Hong Min-pyo. 2016. “Research Trends of Japanese Sociolinguistics”. The Sociolinguistic Journal of Korea 24(1). 311~336. This paper provides an overview of the background of emergence and current research trends of Japanese Sociolinguistics, based on the contents of ’Language Life’ that has been published since 1956 in “Japanese Linguistic”, the official journal of the Linguistic Society of Japan (currently the Society for Japanese Linguistics). It introduces the concept of Language Life, the role and research achievements of National Institute for Japanese Language and Linguistics in study of Japanese language life, the survey on the use of common language in Tsuruoka region, the formation process of common language in Japan, the problem in researches of Japanese language life, the emergence process of Japanese Sociolinguistics, and the special theme discussed in ”The Japanese Journal of Language in Society”, which is the official journal of Japanese Association of Sociolinguistic Sciences. Furthermore, it introduces the current trends and outcomes of the researches of Contrastive Sociolinguistics, Econolinguistics, Welfare Linguistics and Language Landscape. In particular, research trends and outcomes of Welfare Linguistics offer an interesting implication that outcomes of language studies should contribute to the happiness and welfare promotion of social members, as well as pursue new truth.

This paper contrasts different of usages of honorifics in Korean and Japanese based on the actual use of honorifics Japanese and Korean high school students. Based upon such contrast this paper elucidates the following points: First, in case of direct honorifics, the differences of ages or statuses become the first standard to determine the usage of honorifics in Korean. However, in Japanese, in addition to differences of ages or statuses, the degree of closeness/ familiarity between the speaker and the listener is an important determinant. Therefore, Korean children use honorific to their parents in Korea, while Japanese children don't. Second, in case of indirect honorifics, it is widely believed that Koreans use honorific by the rule of unconditional honorific and Japaneses use it by the rule of conditional honorific. However, various factors such as the degree of familiarity or closeness between the speaker and the listener, etc. influence the usage of indirect honorifics in Korean. Therefore, the rule of honorifics for Korean and Japaneses languages is quite ambiguous. Third, in Korean honorifics, we can find conditional honorific which is also called as restrained honorific. However, it is generally not used except for in a hierarchical society such as the military.

A number of trend test methods, i.e., Military Handbook test and Laplace test etc., have been applied to investigate recurrent failures trend in repairable systems. Existing methods provide information about only existence of trend in the system. In this

Language is often described as a mirror reflecting the contemporary world, and since Meiji era, there have been many twists and turns in Japanese language policy for the last 130 years throughout the modern history. Especially the relationship between the dialects and the standard language, which has repeatedly experienced confrontations and conflicts, has been a major issue of Japanese language policy. Before the middle of Meiji era in the late 19th century, dialects were the only language used in daily lives of the ordinary people. Also, the ordinary people did not feel comfortable with the standard language. After the middle of Meiji era, dialects became the target to exterminate, as the government in the mood of the strong nationalism started promoting the standard language. After the defeat of World WarⅡ in the middle of the 20th century, dialects were losing their grounds as the common language has rapidly spread as the awareness of citizenship grew. Also, the dialect used to transmit ideas has become one of the linguistic choices based on the styles. This article is an overview of Japanese language policy in Japan, especially on the relationship between Japanese dialects and standard language and the advent of the common language.

Hong, Minpyo. 2004. A Contrastive Analysis of Selections of and Responses to Conversation Topics at the First Meeting: A Case Study of Korean, Japanese, Chinese, and Australian University Students. The Sociolinguistic Journal of Korea, 12(2). This paper conducts a contrastive analysis of dialogue topics and responses to the topics at the first meeting based on the data produced by Koreans, Japanese, Chinese, and Australians. The main research interest of this study lies in variation observed across nationality and gender. When the conversation topic at the first meeting was about entertainers, less than 20% of the respondents of the four countries reported uneasiness. More than 20% of the respondents showed discomfort regarding the topics of ideal opposite-sex type, one's phone number, or one's boy- or girl-friends. Concerning drinking capacity, most of Korean and Japanese female respondents reported uneasiness. Women of all countries felt discomfort about the topic of one's height. Korean and Japanese students overwhelmingly felt uneasy about topics of personality or future goals, but Chinese did not. Only Chinese showed discomfort about the topic of the residence place. Looking at gender variation, remarkable differences were observed in the Japanese and Australian data, but no differences were found from Koreans or Chinese. When people were asked what they wanted to know at the first meeting with a person of the opposite-sex, people from all countries preferred to know his/her name. People from Korea and China wanted to know his/her age; Japanese wanted to know where s/he was from; Australians wanted to know his/her hobbies. Koreans also liked to know his/her place of residence, but Chinese and Japanese also wanted to know about his/her hobbies.