Many studies evidence the flexibility of speech perception in the first language (L1), which allows rapid adaptation to unfamiliar foreign accents. Two influential studies by Bradlow and Bent (2008) and a follow-up study by Baese-Berk et al. (2013) found that increased variability as a function of the number of talkers and accents facilitated the…

The phonological inventory of Old Okinawan is often reconstructed according to modern Ryukyuan languages. Although the importance of historical resources is never ignored in the study of Okinawan historical linguistics, reconstruction based on historical sources is not well investigated yet, due to the two reasons that a) authors of previous…

This paper offers a historical and sociolinguistic interrogation of Taiwanese to demonstrate the significance of language continuum in relation to identity formation. To this end, Taiwanese is discussed as a particular variety of language. Literacy practices in the Japanese colonial period (1895-1945) are contrasted with the precolonial and…

This paper compares the simplified characters of China, Japan and Singapore, based on China's list of 2295 simplified characters. Charts summarize the comparisons by numbers of characters in each country, and a comparative table lists and illustrates simplified characters in these countries. Taiwanese forms are summarized separately. (CHK)

The two issues of the journal for teachers of English as a second language in Japan include these articles: "What Do JTEs Really Want?" (Wendy F. Scholefield); "Do EFL Learners Make Instrumental Inferences When Reading? Some Evidence from Implicit Memory Tests" (Suzanne Collins, Hidetsugu Tajika); "Function and Structure…