PRE-PRINT VERSION OF: Pizziconi, Barbara.

2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic

Beliefs and the Identities of L2 Users, in Readings in Second Language Pedagogy and Second Language Acquisition In
a Japanese Context, Yoshitomi A, Umino, T. and Negishi, M., (eds.), vol 4, John Benjamins, Amsterdam: 119-153.

Learning to reframe – Japanese benefactives,

metalinguistic beliefs and L2 users’ identities
Background
This paper examines the relationship between language learning and learners’ beliefs
regarding it. It is based on learners’ “stories,” i.e., the learners’ own accounts of
“meanings” in the target language—Japanese1—the meaning of one particular family of
constructions—benefactive constructions—and the learners’ assessment of their own
learning process.
The original work on which this paper is based is a study of the patterns of acquisition
of Japanese benefactive constructions by native speakers of English. In two previous papers,
I have discussed the linguistic issues in non-native acquisition (Pizziconi 2000a) and the
concept of “benefit” in the linguistic usage of native speakers of Japanese (Pizziconi
2000b). In this paper, I return to the discussion of the performance of non-native speakers;
here, however, I will focus on metalinguistic knowledge and beliefs and what (if anything)
they can reveal about the processes of language acquisition and acculturation2.
The system of benefactive constructions in Japanese is an extremely intriguing subject
of enquiry; this is because the acquisition of this system involves different types of skills—
grammatical, sociolinguistic, pragmalinguistic, and sociopragmatic. Although some of
these are often treated as separate entities in the literature on second language acquisition
(SLA), it is obvious that the boundaries between them are far from definite (Kasper and
Rose 2002).
A sociocultural approach to language learning, by virtue of its shift in focus from
language as a self-contained and independent semiotic system to language as a tool for
acculturation and socialization (Schumann 1976, Ochs and Shieffelin 1979), allows for a
paradigm change due to which the traditional boundaries between disciplines are no longer
taken for granted. Consequently, the interactional context is considered to be instrumental
in the way in which grammar is interpreted and represented. Going a step further, some
researchers have proposed that cognitive and affective factors are not dissociated from
social factors; rather, from an ecological perspective on language-learning organisms, these
factors are inextricably integrated in networks of relationships with other organisms in
complex and rich interactive environments (Atkinson 2002)
The affective and cognitive factors involved in language acquisition are often assumed
to operate at a subconscious level; in this article, I explore the aspects of these factors that
may emerge at the conscious level. Although I am interested in the ways in which social
1
Here, the usual proviso is applicable to the language referred to in this study—the standard variety used in
Japanese media and based on the dialect spoken in Tokyo.
2
At the outset of this research, its theoretical orientation was considerably different from that illustrated in
this and in the subsequent section; this is naturally reflected in my initial questions, data collection
methodology, and terminological apparatus. However, the learners’ comments, which I had not previously
discussed, appeared to provide further insights on the issues discussed in this paper. In fact, the analysis of the
learners’ comments in relation to the data on actual performance appeared to indicate certain facts that could
be understood in a different theoretical framework—the sociocognitive approach that I briefly outline in this
paper. The study probably prompts more questions than it answers; yet, it is the first step in an exploration of
a new perspective on how socially and culturally sensitive linguistic facts are learned and acquired.
Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

and cultural issues affect language learning, and while I subscribe to the (neo-Vygotskian)
view that language is an intersubjective accomplishment, I will focus on the individual
rather than the group, and on the manner in which the individual generates cognitive
representations of the target language.
The “voices” presented in this study no longer comprise raw data obtained from
situated exchanges but are a necessarily subjective selection and (re)composition of diverse
commentaries – with all the perils that this entails. This selection has aimed to highlight the
fact that the relationship between learners’ folk theories about language learning and the
available evidence on the actuality of their performance in that language is often ambiguous.
Some working assumptions
One of the widely held assumptions regarding successful SLA is that a positive attitude
toward the target language is conducive to acquisition. Research on the relationship
between language success and learners’ attitudes has addressed aspects such as attitudes
toward the “self” (Siegal 1995, 1996, and her subjectivity theory3) and toward the native
and target cultures (Schumann 1976). Currently, it is held that successful intercultural
interaction requires “attitudes of curiosity and openness, of readiness to suspend disbelief
and judgment with respect to others’ meanings, beliefs, and behaviors” (Byram 1997: 35),
rather than merely “positive” attitudes. Understanding language as an integral part of
culture entails an assumption that the very attitude toward the target language itself—
inasmuch as it impacts on behavior—is a subject worthy of enquiry and is one of the
factors that influence language learning processes and outcomes. Past studies have
investigated learners’ epistemological beliefs regarding language and language learning
(Mori 19994, Wenden 2001); however, there still exist practically no references to the
learners’ evaluative judgments of the pragmalinguistic features of the language and what (if
anything) such features may reveal about their competence.
Strong motivation is believed to be conducive to learning via the mediating role of
attention. An interest in the target culture, the desire to integrate, and a positive
appreciation of its language are considered to be accelerating factors. In contrast, it is
generally accepted that among other factors, a negative opinion of the target language and
culture can indirectly function as a “filter” (Krashen’s 1985 affective filter hypothesis
articulates this) or an obstacle to the development (according to Schumann’s 1976 model, a
large social and psychological distance prevents acculturation). Given these working
assumptions, it is possible to expect a tendential correlation between the learners’ attitudes
toward the language (and in particular, any parts of it which may be conceptually novel to
the learners) and their proficiency. Although I did not posit any strong hypothesis regarding
a relationship between the number of benefactive structures used by the learners and their
general proficiency, I did expect to observe a developmental curve in the learners’ ability to

3
Siegal (1996: 360) delineates three qualities of subjectivity, all of which are relevant to the interpretation of
the learners’ comments discussed in this paper: a. the multiple nature of the subject, b. subjectivity as the site
of a struggle, and c. subjectivity as varying over time. The changes in a learner’s life influence his or her
subjectivity, language use, and language awareness, and at any given time, different facets of the self may
enter into complex relationships of conflict. Thus, the concept of subjectivity is both synchronically and
diachronically dynamic.
4
Mori suggests that “beliefs are in part a function of experience and learning,” and that “the nature of the
learning experience could affect the formulation of student beliefs.” These are themes that will resurface in
my discussion. My commentaries will also show that “Advanced language learners are less likely to believe
in simple, unambiguous knowledge or in the existence of absolute truth than novice learners” (1999: 409).

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

incorporate benefactives in their rhetorical repertoire, parallel to an increasingly positive or

at least “open” metalinguistic evaluation. Later discussions will reveal that this assumption
was not corroborated by the data, at least not in any straightforward way.

Another important assumption, motivated by recent developments in linguistic

theorizing, that, in my opinion, is relevant to the examination of benefactive constructions,
is that if grammar is considered to be “rooted in, and shaped by, everyday language use”
(Ford et al 2003: 119) rather than an independent module of human cognition (Hopper 1998,
Marmaridou 2000), then language acquisition should be conceived of as an interactionally
sensitive process.
Several recent approaches to language acquisition consider interaction as having a
foundational role in the development of a grammar (Kasper and Rose 2002: 166). Some
examples of such approaches are Long’s (1996) interaction hypothesis, Swain’s (1995)
output hypothesis, Lantolf’s (1999) sociocultural theory, and the various views on language
socialization (see Lantolf and Pavlenko 2001, Atkinson 2002 for a review). According to
these recent views, a crucial trigger of grammatical competence is not abstract syntactic
rules, productive as they may be, (in fact, the sociocognitive approach to grammar entirely
transforms the way in which rules are conceived), but the conventionality (or rather
institutionality) of the social uses of language. These uses themselves are embedded in the
grammar of the language: “We understand grammar as a minimally sorted and organized
set of memories of what people have heard and repeated over a lifetime of language use, a
set of forms, patterns, and practices that have arisen to serve the most recurrent functions
that speakers find the need to fulfill” (Ford et al. 2003: 122). In these models, collocations,
frequent repetition, and routines that are crystallized into ‘rituals' are assigned a crucial
“scaffolding” function, and the sociocultural milieu in which such linguistic interactions
occur is considered as a structuring factor rather than as a mere background.
The type of learner data presented in this paper allows for the speculation that the
acquisition of benefactive constructions—linguistic structures that have social and affective
correlates—is facilitated by exposure to social practices (i.e., behavior that is routinized
rather than analyzed), and that routines can become far superior carriers of social meanings
than metalinguistic explanations, overt instruction, or normative prescription. Routines, in
fact, do become such carriers despite the apparently conflicting beliefs of the learners
regarding the putative meanings of grammatical constructions. A previous analysis
(Pizziconi 2000a) provided no support to the claim that syntactic competence must precede
pragmatics. In this paper, I claim that the pragmatic meaning expressed by the benefactives
must be learned anew in Japanese, and I propose that participation in meaningful social
interactions in varied contexts is what allows for the emergence and establishment of new
“labels” for events. Thus, this participation is likely to drive lexico-syntactic competence. I
maintain that a productive use of benefactives —a truly “pragmatic” use that allows the
expression of the learner’s subjective (strategic) intention rather than an imitative,
formulaic use—is based on formulaic use and made possible by the processes of
delexicalization5 and routinization (Hopper 1998: 159)6.

