacts you.’

62.

D:

nnett.
‘All right.’

63.

(2.0)

64.

M:

hai hai. Jyaane.
‘Ok. uh huh. Bye.’

65.

D:

Hai hai. Odaijini.
‘Ok.Ok. Take care.’

66.

M:

Hai mata ne.
‘Yeah. See you.’

67.

D:

Baibai.
‘Bye-bye.’

68.

M:

hai,baiba::i.
‘Ok. Bye-bye.’

69.

(3.0)

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日本語とジェンダー第11号(2011)

Interestingly, the mother and daughter had more than one closing section in one phone
conversation.
Why did more than one closing section occur? In line 1, the daughter offered a statementthat displayed concern for her mother’s health with a code switch from the casual to polite form.
Wishing good health via ‘take care’ is often a constituent of a closing section (Okamoto, 1999;
Takagi, 2002). The code switch is another key to move to a closing section. The daughter switched
her casual speech to desu form (a polite form). Thus the mother took line 1 as a sign to close theconversation and she took pre-closing activity by saying “I will do” with an honorific expression
as her daughter used in line1 and went back to a casual speech, “all right then (Bye)” with a casualand dialectic expression “Honjyaba” in line 2. “Honjyaba” is a yamagata (region in north west)
dialect where the mother is originally from. The daughter followed with a pre-closing response
and closing sentence in line 3; then her mother tried to end the conversation with “have a niceweekend.” In general, her closing response should have been given in line 5, but the daughter
extended the conversation (by giving a reason why her voice sounded good) because she brought
up a new topic and also repeated the discourse particle “ne” three times. A similar routine wasobserved from lines 34 to 42. Her mother initiated the agreement that “we have no topic to talkabout,” and issued a pre-closing statement in line 35, “That’s all. All right then” by switching hercode to a dialectic polite expression, “gozee masu dayo.”

The daughter gave her pre-closing

response in line 36 using the casual and dialectic expression “Honjyabane” as her mother did.
Then her mother gave the reason why she wanted to hang up in line 38 as leave-taking.

Shemight have expected a good-bye exchange here, but the daughter started a new topic in line 39— a
key moment that made her mother keep talking. Beaumont, Vasconcelos, and Ruggeri (2001)
found mothers use highly- considerate speech with their children, and the mother showed similar
high-consideration for her daughter here. A large number of usages of the discourse particle “ne,”which is used to check the agreement of the listener, displayed the mother’s consideration.

The

daughter also knows her mother is concerned about her, living away from home in a foreigncountry. As a result, the mother’s consideration prevented her from ending the conversation.
So how did they end the conversation? The daughter’s utterance in line 62 and a pause inline 63 played a significant role.

Line 62, “All right,” was a sign that the previous line was theconclusion and the daughter was finished discussing the topic. A pause in line 63 also worked as
an agreement to move to a closing activity. Therefore her mother understood that the conversation
was really coming to an end and gave a pre-closing statement in line 64, which the daughter
agreed with, so the conversation was not extended.

They both accepted a move toward the end

and successfully closed the conversation.
Moreover, from line 64 to line 69 the conversation-closing pattern was very similar to theone observed in FDC (see extract 3).

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日本語とジェンダー第11号(2011)

Extract 4 (FDC from conversation 1):
1.

F:

2.
3.

Mou, kaze hiku to are da. (1.0) karada yowakute dameda.
‘Oh. When I catch a cold umm. (1.0) my body gets weaker and not good.’
(4.0)

D:

4.

Jyaa odaijini.
‘Then take care of yourself’
(2.0)

5.

F:

un. Hai.(1.5)jyaa kiotsukete.
‘Yeah. Yes. (1.5) all right take care.’6.

D:

hai. Watashi wa nemasu.
‘Ok. I will go to bed.’

7.
8.

(1.0)
F:

9.

Hai.
‘Ok.’
(1.0)

10.

D:

hai.
‘all right.’

11.

F:

hai. Jyaa nee.
‘ok. Bye.’

12.

D:

jyaa ne[:::.oyasumi:::‘Bye.
[:::. Good night:::’

13.

F:

[hai.
‘[ok.’

