Storia della lingua giapponese

The book, divided into eight chapters, describes the diachronic evolution of the Japanese language, from its origins to the contemporary language. A first chapter is devoted to theories on the origin of the Japanese language and the still ongoing debate on possible genetic affiliations, while a second is dedicated to the introduction of writing in Japan and the complex writing system that developed over the centuries. The following chapters describe the linguistic evolution from 'Old Japanese', to 'Modern Japanese', through 'Early Middle Japanese', 'Middle Japanese' and 'Premodern Japanese' . The last chapter, on 'Modern Japanese', also addresses issues of dialectology and language policy that are fundamental to the comprehension of changes in language use from the period of modernisation to the present day. This is an important book for understanding the history of the Japanese language that is useful for students and scholars of Japanese as well as for linguists and language historians interested in learning more about the Japanese language.