5
Skehan (1998: 33) argues for a reevaluation of the role of the lexicon in language studies as against what he
considers an overemphasis on the rule-governed basis of language use; he then quotes Sinclair (1991 Corpus,
Concordance Collocation, Oxford University Press) in order to point out that “many frequent words become
delexicalized since they enter into frequent collocations and phrases, and they lose meaning to the collocation

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

Prior to illustrating the way in which the learners’ metalinguistic comments and
narratives may support this view of language learning, I will first provide an overview of
my own characterization of these structures in the subsequent section; I will then examine
the learners’ comments and describe their own characterizations. Despite the terminological
differences, it will be observed that the subtlety of the learners’ representations increases
with an increase in their proficiency. However, despite their increasingly sophisticated
descriptions, the analysis will reveal the way in which different goals within lay discourse
can be responsible for the apparent inconsistencies in reported and actual behavior and in
the meanings attributed to these structures. Further, the analysis will reveal the different
agendas underpinning such lay discourse, and scholarly discourse.

A linguistic account of benefactive constructions

I have previously referred to benefactives as structures that characterize a
communicative style (Pizziconi 2000b). I use the term “communicative style” to refer to a
culturally preferred representation of events—a “way of speaking” a-la Hymes—that is
available to the speakers of a language on account of the existence of specific linguistic
resources. Like Maynard (1998), I have also referred to benefactives as “habitual
conceptualizations of the world” (ibid.); if language is, in a broad sense, responsible for the
specific “ways” in which we construe reality, benefactives contribute to this specific
cognitive “construal” by requiring the speaker to position him/herself in a modal dimension
that involves a computation of interactional effects and an indication of the polarity of those
effects (i.e., whether they are positive or negative). It would be useful to characterize
benefactive construals as extremely productive “metaphors” (Lakoff and Johnson 1980), as
a kind of rhetorical device that allows speakers to construct a particular (and, crucially,
culturally specific) conceptualization of human relations.
While I will refrain from engaging in cross-linguistic comparisons, which are beyond
the scope of this study, I would like to mention that it has been noted (e.g., Mizutani 1985)
that the Japanese language commonly utilizes enunciations that picture a scene from the
perspective of the experiencer (b. in the examples below) rather than from that of an ideal
external spectator (a.). As an extension of this tendency—evident in cases like b. or d.—the
grammar allows for the specification of a quality of these subjective experiences. The
beneficial framing is a characterization that is available to and routinely exploited by
Japanese speakers (Clancy 1985, Miyachi 19997) because of the availability of benefactive
structures8.

as a whole.” [Benefactive constructions are one such case in which the frequent occurrence of benefactive
verbs as auxiliaries results in a dimming of their “literal” meanings and generates a quickly recognisable—
because formulaic—frame that adds a modal nuance to the event depicted.
6
“The fading of existential-situational meaning that occurs when any action is constantly repeated until it
becomes routine…we say things that have been said before. Our speech is a vast collection of hand-me-downs
that reaches back in time to the beginning of language. The aggregation of changes that are made to this
inheritance on each individual occasion of use results in a constant erosion and replacement of the sediment of
usage, which is called grammar.”
7
Although I will not discuss the diachronic development of these structures, I will, at this point, take note of
Miyachi’s (1999) suggestive observation that this is a phenomenon that characterizes modern Japanese based
on some evidence that such forms were not systematically employed until the mid-seventeenth century. The
fact that at that very time, Japanese honorifics undergo a general trend toward simplification is, for Miyachi,
not a casual co-occurrence. He notes that the trend toward a focus on the interactional dimension (i.e., the

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

a. Someone took my wallet (OBJECTIVE)

SUBJ V OBJ
b. (watashi wa) saifu wo toraremashita (SUBJECTIVE)
I-SUBJ OBJ V-PASS
My wallet was stolen (lit. I was stolen my wallet)

c. My pupils worked hard (OBJECTIVE)

SUBJ V ADV
d. seito ga ganbatte kureta (SUBJECTIVE)
SUBJ V-TE BEN
(My) pupils worked hard for me.

(SUBJ = subject; V = verb; OBJ = object; PASS = passive; ADV = adverb; BEN = benefactive).

Therefore, benefactives and “adversative” passives resemble two sides of the same coin,
i.e., of a “modality of interactional effects” or of “interconnectedness.”9 The “modality of
interconnectedness” is a structural resource (linguistically embodied in benefactive verbs
and passive constructions) by virtue of which speakers can characterize or frame actions
and events in the external world as facts with a special subjective relevance for individuals
as opposed to facts that are depicted “objectively.” Benefactive constructions achieve this
effect by means of the metaphorical use of a set of giving-receiving verbs. On account of
these linguistic forms, speakers are able to activate a frame of benefit transfer, and therefore,
are able to index an affective stance of “interconnectedness.” I use the term “frame” in the
Fillmorean sense, i.e., in reference to something that characterizes a “small abstract ‘scene’
or ‘situation,’” and that is activated by words such that the meaning of one word cannot be
understood unless the entire scene is envisioned. This includes understanding the “social
institutions or the structures of experience which they presuppose” (Fillmore 1982: 116)10.
Benefactive constructions can neither be understood nor employed appropriately unless one
is able to grasp the schematization of judgments and values that trigger the use of
benefactive verbs, including the metaphorical conceptualization of “benefit” (see Shibatani
1996 for a discussion of the “give” schema activated by benefactives11). In this sense, it is
necessary to presuppose a certain kind of cognitive representation of reality that is codified
in terms of benefit-generating actions (or conversely, as in the case of the complementary
affective category of passive constructions, adversative-effects-generating actions),

speaker’s interlocutor) and the situation-specific assessment of the relationship between the self and others
provide the motivation for the birth of this new cognitive and linguistic construal.
8
Note that even when an utterance is constructed in an active voice and with a third person subject as in d.,
the benefactive auxiliary allows the entire construction to be anchored to the speaker’s point of view.
9
See, for example, Ohtani (2005) for a discussion of important syntactic/morphological similarities and
differences.
10
In addition, a frame is “a system of categories structured in accordance with some motivating context,”
where a motivating context is “some body of understanding, some pattern of practices, or some history of
social institutions, against which we find intelligible the creation of a particular category in the history of the
language community.”
11
His discussion mainly addresses natural semantic conditions such as the following: (1.) the NP2 is human,
(2.) possessive control is interpreted abstractly (metonymic relations), and (3.) a possessive situation is
created by someone other than the possessor and is construed such that it is beneficial to the possessor.
However, Shibatani reveals the importance of local conventions when he observes that the acceptability of
benefactive constructions varies according to the conventionality of the situation (“sweeping the floor” is
more prototypical than, e.g., “smashing a centipede”).

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

benefactors, and beneficiaries. This frame is institutional in nature to the extent that it is a
socially constructed and conventionalized (though not unmodifiable) frame.
Besides broadly defining these verbs as indices of a communicative style, I would like
to highlight two important anti-deterministic qualifications. The first is that I make no
claims regarding the obligatoriness of benefactive structures in the use of Japanese (see
Pizziconi, 2000b). A speaker of Japanese may or may not choose to use these structures to
characterize an action or event. The claim that the use of these constructions defines a
communicative style is primarily derived from the existence of a pragmatic (and cognitive)
category that is linked to a set of contrasting syntactic options; consequently, these options
require/allow speakers to make such an expressive choice. Moreover, it is based on
personal observations that these structures are, in fact, routinely deployed in the whole
range of their meanings (Pizziconi 2000b). The degree to which a speaker exercises control
over these constructions varies and depends on the specifics of the utterance (whether or
not spatial deixis is necessary, whether the viewpoint is constrained by the discourse, etc.,
see below). However, there exist other means by which to maintain deictic specifications
when the benefactive implication is not intended; conversely, whenever a speaker chooses
to adopt a benefactive construction, s/he also consciously allows for the possibility of that
implication, even if it is not foregrounded.
Second, I envisage no direct link between the use of benefactive structures and the
indexing of a specific cultural identity (e.g., a Japanese “interdependent” sense of self). In
other words, I wish to avoid making any claims regarding Japanese identity based merely
on the fact that the Japanese language uses benefactive constructions. These structures
merely serve to index an affective stance that acknowledges/construes the effects of an
individual’s actions on another as beneficial. As previously mentioned, this fact may
occasionally be emphasized, while at other times, it may merely be an interpretation that is
available but not salient. Whether or not such a stance is associated with more general
identity traits is inevitably and equally dependent on situational factors as well as
individual beliefs and ideologies and hence, is contextually variable12. Nevertheless, the
very existence of these grammatical constructions permits or determines the speakers’
recourse to such conceptual characterizations and simultaneously establishes or maintains
the specific cultural practice of explicitly signaling the positive or negative effects of
certain types of human and natural events on individuals. It is not difficult to understand the
way in which this practice may very easily lend itself to the marking of identities.

