現代日本語の動詞条件形及び中止形の 脱動詞化に関する記述的研究－視覚活動を表す動詞「みる」の「みれば」「みて」の形の場合－

Abstract

Conditional form and non-finite form of verbs in modern Japanese are two of verb conjugations which function as predicates in a sentence. However, for some verbs, conditional form and non-finite form lose lexical, morphological and syntactical qualities and deverbalize to transform into grammatical form or lexical expression, such as postposition or sentence adverb. This paper put conditional form ‘mireba’ and non-finite form ‘mite’ of the verb ‘miru’ showing visual activity as a target and studied how they lose verbal features and are used. As a result, the following similarities and differences were confirmed. The common aspects shown in deverbalization are as follows: in lexical terms, the meaning that expresses concrete visual activity becomes abstract; in syntactical terms, the structure of the sentence changes into simple sentence while adjectival and nominal predicates are mainly used; and in morphological terms, the word form becomes fixed. The common ground in the usages of mireba and mite are: ① postposition that indicates the basis for certain decision or evaluation, and ② sentence adverb that suggests how to approach certain decision or evaluation. The different aspects are found in characteristics that stem from usage of the original verb form. The sentence with conditional verb form implies the possibilities of other events. This implication remains in the deverbalized usage so when mireba is used, it implies the existence of additional basis or viewpoint, though it is not expressed in the sentence. However, such implication is absent in the usage of non-finite verb form so in this case, whatever that is displayed in the sentence is narrated. In addition, only the conditional forms are used as postposition in the form of -wo mireba and mireba is used independently as a sentence adverb to describe epistemic attitude toward reality.