論文の英文要旨
Research on expression of poten-tiality in Modern
論文題目 Japanese― The Case of Ichidan Verbs and Kahen Verb “Kuru” ―氏

名LiZHANGIn this dissertation, I try to involve the “ra”-removed forms of ichidan verbs and kahen verb
“kuru” among all expression of poten-tiality in modern Japanese as research subjects, aiming at
examining various viewpoints of previous researches, as well as clarifying the meanings,
patterns and syntactic features of “ra”-removed forms.
Various researches have been done about the actual usages of “ra”-removed forms. However,
it is hard to say that the meanings expressed by it, the types of verb, patterns and syntactic
features have been stated clearly.
In this dissertation, I introduce two viewpoints that have not been covered in previous
researches. The first point is the differences in meaning between "potentiality" and "fulfillmentof intention", and the second point is the presence or absence of evaluative expressions.
Also, I conduct an empirical analysis on the actual usages of “ra”-removed forms withcomparison to “rareru” forms using three types of data. And the three types of data are used as
research materials in this dissertation, that is, word-of-mouth usages on the Internet, BCCWJ
2009 monitor version of "Yahoo! Chiebukuro", and examples in Comics.
The outlines of each chapter are described as follows.
In Chapter 1, I summarized the time and place of occurrence, the history of “ra”-removedforms, as well as previous researches concerning “ra”-removed forms, pointing out the problems
of previous researches, thus giving suggestions on what kind of researches are needed forfurther studies.
The following viewpoints are lacking in previous researches.
The first point is the differences in meaning between potentiality and fulfillment of intention,and the second one is the presence or absence of a co-occurrence relation with evaluative1

expressions.
Some example sentences were used as research materials as shown below.
(1) Ame futte kara ukideru moyou wa mi-rare-nai no ga zannen desu.
(It is regrettable that we cannot see the view appearing after rain.)(2) Sapporo no yakei ga heya kara mi-re-te totemo romanchikku de yokatta desu.
(It was nice to see the romantic night view of Sapporo from the room.)(3) Gazou mo mi-re-ta no wa anshin dekite totemo yokatta desu. o (^ - ^) o
(It was a relief to have seen the image and it was very good.)
Although it has been examined in previous researches whether or not there are proper usagesof “ra”-removed forms and “rareru” forms depending on the situation in terms of subdivision ofpotential forms, most researchers except Kato (1988), gave the same conclusion that it is not
related to the differences of potential forms in meaning. Yet, it should be noted that there was aconflict between “potentiality of abilities” and “potentiality of situations”.
However, following the viewpoints of Ogami (1998, 2003), I divided the meaning ofpotential forms into potentiality and fulfillment of intention in this dissertation. If I interpret theexample sentences above using the viewpoint of Onoe (1998, 2003), "mi-rare-nai (cannot see)"in Example (1) means an unfulfilled intended action, which can be regarded as potential usage
in a “rareru” form. "mi-re (to see)" in Example (2) represents the meaning that the intended
action has been realized, which is a fulfillment of intention usage. Similarly, "mi-re-ta (to haveseen)" in Example (3) also means the intended action has been realized, which is a fulfillment ofintention usage.
In addition, evaluative expressions such as "zannen desu (it is regrettable)", "totemo
romanchikku de yokatta desu (it was very romantic and good)", and "totemo yokatta desu (itwas very good)" were used in the texts of example (1) to (3).
It seems that when it comes to potential forms, there is a bias in subsequent grammaticalforms (syntactic positions), voices (affirmative forms / negative forms), and the possibility ofco-occurrence relation with evaluative expressions, regardless of whether it is a “ra”-removed
form or a “rareru” form. In other words, it has been seen from the examples that if aquasi-nominal particle “no” follows “rareru” forms, negative forms of potential usage are likely
to appear, and there is a tendency for evaluative expressions to follow more easily. Also, if aparticle “te” or “no” follows “ra”-removed forms, fulfillment of intention usages are likely toappear, with evaluative expressions following easily.
This dissertation intended to verify the impression about the existence of such meanings(potentiality / fulfillment of intention), voices (affirmative forms / negative forms) and2

subsequent evaluative expressions with the help of empirical analysis.
In Chapter 2, by specifying research conditions required today concerning “ra”-removed
forms as stated at the end of Chapter 1, I summarized the items investigated and the three typesof data used in this dissertation including word-of-mouth usages on the Internet, BCCWJ 2009
monitor version of "Yahoo! Chiebukuro", and examples in Comics. The necessities, research
purposes, and merits and demerits were explained respectively. Furthermore, with respect toeach type of data, investigated subjects, retrieval methods, and analyzed items were described.
In chapter 3, I examined various viewpoints of previous researches based on three kinds ofdata. As a result, the findings are as follows.
In terms of age, it was found that teenagers and people in their 20s or 30s have a similartendency to use “ra”-removed forms and “rareru” forms, while people aged over 40 tend todecrease the use of “ra”-removed forms gradually. Also, “ra”-removed forms are used mostfrequently among people with the same ages, especially for younger generations.
In terms of gender, I also obtained the conclusion that gender does not affect the tendency touse“ra”-removed forms or “rareru” forms based on word-of-mouth data. With regard to