14.
15.

16.

(1.0)
F:

hai.hai.oyasumi::‘ok. ok. Good night::’
(3.0)

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日本語とジェンダー第11号(2011)In Extract 3, a long pause in line 2 made the daughter think that the conversation was nolonger developing, so the daughter offered leave-taking through “then take care of yourself,”which also functioned as a pre-closing statement because her father responded in the same way
with, “well, take care” in line 5 as a pre-closing response.

In line 6, she clearly showed her

intent to end the conversation by saying, “I will go to bed,” and switched her code from casualspeech to a polite form. This code-switch created a distance. After the second pre-closing activity
from line 6 to line 10, where they showed agreement with each other, they moved to the “closing
section” and finished the conversation. An interesting point is in the repeated pre-ending activities
that seem to demonstrate a pattern in closing sections. Similar to the pre-ending activities inclosing section 3 in the previous MDC (extract 2), both the father and daughter said “hai (ok or all
right),” “bye,” and “Good night” several times. This is a pattern found in all of the recorded
family phone conversations.
From these results, it can be noted that FDC endings (extract 3) had a similar ending
pattern to MDC endings (closing section 3 in extract 2). However, there was only one closing
section observed in FDC (extract 3) whereas there were three closing sections in MDC (extract 2).
5. Discussion
In the extracts above, there are some differences between MDCs and FDCs. First, FDCs
were clearly shorter than MDCs. Second, there were more pauses, shorter utterances, less use of
the particle “ne”, and frequent topic changes in FDCs compared to MDCs data. Third, closing
sequential patterns were different. There were three closing sections in a mother-daughter phone
conversation but there was one in a FDC. Similar conversation styles, high number of use of “ne,”for example, and friend-like conversation using dialect-like casual forms of speech were observedin MDCs. The mother and the daughter co-constructed conversation more easily, the conversation
generally went more smoothly, and it took longer to end. The gender value pattern of theparticipants could be one of the factor that make the mother-daughter speech stiles similar. On theother hand, the father and his daughter applied a different conversation style in their talk. That
made their talk very short and simple. This difference could explain why the daughter talks morewith her mother than with her father. It may be possible to interpret the different conversationstyle as resulting from the male parent being considered dominant in two respects as thedaughter’s parent and as a male member of the society, according to the traditional perspectives ofJapanese culture.
This small-scale study also showed how hard it is to end a phone conversation, and shows
how some points are different from English conversation endings. I observed repetition
phenomena of closing sections in MDC endings (Extract 2), and the same pattern of confirmation
and agreement to end conversations in both MDCs and FDCs. Switching codes to move to theclosure of conversations, such as using formal style and repeating “hai” (“yes”) in the closing
sections were unique in this Japanese data.
Although this is just a limited case study which is limited both in variety and in quantity,
it is hoped that the data may be useful as a starting point for more full-scale research. Again, I
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日本語とジェンダー第11号(2011)

believe this study is unique because it closely observes Japanese family phone conversation
endings, and pointed out the different sequential pattern between a male and female parents which
none of the previous studies covered. For future research, I would like to investigate more
Japanese phone conversation endings (e.g., phone conversations between a son and his parents)
and apply these studies to Japanese language education.
Acknowledgment
I would like to express my deepest gratitude to Professor Katsue Akiba Reynolds for her
input and feedback, as well as classmates in my Japanese sociolinguistics class for their helpfulcomments on an early draft.

I am particularly grateful to the Society for Gender Studies inJapanese for allowing me to present my paper in its annual convention (2010) in Tokyo and to the
Graduate Student Organization of the University of Hawaii at Manoa for enabling me to travel toJapan to attend the convention with their grants and awards. Lastly but not least, I would like tothank my parents for letting me record our phone conversations, without which this study would
not have been possible.
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Appendix
Transcription conventions[

overlapping(0.0)

length of pause(.)

micro pause?

rising intonation

XXX 	
 
:

unsure words
sound stretch（ 神元愛美子 	  MA Candidate, East Asian Languages and Literatures, University of Hawaii at
Manoa ）

100

Copyright © 2011 The Society for Gender Studies in Japanese All rights reserved.