Four-character Sino-Japanese words corresponding to Type I in (25) nearly all func- tion as nouns, VNs, or ANs. Some examples in common use are given in (26).
(26) a. Nouns
財務大臣 zaimu-daizin‘Finance Minister’,鉄道会社tetudoo-gaisya
‘railroad company’,家庭環境 katei-kankyoo‘home environment’, 殺人事件 satuzin-ziken‘murder incident’,土地家屋 toti-kaoku‘land and buildings’
b. Verbal Nouns
出馬表明 syutuba-hyoomei‘declare one’s candidacy’,大学改革 daigaku- kaikaku‘university reform’,離合集散rigoo-syuusan‘meeting and parting’, 受注生産 zyutyuu-seisan‘make to order’,意気消沈 iki-syootin
‘depressed in spirits’ c. Adjectival Nouns
清廉潔白 seiren-keppaku‘upright and cleanhanded’,経験豊富 keiken- hoohu‘rich in experience’,利用可能 riyoo-kanoo‘usable’,単純明快 tanzyun-meikai‘simple and clear’,頭脳明晰zunoo-meiseki‘clearheaded’
In the same way as we categorized two-character Sino-Japanese words by the location of their semantic heads in section 3, we can also similarly categorize four- character S-J words. Following Kobayashi (2004), Table 7 shows the categorization of the examples in (26).
Table 7:Semantic heads in four morpheme S-J words
Nouns Verbal Nouns Adjectival Nouns
Right-hand head 財務大臣 zaimu daizin
‘Finance Minister’
出馬表明 syutuba hyoomei
‘declare one’s candidacy’
経験豊富 keiken hoohu
‘rich in experience’
Double head 土地家屋
toti kaoku
‘land and buildings’
通勤通学 tuukin tuugaku
‘commuting to work and to school’
清廉潔白 seiren keppaku
‘upright and cleanhanded’
Left-hand head none none none
Regardless of the part of speech, Noun, VN, or AN, the majority of words have right- hand heads. For example, the noun zaimu-daizin means ‘the minister (daizin) in charge of finances (zaimu)’, the VN syutuba-hyoomei means ‘announce (hyoomei) one’s candidacy (syutuba)’ and the AN keiken-hoohu(na) means ‘one’s experience (keiken) is plentiful (hoohu)’. Here the right-hand elements daizin, hyoomei, and hoohuare the semantic (and categorical) heads and the left-hand elements function as arguments to or modifiers of the heads. As for the dual-head four-character S-J words, toti-kaoku means‘land (toti) and buildings (kaoku)’, tuukin-tuugaku means
‘commute to work (tuukin) and commute to school (tuugaku)’, and seiren-keppaku means ‘having integrity (seiren) and being clear of blame (keppaku)’; in each the two constituents are semantically coordinated.
Among these categories, the verbal nouns behave in a manner closely linked to their syntactic structure. Below we will focus on four-character S-J words functioning as VNs and describe their internal structures and syntactic behaviors, as we did regarding two-character S-J words.
Since the four-character S-J words treated here all have a structure in which one two-character constituent [A-B] is followed by another two-character constituent [X-Y], in describing the internal structure we will refer to thefirst constituent (two- character S-J word) as [A-B] and the second constituent (two-character S-J word) as [X-Y]. Using this notation, four-character S-J VNs can be divided into three categories as in (27).
(27) a. [X-Y] is a VN and [A-B] is a noun representing an argument to the VN.