The system of benefactives in Japanese has no structural equivalent in English, and

consequently, it is dealt with in rather explicit terms in textbooks and in the classroom.

12
This characterization of the relationship between linguistic forms, stances, and identities is considerably
indebted to the work of Elinor Ochs, and in particular, her papers published in 2002 and 1996 as well as her
categorization of the four interdependent dimensions of action, stance, identity, and activity. She states that
“…social groups associate particular stances with particular actions, associate these linked stances and acts
with particular social identities and activities, and associate particular activities with social identities.” (2002:
110). Identities and activities are more complex and are believed to entail particular actions and stances. On
account of space constraints, in this paper, I will not elaborate on the types of institutional activities that are
systematically linked to the particular stances that a speaker can instantiate through honorifics; however, it is
easy to find many examples of this occurrence in customer-oriented discourse and advertisements. Similarly,
one can easily observe the way in which they are linked to actions, for example, requests or appeals.

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

Benefactives are often presented as a semantically homogenous and systemically organized

conceptual category, as is seen in the following table.
GIVE RECEIVE
SUBJ (SPEAKER) > IND. OBJECT SUBJ > IND. OBJECT (SPEAKER) SUBJ < IND. OBJECT
(V-te) yaru
(V-te) ageru (V-te) kureru (V-te) morau
(V-te) sashiageru* (V-te) kudasaru* (V-te) itadaku*
* = +HONORIFIC (lexical substitutes); (SPEAKER): includes ingroups

Benefactives, or “giving-receiving” verbs (yarimorai or juju dooshi), are a set of seven

verbs in various relationships of contrast at the syntactic, semantic, and pragmatic levels.
Benefactives can be used independently or as auxiliaries. They are extremely productive
when used as auxiliaries and can be used in conjunction with almost any verb; they carry
the connotation that the action or event described by the main verb has a certain beneficial
effect on a determined recipient. To the extent that these constructions are fully
grammaticalized, their lexical meaning is (or can be) “dimmed” (see Note 5), and the
meaning of the overall structure can be glossed as follows: something happened to an
individual [and s/he was positively affected by it]13.
As space constraints do not permit me to present a detailed description of the system, it
is natural that the extremely concise outline that follows overlooks many important details.
My discussion will also pay little attention to ageru/sashiageru, which appeared in only a
few instances in the data, and which have distinct sociopragmatic constraints.
Previous accounts (see Shibatani 1996, Clancy 1986 for extensive discussions) have
discussed syntactic, semantic, and acquisitional issues. While I subscribe to a cognitive,
schema-based account such as that explored by Shibatani (1996), I would like to add the
observation that the use of benefactive constructions generates meaning on the basis of not
only the semantics of the benefactive verbs but also the contrastive network or the
relationships in which each benefactive participates.
1. A ga B wo shootai suru A invited B
2. A ga B wo shootai shite kureru A invited B (+BEN)
3. A ga B ni shootai shite morau A was invited by B (+BEN)
4. A ga B ni shootai sareru A was invited by B
5. A ga B wo shootai shite kudasaru A invited B (+BEN) (+HON)
6. A ga B ni shootai shite itadaku A invited B (+BEN) (+HON)

From a syntactical point of view, 1 is opposed to 4 (while both are non-benefactive

structures) in that the former is in the active voice while the latter is in the passive voice. A
similar opposition exists between 2 and 3 (note the grammatical cases, with kureru as an
13
Therefore, by utilizing such grammatical structures, it is possible to say that an individual gave you
something or did something for you, or also, more peculiarly, that an intransitive action has a positive effect
on or yields a positive outcome for you. The semantics of the verbs is based on the “give” constructions
(Shibatani 1996); hence, the frame that is activated is that of the transfer of beneficial actions. While
describing events in this manner, the speaker must also make an additional choice of frame that concerns
his/her social or affective deixis, i.e., which of the participants, besides the speaker him/herself, to empathize
with in the description of benefactors and beneficiaries. This is because the “giving” verbs ageru/kureru and
sashiageru/kudasaru are not symmetrical and they impose constraints on the referents who can act as givers
or recipients. See a. in the list of functions illustrated below.

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

active-like structure and and morau, a passive-like structure, cf Murakami 1986, Ohtani
2005). Semantically and/or pragmatically, 2 and 3 contrast with 1 and 4 in that a
benefactive component is added to the same propositional meaning (when 4 is a “syntactic”
passive); 2 and 3 are in opposition to 1 in that they interpret the context in terms of benefit
rather than a lack of it, and are in opposition to 4 with regard to the benefactive vs.
malefactive effects of the proposition (when 4 is an “adversative” passive). An additional
(and less problematic) distinction is that between the non-honorific constructions in 2 and 3
and the honorific constructions in 5 and 6. Coincidentally, this distinction serves to
demonstrate the inadequacy of the analyses of the distinct levels of syntax, semantics,
pragmatics, or sociolinguistics in their attempt to describe the multiple dimensions that are
simultaneously called into question in the choice of either term.
The following is a brief account of the manifold functions of benefactives (reproduced
from Pizziconi 2000a). Benefactives contribute to the determination of the following:
a. A spatial deixis, i.e., who does what for/to whom. This aspect is particularly relevant
since the use of pronouns is not crucial to the construction of an utterance. For example,
invitations that are “sent out” are marked with ageru, and those that are received are
marked with kureru, as in “shootai shite ageru/kureru.”, in which it is not necessary for
any referents to be explicitly marked; these are additionally constrained by specifications
of the speakers’ empathy toward other participants. Speakers and their ingroups can only
be referenced by the subjects in ageru constructions and the indirect objects in kureru
constructions; therefore, by choosing either one of these auxiliaries, it is possible to
indirectly index “whose side an individual is on.” This is linked to the choice of:
b. voice/viewpoint in the active-like “give” and passive-like “receive” constructions14. For
example, “A ga B wo shootai shite kureta” (A invited B) is an active-like construction
wherein A is an agent. This is in contrast to “A ga B ni shootai shite moratta” (A was
invited by B), wherein A is the patient.
c. Viewpoint cohesion, the absence of which leads to the formation of nejirebun (lit. twisted
sentences), i.e., ill-formed sentences with more than one viewpoint (Tanaka 1999). For
example, “tomodachi ga haruyasumi ni ryookoo ni ikanai ka to sasotta keredomo, okane
mo hima mo nai node kotowatta” (my friend invited [me] to travel with him during the
spring holidays, but I declined since I cannot afford it). On account of the absence of the
verb kureru, the event cannot be anchored to the speaker and consequently, the
viewpoint of the two clauses is “disjointed.”
d. social deixis, through the selection of honorific or non-honorific options. For example,
“A ga B wo shootai shite kureta vs. kudasatta” (A invited [±honorific] B), “A ga B ni
shootai shite moratta vs. itadaita” (A was invited [±honorific] by B).
e. affective stance, which evokes an acknowledgement of interconnectedness or
indebtedness. For example, “Taroo wa su-pa- e itta” vs. “itte yatta” (“Taroo went to the
supermarket” vs. “Taroo went to the supermarket for her”).
Benefactive constructions are therefore motivated at different levels, have different
constraints on their use, and can be “read” more or less literally (i.e., their “prototypical”

14
Pizziconi (2000a) finds that learners appear to prefer active-like constructions. This may be related to the
preference for objective constructions, like those mentioned above, in the English language.

