Stating and Supporting Opinions in an Interview: L1 and L2 Japanese Speakers

Abstract

Stating and supporting opinions are important speech acts for language learners to develop. This article examines how speakers of Japanese as their first language (L1) state and support their opinions. Performances of second language (L2) learners of Japanese were also examined to identify the language abilities that L2 learners may need to develop. While L1 speakers often sought common ground using various mitigation devices such as -zyanai desu ka (‘‘isn’t the case that’’), -yone (‘‘y’know’’), and the modal adverb yappari (‘‘after all, as expected’’), L2 learners enrolled in a 4th-year Japanese course rarely sought common ground using these devices. In order to help L2 learners develop their ability to state and support opinions in a socioculturally appropriate way, it is important to provide guided opportunities for them to produce discourse-level exchanges beyond sentence-level opinion statements.