speakers’ interpersonal relationship with listeners in dialogues, there is a tendency to use“ra”-removed forms more frequently in conversations with the same generations than thosebetween different generations. Even among different generations, if you have a closer
relationship with listeners, you may use “ra”-removed forms as well. However, it remains to beanalyzed the fact that there were usages of “ra”-removed forms even in conversations between
hostile relationships.
Among all types of verbs, verbs with short stems are likely to be used in “ra”-removed
forms, and according to the analysis of usages of verbs with stems consisting of 3 or 4 syllables,
I may safely drew a conclusion that there is a growing tendency to use “ra”-removed forms ofverbs with longer stems,

which is no longer limited to verbs with short stems. As for verb

conjugation, it can be seen that “ra”-removed forms are more likely to be used for kami-ichidanverbs (conjugation of ichidan verbs ending in "iru") than shimo-ichidan verbs (conjugation ofichidan verbs ending in "eru"). Also, it is said that “ra”-removed forms of the three verbs "miru(see)", "neru (sleep)" and "kuru (come)" have already become fixed usages.
In addition, compared to Matsuda’s (1993) research conducted in the 1990s, it was foundthat the number of usage examples for compound verbs and auxiliary verbs has increased,
which can be regarded as the extension of usage range as time went by.
As for the question that either affirmative forms or negative forms are more likely to appear,
I obtained the result that for any of the three types of data, “ra”-removed forms are more likely3to appear in negative forms than affirmative forms.
Similarly, as for the possibility of main clauses or subordinate clauses, “ra”-removed forms
rather than “rareru” forms are more likely to be used in subordinate clauses for any of the three
types of data.
In chapter 4, I examined whether or not the differences in meaning between “potentiality”
and “fulfillment of intention” affects the tendency to use “rareru” forms or “ra”-removed forms
based on three types of data. As shown in Table 1, it was found that the percentage of“ra”-removed forms as fulfillment of intention usages is higher than that of “rareru” forms foreach of the three types of data. Besides, from all three types of data, the total number ofexamples for fulfillment of intention usages is 840, which accounts for 22.58% of the“ra”-removed form examples with a total number of 3720. On the other hand, 14.46% of thetotal 5077 “rareru” form examples are fulfillment of intention usages, the number of which is734 in total. Even though the number of the “ra”-removed form examples is smaller than that of
the “rareru” form examples, the percentage and the absolute number of usage examples for“ra”-removed forms exceeds that of “rareru” forms. Therefore, I made it clear that thedifferences in meaning between “potentiality” and “fulfillment of intention” affects the tendency
to use “rareru” forms or “ra”-removed forms.
＜Table 1: Total Number of Examples for Fulfillment of Intention Usages＞“Rareru” Forms“Ra”-removed Forms

Meaning

Total

Total NumberTotal

Total Numberand Usage

Number ofand Percentage

Number ofand Percentage

Examplesof Examples for

Examplesof Examples for

Data

Fulfillment ofFulfillment ofIntention Usages

Intention Usages

377

126（33.4%）

194

83（42.8%）2102

535（25.45%）

2191

656（29.94%）

Yahoo! Chiebukuro2217

65（2.93%）1108

58（5.23%）

Examples in Comics

381

8（2.10%）227

43（18.94%）

Total

5077

734（14.46%）

3720

840（22.58%）

Word-of-mouth
Usages Data A
Word-of-mouth
Usages Data B

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In chapter 5, I examined syntactic positions of “rareru” forms and “ra”-removed forms, thatis, where should I place “rareru” forms and “ra”-removed forms in the text of sentences insituations where “rareru” forms and “ra”-removed forms are likely to appear with evaluative
expressions respectively. Also, I clarified the preference of grammatical patterns following thetwo forms, and the features of co-occurrence relations with evaluative expressions.
It was found that for each of the three types of data, “rareru” forms and “ra”-removed forms
are usually placed in the text of example sentences with evaluative expressions. And
furthermore, there is a tendency that “ra”-removed forms are more likely to appear withevaluative expressions than “rareru” forms.
In Chapter 6, I analyzed each usage in the text or at the end of sentences (uncommonusages with many examples) listed in Chapter 5. In this dissertation, I combined the four factors
including the differences in meaning between potentiality and fulfillment of intention, voices(affirmative forms / negative forms), syntactic positions and the possibility of co-occurrence
relations with evaluative expressions to examine these uncommon usages empirically. As aresult, from all three types of data, I drew a conclusion that “ra”-removed forms are used mostfrequently in the conjugation of “te” representing fulfillment of intention, with evaluative
expressions following in all cases.
In Chapter 7, I summarized what I had discussed above based on the analysis of each item,
and confirmed the academic position of this dissertation in the research history. That is, I
managed to investigate a plurality of research items by combining three kinds of different data
based on actual examples. And I focused on the subdivision of meanings of potential forms(potentiality and fulfillment of intention), syntactic positions, and the presence or absence ofevaluative expressions following “ra”-removed forms with comparison to “rareru” forms. Also,
I summarized again the significance of conducting empirical analysis combining the four factors
including the differences in meaning between potentiality and fulfillment of intention, voices(affirmative forms / negative forms), syntactic positions and the possibility of co-occurrence
relations with evaluative expressions.

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