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

benefactive meanings can be more or less salient)15. The use of a benefactive implies the
potential availability of grammatical, social, and affective meanings on account of the
paradigmatic relations in which they participate; the relevant meaning must be determined
by the participants on the basis of the situational context.
Incidentally, it should also be noted that benefactives participate in a number of
conventional (deferential) structures such as [causative + morau/itadaku] (e.g., “setsumei
sasete itadakimasu,” i.e., “I’ll explain this for you”), formulaic expressions (e.g.,
“ippantekina goshitsumon ni tsukimashite wa kochira wo sanshoo shite toiawasete
kudasaimasu yoo onegai itashimasu,” i.e., “please refer to this for general enquiries,” and
idioms such as “nosete itadaku,” which means “to get a lift.” (The last example, in fact,
appears in my database.) Although there are different types of constraints on the use of all
these expressions, it is natural that they make significant contributions to the process of
learning the constructions. This is because they not only make the constructions more
visible and salient, given their common occurrence, but also more memorable. They can be
used as readymade chunks before the learners are able to analyze their structures.
Given the variety of the possible valences of a benefactive form, learners are faced with
the task of determining the extent to which these meanings should be interpreted literally
(Byalistock 1993). Socialization is functional to the development of a “commonsense”
interpretation on the basis of the knowledge of conventional conceptualizations that is
derived from extended use. To the extent that it is necessary for the individual to learn
which actions can be taken for granted and which can be consigned a beneficial
characterization (see Pizziconi 2000b), it is clear that it is a socially constructed perception
of reality that is being referred to; therefore, it is possible to assume that the “benefit
metaphor” is acquired through participation in activities in which it has a social
significance. If this is a habit as described by Bordieau—a disposition that one develops
through extensive exposure to learned worldviews —it would be expected to emerge from
discourse rather than from texts (see Widdowson 1995: 70, Roberts et al. 2001: 80), and
from dynamic exchanges (even in the social context of a classroom) rather than from
structurally-oriented books on grammar.
In order to reveal the significance of this cognitive construal, it may appear natural or
even unavoidable to take recourse to a cultural notion of “interconnectedness” (the concept
that action and language are “regulated” by the same conceptual system is the tenet of
cognitive approaches to metaphor, e.g., Lakoff and Johnson 1980), especially if this
construal is perceived to be “in sync” with the cultural metalanguage of social
relationships in Japan16. However, I will argue against a pedagogic treatment of these
15
However, when these auxiliaries are used with intransitive verbs—which are peripheral cases of the use of
the prototypical “give” construction, as in Shibatani’s (1996) analysis—the preferred reading would have to
be that of the “affective” meaning.
16
I am referring to the extensive literature on the collectivistic, hierarchy-conscious, duty-bound Japanese
orientations and their reflections in the individual sphere: situated selves, inter-subjective psychology, and
dependency bonds. Works with this orientation are too numerous to be listed here; however, there is very little
literature that discusses the ideological underpinning of these constructs. One of the few notable exceptions is
Befu Harumi’s recent (2001) Hegemony of Homogeneity, Trans Pacific Press. Nevertheless, such
deconstructions must question the “innateness” or the motivation for, rather than the existence of practices
(for example, greetings on subsequent encounters that acknowledge previous exchanges: “kono aida
doomo…”) through which individuals are socialized to be sensitive to their social surroundings and to the
manner in which a wide range of actions is likely to affect them. The generation of chains of indebtedness and
sustained interrelatedness is an example of the way in which this occurs.

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

structures, which disentangles their lexical meaning from the network of other meanings
described above and encourages an essentialist reading of the metaphor. The adoption of
such an approach serves only to reinforce cultural stereotypes which although unlikely to
entirely prevent acquisition are, nevertheless, likely to retard or unnecessarily hinder it, and
does not contribute in anyway to the acquisition of the structures as a linguistic resource.
Learning the metaphorical structuring of a language both cognitively and affectively is
crucial because “‘metaphorical imagination is a crucial skill in creating rapport’ [sic:
quoted but not referenced]. Understanding how a speaker is using a metaphor—the webs of
meaning entangled in it—is a way of sharing and perhaps empathizing with that speaker”
(Roberts et al. 2001: 73). However, we will examine the way in which undue stress on the
cultural correlates to the expenses of the mere linguistic convention may result in a clash
with the cultural values of the learners and provoke unnecessary misconceptions.
In this paper, I have listed the functions of benefactives, ranging from those that are the
most syntactically motivated to those that are the most expressive and affectively motivated.
This type of cataloguing inverts the phylogeny of these constructions (whereby the
auxiliary use is derived from the metaphorical adoption of the lexical value of the
benefactives in increasingly generalized structures, to the extent that the benefactives
become entirely grammaticalized and their original lexical meaning is diluted as a result of
routinized usage, Hiraga 1999, Hopper 1998). In contrast to the received conceptualization
of these constructions by native speakers (NS), who appear to be largely unconcerned with
the literal meaning of the auxiliaries in complex constructions, learners (arguably on
account of teaching conventions as well) appear to be fairly sensitive to the lexical meaning
of the auxiliaries. As is evident in their reports, this is the factor responsible for triggering
and, crucially, constraining the learners’ interpretation of constructions in the early stages
of learning.

The learners’ metalinguistic comments

Pizziconi’s (2000a17) analysis concluded that no direct progression from the compulsory
to optional uses of benefactives could be observed, and that the semantics of the verbs
were of no assistance in the prediction of the accuracy of the use18. However, in general
17
The method included an oral interview and a written questionnaire (both in Japanese) as well as a post-test
discussion. In this discussion, the beginners/intermediate learners invariably chose to speak in English, while
the advanced learners frequently switched between English and Japanese. In these post-task sessions, I
accumulated further demographic data, obtained clarifications of the learners’ intended meanings in the
interview, disclosed the object of my research to them, and documented their metalinguistic judgements
regarding the constructions and their own performance. There was an extensive variation in the scope of these
judgements, depending on the students’ proficiency level, the time available to them, and other personal
factors.
18
Pizziconi (2000a) assumed that compulsory uses, i.e., uses demanded by the need for deictic specification,
would be more “transparent” to learners than those that were more “volatile,” i.e., the optional and subjective
expressions of affective stances. At present, this assumption, which was based on an NS’s parameter of
grammatical normativity rather than on a universal criterion of semantic clarity, appears to be slightly
arbitrary. The perplexing results, which indicated that even advanced users could “miss” the obligatory uses
and that some beginners could produce non-obligatory constructions, may be advantageously revisited from
the viewpoint of the ease of the association of a determined situation with a frame of “benefit transfer.”
Although cases such as the use of benefactives in the case of oshieru (to teach) or their avoidance in the case
of sagasu (to search) could perhaps be explained from this viewpoint, their use in conjunction with noseru
(literally, “to put on,” but appearing in a formulaic use in “to give a lift”) and their avoidance in conjunction
with shookai suru (to introduce) would, nevertheless, require another explanation.

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

(albeit only at the group level), both the frequency and accuracy of use increased with the
proficiency of the learners, thereby demonstrating their increasing ability to adjust to the
preferred conceptualization (and mapping) of the target language/culture. This is evident in
Chart 1. Note that this is no more than an indication of the learners’ increased
“confidence”; a qualitative description of expressive uses must be examined individually. I
will refer to the specific uses while illustrating the data.

8 4 8
novice

40 11 17
intermediate

90 5 11
advanced

0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%

correct misused avoided

CHART 1: BENEFACTIVES USED/MISUSED19/AVOIDED PER PROFICIENCY LEVEL (NNS)

The chart provided below compares the frequency of the use of benefactives among both
the native speakers and learners during the 30-minute slots in which the interviews were
conducted. The apparently curious result that the use of benefactives among advanced
learners exceeds that among native speakers will also be discussed in the next section.

9.5
NS (10)

advanced (7)

13.7

4.6
intermediates (11)

3
novices (4)

0 2 4 6 8 10 12 14

CHART 2: AVERAGE NUMBER OF OCCURRENCES X GROUP (NS = 10, NNS = 22)

19
“Misuse” indicates the use of kureru in place of morau or vice versa, or the use of inaccurate case particles,
e.g., [Int: did you call by yourself?] and NNS21: “...*okaasan kara tasukete kuremashita” [*from my mother
(I) helped].

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

I will now present and discuss the learners’ own metalinguistic comments. Although this
study focuses on the learners’ metalinguistic assessments of their performance in the use of
these constructions and not on their actual use, their performance at the group level and
their individual performance when individual cases are presented will also be illustrated
briefly in order to place their comments in perspective20. Occasionally, I will also quote
remarks made by my own students, who participated in a survey on benefactives on a
separate occasion21. This is done in order to corroborate some of my observations with the
learners’ own statements.

Beginners and Intermediate learners

Beginners do, occasionally, use benefactive constructions (three instances of use per
subject as opposed to an average of 7.5 instances of use per subject across all proficiency
groups); however they use them less frequently and less fluently than other groups (see
Pizziconi 2000a: 9). These learners are, in general, aware of the structural properties of
benefactives. However, they do, at best, possess passive competence, or active competence
below the level of automization (see McLaughlin 1987) that is necessary to employ
benefactives fluently in the course of natural conversation. More important, the
metalinguistic awareness of these learners is also largely confined to an awareness of the
formal properties of the constructions, while pragmalinguistic functions are, in general,
neglected.
This group utilizes benefactive constructions merely in contexts that are semantically
clear (yuujin ga oshiete kureta = my friend told me/explained to me) or in formulaic,
idiomatic uses (Kyoto made nosete moratta = I was given a lift to Kyoto).
In general, the manner in which this group constructs an utterance continues, to a great
extent, to reflect the cognitive conceptualization – and the linguistic instantiation – of their
native tongue’s system. Consequently, the use of benefactives is never motivated by an
attempt to produce a framing of events foregrounding affect, and it can be “forgotten” even
in contexts wherein the syntax of Japanese obligatorily requires deictic specifications. The
existing cognitive frames show no indication of being modified or restructured irrespective
of the circumstance—learners are likely to adapt new information to what they already
know— in the same way that the conceptualizations of the target language are shaped by
those of the native language, “target language words and structures are ‘carriers’ of […]
native concepts” (Danesi 1993, quoted in Lantolf 1999: 43). Beginners, who are engaged in

20
The constructions analyzed in the two previous studies, which are the targets of the learners’ comments, are
those in which benefactives appear as auxiliaries and those in discourse that reports events rather than direct
appeals, i.e., discourse in which many requestive expressions are conventionally used in conjunction with
benefactives. In this study, the students are identified by numbers, e.g., NNSn.
21
These are retrospective comments that were obtained in a written survey conducted in 2004, in which
second and third year students participated voluntarily. Here, these comments are used to illustrate certain
general points from the perspective of the learners rather than that of the researchers. The survey comprised
the following five questions: (1.) did you find benefactives difficult to understand when you first encountered
them in year one?; (2.) did you start using them straight away or did you tend to avoid them and use other
expressions instead (if so, which expressions)?; (3.) at present, do you use them naturally in conversation?;
(4.) what do these verbs tell you about the “Japanese” way of speaking?; (5.) do you have any comments
regarding the learning and use of these forms? The students in this study are identified by a coded initial, e.g.,
XYn.

