Research, Society, Students, and Family

2019/11/28

My specialty is phonetics and linguistics, but people outside the field often tend to think, "I have no idea what kind of research you're doing." My colleagues might get mad at me for saying this, but I don't think we're doing enough to promote our work from within academia to society. With that in mind, I conduct my research, education, and outreach activities under the motto, "Linguists, let's get out there!"

Under this banner and the guidance of my four-year-old daughter, I analyzed the names of characters in Pretty Cure. In "Fresh Pretty Cure!," characters like "Peach" and "Berry" appear. If you pay attention to how your lips move when pronouncing the beginning of these names, you'll notice that for both "Pi" and "Be," the lips close. In "Witchy Pretty Cure!," there are "Magical" and "Felice." For "Ma," the lips close, and for "Fe," the lips round. These types of sounds are called "bilabial sounds." Through systematic analysis, I found that the names of Pretty Cure characters have a statistically high probability of starting with bilabial sounds. Furthermore, bilabial sounds are often produced by babies, and my nine-month-old younger daughter is currently practicing them with great enthusiasm. In short, the connection is "bilabial sounds = babies = cute = Pretty Cure." I am grateful to my daughter for teaching me all about Pretty Cure.

I also analyzed Pokémon names. Voiced consonants (dakuon) give an impression of being "heavy." A student told me, "Each individual Pokémon has a set weight." So, I decided to analyze the correlation between the number of voiced consonants in a name and the Pokémon's weight! As it turned out, a statistically positive correlation was found. This discovery spread worldwide immediately after it was published, and Pokémon names are now being studied in various languages, including English. An international conference was even held at Keio. Perhaps by using familiar subjects for analysis, more people can come to understand linguistics.

One more point regarding the relationship between academia and society. Patients with intractable neurological diseases such as ALS lose their voices as their condition progresses. I am also helping with a project called "My Voice," which records their voices beforehand so that sentences typed into a computer can be played back in their own voice. When I introduced this in class, a student suggested, "Wouldn't communication be smoother if there were stickers to use on social media?" Thanks to that, a sticker function has now been implemented. Some students even drew copyright-free stickers for us.

In every case, ideas unique to young people have advanced the field of study. Professors, too, learn a great deal from their students and children.