Adjectival noun (Japanese)
In descriptions of the Japanese language, an adjectival noun, adjectival, or na-adjective is a noun that can function as an adjective by taking the particle 〜な -na. Adjectival nouns constitute one of several Japanese word classes that can be considered equivalent to adjectives.
In their attributive function, Japanese adjectival nouns function similarly to English noun adjuncts, as in "chicken soup" or "winter coat" – in these cases, the nouns "chicken" and "winter" modify the nouns "soup" and "coat", respectively. Japanese adjectival nouns can also be used predicatively – in that use, they do not take the -na suffix, but normally combine with forms of the copular verb.
Terminology
The terminology used to refer to this word-class is inconsistent. The Japanese name is 形容動詞 keiyō-dōshi, which literally means "adjectival verb". This is not necessarily at odds with the English term adjectival noun, since in traditional Japanese grammar, keiyō-dōshi includes the copula, while the adjectival noun in the analysis described here does not include the copula. For example, in the traditional grammar, kirei da is a keiyō-dōshi and kirei is its stem; in the analysis here, kirei is an adjectival noun and kirei da is its combination with the copula. Considering the copula is a kind of verb and kirei is a kind of noun syntactically, both terminologies make sense.Grammatically, these words are nouns, or more technically, nominals, which function attributively – the main differences being that nouns take a 〜の -no suffix when acting attributively, while these words take a 〜な -na suffix when acting attributively, and that most of these words cannot be used as the agent or patient of a sentence, but otherwise behaving essentially identically grammatically. Thus, they are variously referred to as "adjectival verbs", "adjectival nouns", na-adjectives, and na-nominals. For example, Eleanor Harz Jorden refers to them as na-nominals in her textbook .
In fact, by some analyses, nouns and na-nominals are fundamentally grammatically the same, where 〜の vs. 〜な when used attributively is simply a conventional stylistic complementary distribution, with 〜の／〜な being allomorphs. This view is reinforced by the fact that some words, such as 特別 tokubetsu "special", can take either a 〜の or a 〜な, depending on the phrase. Ultimately, 〜な is an abbreviation of 〜にある, used to use a noun attributively, while 〜の is the genitive case; see [|etymology], below.
Characterization
In traditional Japanese grammar, adjectival nouns are considered "inflectional", katsuyō, like verbs and i-adjectives, rather than non-inflectional hikatsuyōgo or mukatsuyōgo, like nouns.This is a point of disagreement in current Japanese grammar, and authors such as Uehara argue that instead, adjectival nouns should be classed with nouns as non-inflectional.
The claim that na-adjectives are inflectional rests on the claim that the syllable da 'is', usually regarded as a "copula verb", is really a suffix – an inflection. Thus, hon 'book', generates a one-word sentence, honda 'it is a book', not a two-word sentence, hon da. However, numerous constructions seem to be incompatible with the suffixal copula claim.
On the basis of such constructions, Uehara finds that the copula is indeed an independent word, and that regarding the parameters on which i-adjectives share the syntactic pattern of verbs, the nominal adjectives pattern with pure nouns instead.
''taru'' adjectives
In [|Late Old Japanese], a separate kind of tari adjectival nouns developed alongside the existing nari ones. The nari ones developed into the adjectival nouns that are the subject of this article, while the tari ones mostly died out over the course of Late Middle Japanese, being mostly gone by Early Modern Japanese, surviving as fossils in a few words which are generally considered somewhat stiff or archaic. These are generally referred to as ト・タル形容動詞 or タルト型活用, and can also function adverbially with 〜と -to, instead of the 〜に -ni which is mostly used with な nominals. See taru adjectives for further discussion in English, and :ja:形容動詞#タルト型活用|形容動詞#タルト型活用 for Japanese.naru adjectives
A few nari adjectival nouns followed a similar path to tari adjectival nouns, becoming naru adjectives in Modern Japanese, rather than na adjectives as most nari adjectival nouns did. These include 単なる tannaru "mere, simple" or 聖なる seinaru "holy" and are generally classed as rentaishi.Historical Forms
Old Japanese
Old Japanese has one type of adjectival noun with the following inflections.| Irrealis 未然形 | Adverbial 連用形 | Conclusive 終止形 | Attributive 連体形 | Realis 已然形 | Imperative 命令形 |
| -nara | -nari | -nari | -naru | -nare | -nare |
Late Old Japanese
Late Old Japanese has two types of adjectival nouns: nar- and tar-.| Type | Irrealis 未然形 | Adverbial 連用形 | Conclusive 終止形 | Attributive 連体形 | Realis 已然形 | Imperative 命令形 |
| Nar- | -nara | -nari -ni | -nari | -naru | -nare | -nare |
| Tar- | -tara | -tari -to | -tari | -taru | -tare | -tare |
The newly developed tar- inflections are used in kanbun kundoku.
