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A Study Of The Japanese Reflexive Pronouns, Zibun And Zibun-Zisin, Masaru Yamada

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports

The behavior of various types of anaphors may be classified into two types, local and long-distance anaphors. The English reflexive 'himself' and the Japanese reflexive 'zibun' representatively characterize the two types of anaphors. They contrast in that 'himself' is a local anaphor, whereas 'zibun' is a long-distance anaphor. Japanese has another reflexive pronoun, `zibun-zisin', and it behaves more similarly to himself. The standard binding theory (Chomsky (1981)) regulates the behavior of local anaphors; however, the behavior of long-distance anaphors cannot be explained. One proposal for this matter is to invoke parameterization, which defines a language-specific binding domain for anaphors. Within …