Lika men olika : wn granskning av relationen mellan kanji och homofoner

Författare

Daniel Gustafsson Löfdahl

Summary, in English

The main objective of this thesis is to argue whether Chinese characters (kanji) exists in Japanese spoken language as mental agents to distinguish homophonous words. A clearer picture of the background to this phenomenon is given by a brief review of the history of kanji, by bringing up different definitions of what kanji is and by explaining the relation between kanji and homophonous words. The argument is strengthened by underlining the importance of the semantic function of kanji, which is shown in a survey where Japanese native speakers are given the job to transcribe homophonous words from a hiragana-version of a text to conventional Japanese.

Avdelning/ar