The Relation Between the View on the Language and Educational Ideology in the Early Meiji Period in Japan Through the Discourse of Regionalism

Abstract

In this article, the Japanese language situation in early Meiji period will be analysed from the viewpoint of the provinces. In concrete terms, the origin of the idea that "an opaque language yields an unlcear ideology" – we can often find such a discourse through Meiji, Taisho and early Showa period – will be searched for by using primary sources in northern Kyushu, the southern part of Japan. This kind of idea can be seen in the writings of teachers and professors. Consequently, educational theories and teaching methods which had spread over the country in that period will be clues to analyse this subject. Moreover, I will try to compare the concept of "opaque language" in the Taisho period, during which dialects were considered as the representative example of such a language, with what was considered "opaque language" in the early Meiji period, when the definition of dialect and the concrete form of the standard language were still vague.