地盤沈下(する)ziban-tinka (suru)‘land subsidence’,危険回避(する) kiken-kaihi (suru)‘danger avoidance’,出馬表明(する)syutuba-hyoomei (suru)‘candidacy announcement’
Sino-Japanese words 117
b. Both [A-B] and [X-Y] are VNs
通勤通学(する)tuukin-tuugaku (suru)‘commute to work and to school’, 冷凍保存(する)reitoo-hozon (suru)‘preserve by freezing’,受注生 産(する)zyutyuu-seisan (suru)‘receive orders and manufacture’ c. [X-Y] is a VN and [A-B] is a noun or adjunct
私費留学(する)sihi-ryuugaku (suru)‘self-financed study abroad’, 高速回転(する)koosoku-kaiten (suru)‘revolve at a high speed’, 完全撤退(する)kanzen-tettai (suru)‘withdraw completely’
First, in the type in (27a), thefirst constituentsziban‘land’andkiken‘danger’are nouns and the second constituentstinka‘subside’and kaihi‘avoid’are VNs. Unlike the case of two-character S-J VNs, in these four-character S-J VNs the second constit- uents are the heads. Inziban-tinka, meaningziban ga tinka suru‘the land subsides’, the unaccusative VNtinka‘subside’forms a compound with its subjectziban‘land’ and inkiken-kaihimeaningkiken o kaihi suru‘avoid danger’the transitive VNkaihi
‘avoid’forms a compound with its objectkiken‘danger’. The subjects of unaccusative verbs and the objects of transitive verbs are called “internal arguments” and in ziban-tinka and kiken-kaihi the internal arguments have joined with the VNs. In contrast, there is a general constraint that “external arguments” (the subjects of unergative intransitive verbs and the subjects of transitive verbs) do not occur inside compounds and, in fact, in four-character S-J VNs as well, external arguments are excluded (Kageyama 1993; Kobayashi 2004).
(28) a. *作家自殺(する) *sakka-zisatu (suru)‘author-suicide’(cf.Sakka ga zisatu suru‘an author commits suicide.’)
b. *医師診察(する) *isi-sinsatu‘doctor-examination’(cf.Isi ga kanzya o sinsatu suru‘The doctor examines the patient.’)
However, transitive VNs compounded with their subjects are observed, apparently violating the above generalization.
(29) a. 総理主催 (のパーティ)soori-syusai(no paatii)‘(a party) hosted by the prime minister’(cf.Soori ga paatii o syusai suru‘The prime minister hosts a party.’
b. 学長主導(の大学改革)gakutyoo-syudoo(no daigaku-kaikaku)‘university reform led by the university president’(cf.Gakutyoo ga kaikaku o syudoo suru.‘The university president leads the reform.’)
Looking only at the relations within the compound, soori-syusai and gakutyoo- syudooin (29) appear to be formed of a transitive VN and its subject. Interestingly,
however, as shown in (30), these compounds cannot form a tensed verb through the affixation ofsuru.
(30) a. *総理主催したパーティ *soori-syusai sita paatii
‘the party the prime minister hosted’
b. *学長主導した大学改革*gakutyoo-syudoo sita daigaku-kaikaku
‘the university reform the university president led’
That is,soori-syusaiandgakutyoo-syudooare not VNs after all, but, as shown in (29) are a kind of adjective-like noun that carries the function of modifying the following noun (paatii‘party’ordaigaku-kakumei‘university reform’). This type of compound is not limited to four-character S-J words, but is widely used (see Chapter 7 [Kageyama, this volume]).
The four-character S-J words in (27b) are composed of two VNs. Since tuukin- tuugaku means tuukin ‘commute to work’ and tuugaku ‘commute to school’ and can be considered to have a coordinate structure, from the point of view of identify- ing the semantic head, it can be taken as having a dual-head structure. Cases like 暴飲暴食 booin-boosyoku, meaning booin ‘heavy drinking’ and boosyoku ‘heavy eating’, and連携協力 renkei-kyooryoku, meaningrenkei‘coordinate’andkyooryoku
‘cooperate’, can also be analyzed as having coordinate structures. However, not all four-character S-J VNs composed of two VNs have a coordinate (i.e. dual-head) structure. Reitoo-hozon and zyutyuu-seisan given in (27b) can be paraphrased as reitoo site hozon suru‘preserve by freezing’andzyutyuu site seisan suru‘manufacture after receiving orders’, respectively, and so the second constituents are clearly the semantic heads.
Finally, in the four-character S-J words of the type in (27c), thefirst constituents have either adjunct-like or adverbial meanings and serve to modify the second con- stituent VNs as demonstrated by the fact that, for example,sihi-ryuugaku‘self-financed study abroad’can be restated as sihi de ryuugaku (suru) ‘study abroad on private funds’, koosoku-kaiten as koosoku de kaiten (suru) ‘revolve at a high speed’, and kanzen-tettai as kanzen ni tettai (suru) ‘withdraw completely’. Furthermore, the whole four-character S-J word is a VN as are the second constituents. From these facts, it is clear that the second constituents are heads both semantically and categorically.
To conclude, except for a small number of VNs with a coordinate structure, four- character S-J VNs all have a right-hand head structure.