2023 Volume 20 Pages 51-67
This paper strives to impact “Business Japanese” education by clarifying the Taigu consciousness, interpreted from the metalingual phrases used in business emails. A collection of 761 examples of metalingual phrases used in business emails have been mined from ten books, including textbooks, related to business emails, and websites which have authorized use of their data. These extracted examples clearly show Taigu communication dealing with “human relationships,” “time & place,” “consciousness,” “content,” and “form.” After dividing and labeling the data according to the five aspects above, including supporting lower-level concepts, the data was then organized according to what kinds of metalingual phrases can be seen in each area. Additionally, a descriptive analysis was performed for each example by considering which of the five categories the metalingual phrases pertain to, and what sort of Taigu consciousness can be derived from it. As a result, through actual metalingual phrase examples, the abstract concept of Taigu consciousness was able to be shown in an understandable way. In Business Japanese education, instead of memorizing and using business email metalingual phrases just as type of expression, it is important to have the student think about Taigu consciousness through metalingual phrases.