Early Middle Japanese
Early Middle Japanese has two types of adjectival nouns: na- and tar-.| Type | Irrealis 未然形 | Adverbial 連用形 | Conclusive 終止形 | Attributive 連体形 | Realis 已然形 | Imperative 命令形 |
| Na- | -nara | -nari -ni | -nari | -naru -na | -nare | |
| Tar- | -to | -tari | -taru |
Late Middle Japanese
Late Middle Japanese has two types of adjectival nouns: na and t-.| Type | Irrealis 未然形 | Adverbial 連用形 | Conclusive 終止形 | Attributive 連体形 | Realis 已然形 | Imperative 命令形 |
| N- | -nara | -ni -de | -dya -na | -naru -na no | -nare | |
| T- | -to | -taru |
Early Modern Japanese (Kamigata)
The early half of Early Middle Japanese as exhibited in the Kamigata region has a single type of adjectival noun with the following inflections.| Irrealis 未然形 | Adverbial 連用形 | Conclusive 終止形 | Attributive 連体形 | Realis 已然形 | Imperative 命令形 |
| -ni -de | -na | -na | -nare |
The deteriorating tar- type is lost.
Early Modern Japanese (Edo)
The later half of Early Modern Japanese as found in Edo has a single type of adjectival noun with the following inflections. These forms are identical to the modern forms.| Irrealis 未然形 | Adverbial 連用形 | Conclusive 終止形 | Attributive 連体形 | Hypothetical 仮定形 | Imperative 命令形 |
| -daro | -daQ -de -ni | -da | -na | -nara |
Modern Japanese
There is one type of adjectival noun in modern usage, with inflections as follows.| Irrealis 未然形 | Adverbial 連用形 | Conclusive 終止形 | Attributive 連体形 | Hypothetical 仮定形 | Imperative 命令形 |
| -daro | -daQ -de -ni | -da | -na | -nara |
- The modern inflections are based on two primitive forms: d- and n-. The n- forms are historically older while the d- forms are newer and have replaced some of the older n- forms.
- Irrealis -daro is found with particle -u, resulting in -darou. Historically it was -dara. /au/ regularly changed into .
- Adverbial -daQ is often found with past particle -ta, resulting in "daQta" -> "datta".
- Adverbial -de is found before "aru" and "nai", as well as being used in to terminate one clause before beginning another.
- Adverbial -ni is used in adverbial constructions.
- Modern Japanese no longer inflects for imperative.
Etymology
Loanwords
Most adjectival nouns are of primarily Chinese origin, but there is a not-insignificant quantity of adjectival noun loanwords from other languages as wellChinese Origin
| Word | Romanization | Gloss |
| 綺麗 | kirei | beauty/beautiful |
| 元気 | genki | spirit, liveliness/energetic, lively |
| 安全 | anzen | safe/safety |
English Origin
| Word | Romanization | Gloss |
| リアル | riaru | real world/real |
| モダン | modan | modernity/modern |
| スリリング | suriringu | thrill/thrilling |
French Origin
| Word | Romanization | Gloss | Gloss |
| アバンギャルド | abangyarudo | avant-garde | avant-garde |
| シュール | shuuru | surréalistique | surreal/surrealism |
| シック | shikku | chic | chic/in vogue |
Native Words
In addition to loanwords, within the class of adjectival nouns also exists a small subset of native Japanese words. These words are argued to be polymorphemic in nature, with the latter -ka being a suffix that creates an adjectival noun. Nishiyama asserts that this helps to distinguish native adjectival nouns from native adjectival verbs.Native Adjectival Nouns
| Word | Romanization | Gloss |
| 静か | shizu-ka | silent; quiet |
| 爽やか | sawa-yaka | fresh |
| 明らか | aki-raka | obvious; clear; plain |
Copula ''-na/-da''
All forms of the copula can be considered to derive from two infinitive forms, ni and to. Because the copula lacked any other forms, secondary conjugations with the verb ari were used. The original ni ari and to ari contracted to form nari and tari. To derive the modern forms na and da, changes such as the following have been proposed.For attributive na :
- ni aru > naru > na
- ni te ari > de ari > de a > da
The infinitive form ni is still in widespread use, but the form to has become a much rarer alternative.
Internal properties
The internal properties of Japanese adjectival nouns can be analysed either through a lexical features approach or through a Distributed Morphology approach.Chomsky's lexical properties
Miyagawa argues that Japanese adjectival nouns can be classified using Noam Chomsky's lexical feature system. He proposed the following analysis for Japanese lexical categories:Japanese Lexical Categories
| Lexical Category | Lexical Features |
| Verb | |
| Noun | |
| Verbal Noun | |
| Adjectival Verb | |
| Adjectival Noun | |
| Postposition |
Under this system, Japanese adjectival nouns are classed similarly to English pure adjectives . However, because Japanese also has adjectival verbs with the lexical property , it is observed that Japanese adjectival nouns and English pure adjectives are distinct.
Morphological tree structure
The internal morphological structure of Japanese adjectival phrases can be represented by the following trees:| Adjectival Noun | Adjectival Verb | Noun |
Within the tree structures, the word root combines with the functional category n0 to become a noun, then combine with the functional head a0 to form an adjective. Both nouns and adjectives contain the root-n0 combination, and it is the presence of a0 that results in the appearance of the attributive copula -na.