POSSESSION AND RELATIVITY IN JAPANESE GRAMMAR: A SYNTACTIC PERSPECTIVE
Keywords:
Japanese grammar, possession, genitive case, existential verbs, noun modification, relative clauses, syntactic structuresAbstract
Possession is a core grammatical concept found in all languages, but the way it is expressed varies widely. In Japanese, possession is primarily indicated using the particle の (no), which functions as a genitive marker, as well as through existential verbs like ある (aru) and いる (iru). Unlike Indo-European languages, which rely on possessive pronouns and verb-based possession structures, Japanese employs a more syntactic approach. This paper explores how possession is conveyed in Japanese, how it interacts with relative clauses, and how it differs from other linguistic systems.
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