Organizer and Chair: Alexander Vovin, University of Hawai'i, Manoa
Discussants: Juha Janhunen, University of Helsinki; Ann Kumar, Australian
National University; Gerald B. Mathias, University of Hawai'i, Manoa; Leon
Serafim, University of Hawai'i, Manoa; Alexander Vovin, University of Hawai'i,
Manoa; John B. Whitman, Cornell University
This round table will bring together specialists in linguistics and anthropology and it will center on several major issues in reconstruction of the proto-Japanese language and Japanese prehistory brought up in the research of active round table participants in recent years. I believe that the problem of Japanese origins has a complex nature, and, therefore, it is productive to have specialists from different areas to discuss it together. We will discuss such topics as: proto-Japanese root structure, anthropological and archeological evidence of Austronesian influence on Yayoi population, typological similarities and common genetic origin of transitivity switches in Japanese and Korean, recent progress in reconstruction of proto-Japanese-Korean, Central Asian influence on Japanese archipelago in prehistory, ways of migration of speakers of proto-Japanese and proto-Ryukyuan into Japanese archipelago, and Altaic nature of Japanese morphology. This round table should be of interest to specialists in Japanese, Korean, Central Asian and Austonesian linguistics, anthropology and archeology. The location of the round table at AAS 1996 Annual Meeting in Honululu seems to be ideal, since the University of Hawai'i represents a major U.S. center in Japanese historical and comparative linguistics, with three faculty members actively doing research in the field, all of whom will take part in the round table as active participants.