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

the extremely demanding task of extracting meaning from the overwhelmingly rapid
stream of speech, can barely attend to the technicalities of such complex functional
structures. One of the beginners participating in this research (NNS6) made a rather
revealing statement when he commented on his use of benefactives as follows: “I don’t pay
attention to them unless I am in an exam.”
The particular framing conveyed through the use of benefactives—which necessarily
involves the adoption of a specific affective stance—is likely to be redundant information
unless some other intervening factors permit a shift in attention to target language-specific
meanings and forms. Such factors must include both a procedural dimension, i.e., the
freeing of additional attentional resources from low-level manipulations by means of
repeated practice, and a social dimension, namely, the “shared experience” that serves as
the foundation for the establishment of networks of new conceptual categories. (Roberts et
al. 2001: 59).
The following are extracts from the post-interview discussions, in which a Japanese NS
research assistant and I would typically ask learners to repeat—in English—descriptions of
events that they had previously recounted in Japanese (which prompted or could have
prompted the use of a benefactive construction). This procedure was an attempt to outline a
rationale for the use, or lack thereof, of these constructions and to obtain information on the
way in which the students learned them, etc.

NNS15 is a female American learner aged 20 years, who studied Japanese for six years in
Hawaii and spent three months in Japan. Her proficiency level has been assessed as
Novice+. She displays an almost total avoidance of benefactives in both the written
questionnaire and the oral interview22.
Int: Do you use them consciously? Or do you avoid them consciously?
NNS15: Sometimes I try and use them but they are really hard and it’s very confusing between ageru and
kureru…. I avoid using morau because I always think I can substitute kureru with morau, or if not I
just switch the ageru people around.
Int: Normally morau is not considered to be complex because it is more like ‘receive’23, whereas with
kureru the subject has to be someone else, so you have to be talking about that person….But you
seem to think morau is more complex….
NNS15: yes, because…you see, with kureru you can just use that one person, and be stating that “you or
someone really close to you receives something from that person”, whereas I think pronouns are
what make morau and kureru all that more complicated, because you have “somebody ga somebody
ni…”, and it is really hard to relate the two pronouns plus which verb to use.
[…]
Int: Do these verbs allow you to express what you want, or you simply don’t use them frequently because
you don’t think about them….
NNS15: I don’t think I use them that frequently but… it really helps to express more…Its a good thing that
we have, because it allows you to say something without creating a separate sentence, but… it is
really difficult to use so sometimes I do try to avoid it.
[…]
Int: Can you think of any other device that you use in their place, to show you are appreciating their
doing something for you…

22
She uses kureru in only three instances; in fact, in two of these, kureru is mistakenly used in place of morau.
23
Morau (to receive) sets no pragmalinguistic constraints on the choice of the subject. In contrast, ageru (to
give ‘outward’) can only be used when the speaker (or someone in his in-group) coincides with the giver, and
kureru (to give ‘inward’) in the specular case of when the speaker or someone in his in-group are the receivers.

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

NNS15: I would only use something like…“she did something and I was ureshikatta [=happy]”. […] But
then we spent… maybe a day in several months on them…

Despite their praise for the economy of this device, these “novice” learners are generally
unable to recognize the occurrences of benefactives and are also aware that they lack
control over the use of these verbs; therefore, they actively resort to avoidance strategies or
rely on “safe” formulaic uses. This is a cognitive limitation that probably cannot be
changed by instruction to the same extent that it can be changed by repeated practice. One
of my own students reports the following strategy:

DK3: It is was a fairly safe bet to stick with set phrases such as "-te itadakemasen ka" or "-te kudasai" for
requests and just to avoid using them at all when talking about third parties etc.

Moreover, perhaps as a consequence of this limitation, the evaluations of the learners at

this stage were not very detailed but merely comprised a general expression of confusion
with regard to this rather complex set of grammatical structures.

JM2: Yes, in fact it is quite confusing that there are so many words for “give” and “receive,” and the use of
the “ni” (which can mean “to” or “from” in English) is quite tricky.

The fact that it is possible to construct multiple, similar benefactive phrasings does,
indeed, result in much confusion—pragmalinguistic nuances are difficult to tease out even
when the syntactic workings have been clarified.
AB3: I wouldn’t say difficult to understand but sometimes I used to confuse the meaning, for example:
‘tomodachi ni kami wo kitte moratta’ and ‘tomodachi ga kami wo kitte kureta’. I wasn’t sure if that meant
that ‘I asked my friend to cut my hair for me’ or ‘my friend just did it of his own intention’.

JHMA: Didn't start using them straight away. Generally I just used the main verb with no indication of who
was doing what for what [sic]. I often would realise later that I could have used them and then would work
out what i could have said. However, this didn't mean that I used them easily on future occasions - I'm not
sure why.

Along with this obvious procedural tentativeness, the most significant cognitive
distinction between the beginner group and the high-proficiency group is that the beginners
prefer to restrict themselves to “familiar” meanings, in the expression of which there is
neither the space nor the need for yarimorai constructions.

The use of benefactives among intermediate-level learners is slightly more frequent

(approximately 4.5 uses per subject); however, their performance continues to lack
confidence (along with 40 correct uses, 18 instances of avoidance and 13 of misuse were
documented in all). Nevertheless, it is possible to observe cases such as the following, in
which benefactives appear to have fallen entirely into a “blind spot.”

NNS14: This lower-intermediate level learner represents an extreme case at the lower end
of the spectrum since he entirely avoided benefactive constructions in both the written
questionnaire and the oral interview (for example, his response to the interviewer’s

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

question sensei wa naoshite kureru n desu ka [does the teacher correct+BEN you?], was iie,
naoshimasen [no, he does not]). The learner is an American male aged 20 years, who
studied Japanese for two years in America and spent four months in Japan.
Int: Do you think you don’t use them because you don’t understand the meaning or is it a meaning you
don’t want to express?
NNS14: Neither, I think. I believe I understand the meaning, and I have been taught the meaning and the right
time to use it, but it’s not something that I am familiar with using, its a concept that… you know…
“to do something for another person”... I am more used to just saying: “he read the book for me”,
rather than saying “He read the book for me doing me this favour”.
Int: It’s interesting that you said that, because in textbooks this meaning is exaggerated, but in fact they
are just grammatical devices.
NNS14: Perhaps, but I was also taught “watashini” would be another way of saying “for me” or “on my
behalf”, so because of that I think I hardly use it, and also in conversation I found that friends
weren’t using them, so perhaps, I was maybe misled, but I was given the impression that it wasn’t
exactly the same....
Int: It’s interesting that in English you said: “they really try hard to explain to me”. So obviously you are
acknowledging that it was not something that you can take for granted, but they were making an
effort for you, which is exactly the meaning that a verb like kureru would express… but still you
never used it in Japanese. So, it’s not that you are not aware of....
NNS14: No, I am very much aware of it, I studied it about a year ago and we studied it in intensive language
[??], and occasionally I also use it in class though I hardly ever use them in conversation. I am aware
of not using them, but I think…though I understand it I maybe don’t know when to use them, or
maybe I am not exactly comfortable with them.
Int: [....] Are you aware of your friends using them?
NNS14: If they used it I think I’d notice it, though I usually don’t think I would think anything of it, other
than. ..maybe what you said about the direction, but at the same time I don’t think I would respond
by using the opposite.
Int: When you say, “my friend called me”, how do you say that in Japanese?
NNS14: “tomodachi wa watashi ni denwa shita” or “moratta”.
Int: But you know that you could use “denwa shite kureta”.
NNS14: I would use “watashini “ because there it translates English more directly, because if you say “denwa
wo shite kureta” I as a subject never comes into this, and so if you say “watashini” at least the
sentence is more structured.
Int: That’s interesting; so it helps you make the structure clear.
NNS14: It’s because I am still thinking in English and I haven’t yet.... it took me five years before I could
start thinking in French so, I know that after 2 years of study it’s not a point yet where I can think in
Japanese.

