The Case Particles GA and NO in Esopono fabvlas: A morphosyntactic analysis of the Japanese language spoken in the 16th Century

• Grant number: 25/00341-0
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships abroad - Research Internship - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: August 05, 2025
• End date: December 04, 2025
• Field of knowledge: Linguistics, Literature and Arts - Literature - Modern Foreign Languages
• Principal Investigator: Eliza Atsuko Tashiro
• Grantee: Giordan Minozzi Camilo Silva
• Supervisor: Jun Shirai
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Institution abroad: Hiroshima University, Japan
• Associated to the scholarship: 24/16582-3 - The case particles GA and NO in Esopono Fabulas: A morphosyntactic analysis of the Japanese language spoken in the XVI century., BP.IC

Abstract

This research involves two areas of Japanese Studies: linguistic studies, as it includes an analysis of the syntactic structure of the language, and literary studies, as it is based on an examination of the Aesop's fables translated into Japanese. More specifically, the linguistic elements under analysis are the case particles (in Japanese, kaku joshi ¿¿¿) GA (¿) and NO (¿) used in the fables translated by Jesuit missionaries in Japan during the Azuchi-Momoyama period (16th century) in Japanese historiography. These fables make up the didactic material for reading entitled Esopono fabvlas (1593), created for the learning of the Japanese language in the educational institutions of the Society of Jesus in the Far East. Through reading the fables, listing the sentences containing the aforementioned particles, examining their usage, and comparing them with descriptions found in the grammars, dictionaries, and vocabularies by the same Jesuits at the time, we aim to understand, even if partially, the syntactic structure of the spoken Japanese language and the way the Jesuit missionaries explained it. At Hiroshima University, initially the reading of the bibliography will be undertaken, and then, in collaboration with Prof. Dr. Jun Shirai, a specialist in missionary documentation on the Japanese language, the translation of the sentences - whether in simple or compound forms - that have been tabulated will be undertaken.