Proximal Demonstrative Mapping in Japanese and English: Orientation and Fictive Movement

This study revisits the spatial deictic reference of proximal demonstratives in Japanese and English in terms of orientation and fictive trajectory.It demonstrates that the referent of the Japanese proximal demonstrative ko-is fundamentally determined by static configurations whereas that of the English proximal demonstrative this is more likely subject to a projected fictive trajectory.In our experiment with various visual stimuli, Japanese subjects preferred the closer visual object as the referent of the proximal demonstrative ko-in all the presented images, whether still or moving.This indicates that Japanese subjects are more sensitive to distance in either a static or dynamic situation.English subjects, in contrast, responded to moving images with stronger preference for the object coming closer as the referent of the proximal demonstrative this, though they were not certain about the referent in still images.This reveals that the spatial deixis system of English differs from that of Japanese in that English often exhibits preference of (fictive) movement and orientation over distance.