In addition to his diffidence toward the complexities of this set of verbs and the tailoring of
Japanese utterances to fit English conceptual frames, it is interesting to note that in his
answer to the first question, NNS14 mentions the lexical meaning of the verbs. It can be
argued that it is the notion of a “favor” that is conspicuous upon the introduction of these
verbs (often because of the way in which they are introduced), and that this notion will be
considered to be the primary aspect of meaning in all the uses of these verbs. However,
even in cases in which this benefactive connotation can be acknowledged, these verbs
continue to retain an element of unfamiliarity; this can make learners uncomfortable with
actively employing them. I will return to the critical issue of the largely literal readings of
these verbs later.
While intermediate learners who are at a slightly more advanced level continue to be
aware that their performance is conditioned by the demands of spontaneous conversation on

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

processing time, they appear to approach a threshold at which they begin to “get the feel”
of the constructions.

NNS21’s use of benefactives is largely correct—eight out of twelve uses in the

questionnaire and five uses in the interview were correct, and there was only one instance
of misuse. NNS21 is an intermediate-level learner—an American male aged 19, who
studied Japanese for four years and spent three months in Japan.
NNS21: I know the difference but I don’t use them, I don’t know how to use them.
Int: Do you know if and how your friends use them?
NNS21: I hear a lot of kureru and morau but I don’t hear much of the other ones…
Int: That is very likely if you only talk with friends. But you used it in Sentence 1 [of the questionnaire:
tomodachi ga pa-ti ni kite kurete, ureshikatta], which is surprising because you don’t seem to be
using them like this [optional uses, BP] in conversation […]
NNS21: I did think about it. I thought about whether I should use kureru or not and then I tried to think of
how a Japanese would say it, and so I thought it would be kite kuremashita. […] It is a matter of
having time to think about it […] One problem for me is that I just use intuition, so knowing the
rules doesn’t really help, I need to get a feeling that it is “right.”
Int: Would you find it strange if someone said, “Okaasan ga yorokonde kureta”?
NNS21: No, I would find it all right.
Int: But would you use it yourself?
NNS21: I would probably say, “Okaasan ga totemo ureshikatta.”. It doesn’t come naturally to use it, but if I
hear it I think, “Oh, yeah.”

The accumulation of linguistic experience is crucial in that it facilitates the perception of

what “sounds native” (which can be considered evidence of a computation of what is
frequent and conventional in the input). Further, it allows for the adoption of novel and
more complex constructions, including benefactives, that are divergent from the initial
repertoire, thereby admitting a new type of “metaphor” (the benefit-transfer metaphor) into
this repertoire.
MDMA: […] However, after a few weeks, I could understand ageru, morau, kureru, itadaku, etc. It wasn't
until I went to Japan that I really got the hang of how to use them with other verbs […]. I think it took me
about six months or so of being in Japan to be able to use these constructions without thinking too hard about
them. Before I really understood how to form a sentence like “Tomodachi ga kite kurete, ureshikatta,” I
would have probably said something like “Tomodachi ga kite, ureshikatta.”

My claim is that the working of the benefactive structure is similar to that of the Trojan
horse. The metaphor is gradually adopted on the grounds that it is used for syntactic and
discoursal reasons and hence occurs frequently in the input. However, it carries the
potential for constructing new “frames,” and hence, for evoking new stances and ultimately,
constituting new identities. The structure opens up new avenues in the sociocognitive
landscape once it has been integrated into a linguistic repertoire. However, and perhaps
paradoxically, this is likely to occur at a level at which the structures have become
formulaic, i.e., at a level at which they are fluently manipulated as chunks of “native”
behavior with a lower lexical and a stronger grammatical valence.
This “infiltration” of a new metaphor into an individual’s repertoire is probably not a
“naturally” conscious process; nevertheless, a particular linguistic sensitivity, a solicited
introspection, or a professional analytical interpretation could presumably bring it to

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

consciousness. However, the sociocognitive construction of the frames is impervious to

introspection, and thus lends itself to the creation of personal narratives that can then be
used for argumentative and social purposes.
Advanced learners
The connotations of my use of the term “Trojan horse” may be further illustrated by the
words of NNS20, an advanced learner. It is interesting that the rather dismissive remarks
that follow are those of a person who is not only the most prolific user of benefactives in
the entire group but also a person who uses them rather liberally. Some of the situations she
describes are clearly benefactive, such as a teacher providing her with a reference letter
(suisenjo wo kaite kudasaimashita) or her Japanese boyfriend not correcting her mistakes
despite her expectation that he should do so (naoshite kurenai). Some of the other situations
described by this learner were less obviously benefactive, for example, neighbors not
initiating conversations (hanashikakete kurenai), other people being able to understand her
when she spoke in Japanese (wakatte kurereba…), and her becoming interested in Japanese
because of a teacher who showed the students videos in class (bideo misete kuremashita).

NNS20 is a female learner from New Zealand; she is 23 years old and has studied Japanese
for nine years. She has lived in Japan for two years. She uses benefactives more frequently
than any other learner (24 occurrences in the interview), and a majority of these are very
accurate.
Int: As far as keigo [honorifics] is concerned, you seem to be shifting from kureru to kudasaru at
random…
NNS20: Is not something……I mixed them for a long time…all through high school basically…they are a
mystery to me…once I got into university and my teacher…I had the context so I had to ask for
things […] or asking for various things in class…But it’s still the keigo [honorifics], and as an
English speaker, sometimes I don’t see the necessity.
Int: But there is no really polite implication in most of the uses of kureru…
NNS20: When I am using them I don’t use them so much thinking that these people are doing something for
me. I think it just makes it [the action] clearer.

If the learner’s intention in the abovementioned instances was merely to “make the
action clearer,” she could have used, for example, –te kuru constructions, passives, or even
the main verb without an auxiliary; however, she did not do so. Her statement regarding not
“seeing the necessity” of using benefactives (which she considers to be keigo) cannot be
considered a reflection of her actual frequency of usage (24 occurrences, as opposed to an
average of 9.5 occurrences among native speakers).
It may be held that this learner has learned to use benefactives as a kind of stencil, i.e., a
convenient device that can be used in a variety of novel situations. She claims that she uses
them only “to make the situation clearer”; therefore, she is aware that benefactives do not
always carry a strong lexical meaning. This indicates that they are used as grammatical
devices in a manner evocative of the way native speakers construe their use of these
structures. However, the high number of benefactives used raises the question of whether
this learner is still capable of making deliberate pragmatic choices regarding the use of
benefactive and non-benefactive framings, or whether this has turned into a case of
conditioned hypercorrection. I will return to this question after examining two more cases.
The most perplexing characteristic of the metalinguistic judgments of the most
advanced learners is that they indicate a discomfort with the use of benefactive verbs,

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

which is, in fact, not at all reflected in their actual performance. These learners are
relatively self-assured and fluent in their use of benefactive constructions and, quite
surprisingly, they not only match but also exceed the frequency with which native speakers
use them. This can be observed in Table 2.
Many learners answered the general question on benefactives by referring to a moral
dimension, thereby suggesting that this dimension may indeed be salient in their conceptual
schema.

EG3: To me, these type [sic] of expressions demonstrate an emphasis in Japanese to show gratitude to people
who do something for you. I suppose it may be related to the concept of “giri”—the idea that you owe this
person something for their favor.

JM2: The fact that “to give” or “to receive” is used so commonly for actions (in English, for nouns defining
tangible things) is maybe another indication of the “girishakai,” i.e., the grammar supports the idea of
obligation.

Keigo is often mentioned in relation to benefactives; however, we have seen that the
honorific meaning is conveyed by only one of the many paradigmatic oppositions
described above. The learners’ comments regarding keigo and its ideological underpinnings
were considerably more homogenous than their varied geographical and cultural
backgrounds would have suggested. However, in addition to a few negative comments on
the nature of such a moral order (which occur again in the interviews presented below),
their comments also appear to hint at the mere fatigue resulting from constantly paying
attention to such social dimensions.
SG3: I think these verbs are another way of reinforcing the hierarchical system which underpins Japanese
society.

DB3: Yet another way of indicating the social status of oneself and other people. It’s a little bit positive and
negative I suppose. I found it particularly annoying to have to show what I thought of my relationship with the
other person all the time. I didn’t mind being polite, but would have like to been able [sic] to speak neutrally
without having to indicate social status.

