Attitudes towards masculine Japanese speech in multilingual professional contexts of Hong Kong: Gender, identity, and native-speaker status

Attitudes towards masculine Japanese speech in multilingual professional contexts of Hong Kong: Gender, identity, and native-speaker status

• Itakura, Hiroko Dept. of English Language and Literature, Hong Kong Baptist University

Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, 29(6), 467-482, 2008

Routledge

2008

• G Curriculum, Teaching & Learning: Specific Disciplines
  • GF Humanities & Arts

Gender Language Attitudes Masculine Speech Japanese Identity

• Hong Kong

• 1997.7 onwards

• Unknown or Unspecified

The gendered speech in a foreign language has been found to pose barriers for learners due to different gender norms associated with their mother tongue and the foreign language. The problem is especially serious with the masculine and feminine forms of speech in the Japanese language, as these are strongly linked with social inequality between men and women. While a number of previous studies have been conducted on feminine style of Japanese and foreign language learners, still little is known of masculine speech of Japanese and foreign professionals who use Japanese in their intercultural work contexts. The present paper investigates attitudes towards the use of masculine Japanese among Hong Kong professionals. It includes the finding that, unlike in monolingual contexts, in multilingual contexts masculine Japanese was perceived among the respondents as projecting not only the quality of Japanese masculinity but also of group solidarity and native speaker status in the language and culture. While the respondents felt that it could be an effective device for constructing their professional identity, the decision to use it appeared to involve a careful analysis of their professional contexts and identity considerations. The implications of the analysis for teaching Japanese as a foreign language are discussed.
[Copyright of Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development is the property of Routledge. Full article may be available at the publisher's website: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01434630802147932]

• English

Journal Articles

• 01434632

• 10.1080/01434630802147932

https://bibliography.lib.eduhk.hk/bibs/994cd7fd

2010-11-28