The Phenomenon of the Loss of Accent in Japanese: Which Accented Patterns Tend to Be Affected?

Abstract

This paper focuses on a phonological research of the phenomenon of the loss of accent in standard Tokyo Japanese. The aim of this paper is to examine which of the accented patterns (initial, final, penultimate, antepenultimate or pre antepenultimate patterns) is most likely to be replaced by the unaccented pattern in case of wago (Japanese origin) and kango (Chinese origin). The main findings are that: a) the final and penultimate accent types are the accent types which are the most replaced by the unaccented pattern, b) the antepenultimate pattern is the pattern which is the most resistant to accent lost.