Although the mechanics of their linguistic features are becoming decreasingly onerous,
benefactive constructions can still be construed as having a purpose that is, in certain
respects, at odds with the learners’ social identity. The learners’ comments—even when
they are not corroborated by data on the learners’ actual performance—indicate that the
social system and cultural values that underlie or are reflected in these structures are
potentially misaligned with the learners’ sense of self. Benefactives, therefore, epitomize
what can be termed a prototypical site of struggle.
While NNS20’s succinct statement suggests that keigo is of little use to English speakers,
NNS24, the subsequent learner, provides a much more vivid description of such a linguistic
ideology.
This learner is a fluent speaker and produces complex utterances such as “heya ga aite iru
koto wo oshiete moraenakatta” (I couldn’t get them to tell me that there was a spare room),
“tomete morainagara heya wo sagashite ita” (I looked for a room while being put up there),
or “omoshiroku, okashiku hanasashite moratta ndakedo” (They kindly let me have
interesting and funny conversations with them); yet, during self-assessment, he apparently

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

stated that his use of these structures is no more than an opportunistic stance that is linked
to his need for connections.

NNS24 is an American male aged 27 years, who studied Japanese for four years, spent two
and a half years in Japan, and whose proficiency level has been assessed as Superior. He is
a frequent, though not always orthodox, user of benefactives (ten occurrences in the oral
interview).
NNS24: I don’t really know how I use these verbs. I learned them in context when I was doing my internship
and dealing with a lot of different people, and from a book, Gone fishin’, that has had a great
influence on me.
[….] I use morau more often. But I don’t know if this is because when you learn one form, you
always use that and avoid the others.
[.…] I think that I use morau when it is me having them do something, whereas I use kureru when
people do things out of their own will.
[….] I think I have learned them as set phrases.
[….] I don’t only use them naturally or spontaneously, but I need to think about it, for example,
“[kippu no] sagaku wa Takamatsu kara harawashite moraemasu ka” [Can I (lit. Can I be allowed
to) pay the difference from Takamatsu station?]. I think I thought about it while I was walking up to
the conductor, but maybe this is a mainly interactional trick [a set phrase?, BP] and has none of the
problems of kureru and morau on the syntactic level.
[.…] I do think of these verbs as something that is not really me. I am much more polite in Japanese
than I would be in English. If I am dealing with a situation where I am interviewing somebody or
somebody I just met, where I want to be nice to them or I’m kind of depending on them, I am this
little student from nowhere and he is such a busy person; I want to interview this person and so I am
trying to be polite, and it is like “if I could be that polite in English” I would be, but there is no... you
know, there is only so much you can do.
[…] I think I use itadaku a lot, but not kudasaru—it just seems too much. Itadaku is not so terribly
polite but Kudasaru is, and I don’t hear it much; I associate it with an old woman in a
kimono…Itadaku seems less of a jump from morau than kudasaru from kureru. Sashiageru sounds
very arrogant.

Again, we observe the way in which benefactives tend to be seamlessly intertwined with
keigo, which tends to be perceived as “foreign.” Keigo and benefactives are generally
regarded as being “difficult,” complicated, and unnecessarily pervasive, and are usually
perceived as being in conflict with one’s real persona and communicative needs (an
investigation of the extent to which this is the result of teaching methods and the
predominance of the stereotypical representation of the uses of keigo remains a major topic
for further research).

NNS19 is a female American learner aged 31 years; her proficiency level is Superior and
she has studied Japanese for nine years and lived in Japan for two years. Her oversights are
merely occasional (one instance of misuse and one of avoidance in the oral interview);
however, the most striking feature of her speech is her frequent use of a variety of
benefactives—17 occurrences in the interview, many of which are in non-conventional or
non-compulsory environments; i.e., they are affective uses such as “[ryuugakusei senta-de]
yasashiku yatte kureru ndesuga” (kindly did [things] for me [at the foreign student office])
or “josei no hou ga kanrinin wo shite kurete imasu” (she acts as caretaker for us).
[Commenting on some NS’s use of kureru to refer to their own students doing the homework]:

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

NNS19: […] the students must do their homework, so…I see it objectively, and I don’t think that they should
do it for me, but if a Japanese girl said “gakusei ga benkyou shite kureru,” I wouldn’t think okashii
[odd], but jibunwa sou iu waku de kangaete inai to omoimasu. [I don’t think along those lines.]
Int: If you were teaching a student who doesn’t want to do his homework, and then, at last, does it, would
you use it?
NNS19: I don’t think I would say “yatto shite kureta.”
Int: Gimu no hou wo yuusen suru ndesu ne. [You would prioritize the “duty.”]
NNS19: I would say a student “tegami wo kaite kureta” [wrote me a letter] or “miyage wo katte kureta”
[bought me a present] but not “benkyou shite kureta” [studied for me].
Int: The previous person said that he noticed them when the teacher in class said “yatte moraimashou.”
Nande yatte morau koto ni naru no ka tte, nattoku dekinakatta kara kigatsuita tte itte itan desu
kedomo…[He said, “Why does it come to having someone buy something for you? I noticed that
because I wasn’t convinced.”]
NNS19: I never had such an experience of sudden “kigatsuku” [realize, become aware] […] dakara tabun
mawari no hito ga tsukatte ita kara….kiga tsuita ka mo shiremasen…[well, maybe I did notice
it…because people around me used it.]

It is interesting that during the interview, NNS19, while distancing herself from the way
a NS had characterized her own stance toward her pupils’ work assignments, produced
frames that even a native would not invariably adopt. In addition to the two rather
idiosyncratic uses mentioned previously, this learner also said [jimu no] sasaki san ga ima
[apa-to ni] sunde iru hito ni renraku wo totte kudasaimasu (Mr. Sasaki from the office
contacted+BEN the people currently living in the flat) while referring to the person in the
foreign students’ division whose job is to organize accommodation. When asked to
comment on the way in which she had secured a job in a school, she said, in reference to
the career office, “soo iu shidoo shite kureru ofisu datte, sokoni ittara, a, kou iu shigoto ga
arimasu yo […] de sou iu fuu ni mitsukemashita” (I found it (through) an office which
gives+BEN this kind of advice, for example, “Try going there, they have this job…”).
Similarly, while commenting on the teacher’s corrections of her Japanese, she does not
hesitate to use a benefactive rather than, for instance, a more neutral passive—“kokono
sensei wa dono toki mo machigaetara sugu naoshite kudasaru shi…” [This teacher would
correct me immediately as soon as I made a mistake]. Again, it is necessary to reflect on
whether these learners are merely engaging in hypercorrection.
Despite the association of benefactives with keigo and the relatively negative evaluation
of the latter in the learners’ comments, it is certainly curious that the average use of
benefactives per subject among the advanced learners is considerably higher than that
among native speakers (13.7 among the non-native speakers vs. 9.5 among the native
speakers). Many factors—the small size of the sample in particular—may have contributed
to this result. Although the interviews were of the same duration and the topics were
generally similar, natural conversation is, by definition, an idiosyncratic joint venture rather
than an enterprise that can be precisely or unilaterally planned. It is, however, possible to
speculate on other explanations for this result. If the “framing” of events in terms of the
giving/receiving of benefit is, in fact, a linguaculturally-specific feature as is claimed in this
paper, then it is possible to hypothesize that the framing may be perceived as a “marked,”
and hence, salient feature. In contrast to second language acquisition research that is
conducted within the Universal Grammar paradigm—in which markedness has been
invoked as an explanatory factor to account for the degrees of learning difficulty
(McLaughlin 1987: 84)—research on second culture acquisition has suggested that

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

markedness is a feature that determines learnability (Lantolf 1999: 3824). It has been
observed that “almost all of the most successful learners [at the Foreign Service Institute,
BP] demonstrate substantial flexibility and a willingness to shift their cognitive set, many
of them even to the point that they, in fact, appear to develop a kind of target-language
subpersonality when speaking the target language” (Ehrman 1993). It is possible that this
“target-language subpersonality” may be organized in terms of an emphasis on what is
perceived as the defining, singular, and stereotypical norm of a culture—a phenomenon of
the “exaggeration” of a stereotype, similar to that which determines hypercorrection. This
would account for the attested hyper-nativization of the behavior of advanced learners and
much of the anecdotal evidence on second culture acquisition.
However, while this explanation can certainly account for some of the apparent
contradictions that we have observed, it is necessary to take note of other facts as well.
Regardless of the presence or absence of an event of sudden realization (which, in any case,
presumes the existence of a “building up”), NNS19’s statement regarding the
appropriateness of benefactive use for the purpose of defining teacher-pupil role-based
expectations suggests that this learner can adopt a principled behavior, which she is capable
of bringing to consciousness and elaborating on to a certain degree. In the excerpt, she
comments on a native speaker’s use of a benefactive; however, while comparing her own
norm to that of the native speaker, she claims the right to a distinctive identity and the right
to use Japanese in the manner that she wishes. According to her, a teacher should not be
personally concerned about students’ homework. The affective (as well as social)
dimension that she can conceive of between herself, as a teacher, and her students is one
that appears consistent with the way in which she could, perhaps, have coded this
dimension in English. However, she is content to adopt a more “interconnected” stance in
other roles (tenant vs. caretaker, etc.), connoting an “intersubjective” understanding of
relationships that is possible because she creatively exploits this linguistic resource. This
learner may have adopted another (hypercorrected) subpersonality; however, she
demonstrates that she is not entirely ruled by it. The Japanese language introduces her to
frames that she did not possess when she spoke only in English; yet, it does not force her
into these frames completely. She can choose not to adopt frames that present a problem to
her.
Nevertheless, it is necessary to account for the apparent inconsistencies between the
metalinguistic judgments and the actual performance of the learners. These interviews
confirm the well-known fact that learners, like native speakers, are often inaccurate while
providing self-reports of their actual performance. It is interesting to note that learners
typically refer to “misalignment” even in cases in which the structures are used extensively
and fluently; self-assessments appear to “disown” what is considered to be a “typically
Japanese” feature. The direction of this misrepresentation is therefore the opposite of one
that is much more widely attested, i.e., the claim of following normative and canonical
rules while being deviant, vernacular, etc., in actual production. The nature of such
24
Lantolf quotes a study conducted by Yoshida, K. (1990), “Knowing vs. behaving vs. feeling: Studies in
Japanese bilinguals,” in L. Arena, (ed.), Language Proficiency: Defining, Teaching, and Testing, New York:
Plenum and refers to Yoshida’s cross-cultural word association tests, in which Japanese-English bilinguals
behave like monolinguals in culture-specific terms. The bilinguals behave like Japanese when associating
with Japan and like Americans when associating with Christmas. “This leads one to suspect that when a
concept is unique to the C[ulture]2 and perhaps known only at a conscious intellectual level in the C1, C2
learners may learn the concept, at least at the metalevel, because it is marked relative to culture.”

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

metarepresentations, however, is the same—an ideologically motivated narrative about the

self, which is not necessarily contradictory. If one considers the actual usage of
benefactives during the interview in Japanese and the metalinguistic judgments about these
benefactives during the post-interview session in English as two separate and distinct
activities that have separate, distinct aims and belong to separate, distinct discourses, this
inconsistency ceases to be problematic. While the interview (conducted entirely in
Japanese) instantiates the “subpersonality” that adopts target norms (or any subjective
reelaboration of them, which could exceed native norms), the post-interview session
(conducted in English) is an instantiation of the “subpersonality” that can depart from those
norms. It is necessary to be aware of the risks involved in taking the research participants
“at their word” (Block, 2000: 758) and of the many dimensions of the interview as a social
context. Consequently, the interview data provides “representations of real events” as well
as “presentations of the individual speaking” (ibid.). According to this characterization, the
learners’ interviews and post-interview comments must be conceived of as activity-driven
behavior and metacognitive conceptualizations of that behavior, respectively, serving
different “politic” aims that are defined by the setting and the “dominant” language used at
the time. In other words, it is possible to understand the learners’ display of “discomfort”
toward the use of benefactives as a means of claiming an identity distinct from that of the
native speakers of the target language; this is unsurprising, if not predictable, in situations
in which “nativeness” is no longer relevant.
The qualitative difference in the case of advanced second language users is not only that
they use benefactives fluently and without hesitation and are confident with idiomatic uses
but also that they can extend this use to non-idiomatic and novel contexts, thereby
demonstrating undisputed creative skill.

Some conclusive observations

In this paper, we have examined the way in which learners of Japanese decipher, adopt,
and ultimately adapt to one of the expressive features of the language that is likely to be
particularly demanding due to the multiple functions it performs. The profiles of different
proficiency groups outline differences in frequency of use and accuracy, and a close
reading of individual interviews reveals differences in fluency. A feature that is common to
all the groups is a general disassociation from the social values of hierarchical
subordination or old-fashioned mannerisms that (in the subjective or argumentative
construal of such values by most learners) allegedly govern the use of benefactives, and a
distancing from the use of benefactives as honorifics. It has been argued that the gap
between the learners’ actual performance and the constructions presented in their
metalinguistic comments is evident in the different discourses underlying the two activities,
i.e., the ethnographic interview conducted in Japanese and the reflexive post-interview
session conducted in English.
I have argued that this competence (evidenced by a fluent, if not always canonical use) is
achieved in a subliminal manner. Benefactives are adopted because they occur frequently in
the environment and have a grammatical basis. Each instance of the use of these verbs aids
the establishment of a cognitive possibility that did not previously exist, namely, that of
framing events as facts whose intersubjective effects are as salient as the nature of the
events they evoke. In my opinion, the habit of codifying the (alleged) existence of such
effects is developed through extensive exposure, through repeated imitation, participation
in social networks, and meaningful interaction. This process is subliminal because, on

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

account of the social ideologies that it potentially competes with when it does not clash
with them, it is rarely acknowledged openly.
The “cognitive restructuring” (Danesi 1993, quoted in Lantolf 1999: 43) is probably
driven by a progressively increased familiarity with situated structures. It explodes in a
burst of creativity once two conditions are fulfilled, i.e., once the “processing” constraints
are overcome and once the learners are no longer inhibited by an analytical reading of the
auxiliaries and an overreliance on the literal notion of benefit transfer. It is only when
benefactive constructions become routinized and grammaticalized that a truly pragmatic
(i.e., strategic and subjective) meaning is achieved. Thus, creativity can be considered to
emerge from conventionality and routinization. The hypercorrective nature of the attested
frequent use does not appear to preclude a principled avoidance (or a mere non-use) of
benefactives in specific, and perhaps potentially controversial, cases.
Our discussion has highlighted the manner in which an excessively close lexical reading
of these constructions may become an interpretative “trap”; learners must first understand
that the conceptual schema evoked by notions of “favor” is one whose structure is rather
different.
MR3: There are two aspects to it, the first one being a demonstration of respect and thanks, since this form
implies either a request or a favor that has been received. However, as in “uchi ni kite kureta toki” [when he
came+BEN to my place…], we can observe that the conception of “a favor” goes beyond that of English. The
second aspect is that it clarifies who is doing what and for whom, which is particularly useful in Japanese due
to subject omission; this might explain the use of these forms, rather than merely politeness.

The introduction of auxiliaries after the use of benefactives as main verbs is a pedagogical
convention; this is because of rather obvious reasons that are related to structural
complexity and linear progression. However, the literal interpretation of the verbs—whose
deferential symbolism is quite transparent—compounded with the availability of honorific
options and consequently, their association with politeness-related meanings, intensifies the
challenge posed by these structures and renders them items that the learners apparently
struggle with for a long time. It is perhaps unwarranted to use these speculative
observations to draw strong conclusions regarding the direction of classroom practices;
however, some general guidelines like the following could be suggested. The distinction
between meanings derived from honorific vs. non-honorific contrasts (e.g., kureru vs.
kudasaru) and those that do not involve honorific distinctions should be clearly outlined in
order to prevent stereotypical representations. The relationship of this set of verbs with the
other structures in paradigmatic oppositions should be explored. It is necessary for teachers
to be aware that these verbs activate conceptual frames that carry strong ideological
implications; thus, a metaphorical reading should be encouraged, while an emphasis on the
literal meaning, which is no longer immediately accessible even to native speakers, should
be avoided.
EG3: I personally like these forms—I like the way they can subtly show gratitude without getting too soppy
about it. The English translations which were used to help us understand Japanese always sounded a little
over the top.

DK3: I find that processing them through the idiomatic use of L1 works. “-te kureru” is taught as “someone
gave to me by (doing) -te.” However, if it is removed from its literal translation and treated with an idiomatic
interpretation such as “somebody* did –te” (which was nice of them*/benefited me), the mental gymnastics
required to process who is doing what is lessened.

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Pizziconi, Barbara. 2006 Learning to Reframe: Japanese Benefactives, Metalinguistic Beliefs and the Identities of L2
Users,

Since I was able to find a sufficient number of proficient speakers of Japanese who
employed these constructions fluently despite their allegations of avoidance and
misalignment, I am inclined to believe that a negative evaluation certainly does not prevent
acquisition. The extent to which it may handicap or delay this acquisition cannot be
determined using the data presented in this study; however, this is an issue that warrants
consideration.
I have characterized “giving/receiving” verbs as indices of frames of interconnectedness,
and have suggested ways in which cognitive restructuring and acculturation may occur. I
have attempted to provide an “objective” (or at least “detached”) conceptualization in
accordance with the conventions of scholarly enquiries. Nevertheless, my “story” is not
more real than those of the users in situated contexts; it merely pursues different goals. In
an attempt to answer the question of “what these verbs reveal about the ‘Japanese’ way of
speaking,” a remarkably talented, advanced learner describes her “story” as follows:
JHMA: I feel slightly hesitant in answering this and don’t want to generalize too much. However, it does
seem to be the case that there is never an entirely equal relationship in Japanese conversations. It is pretty
much impossible to speak naturally without thinking about how you and your interlocutor relate and what you
can do for each other. This might seem negative, but actually, the idea of favors criss-crossing back and forth
eternally seems like quite an active concept of interaction to me.
I think that you HAVE to think about these things. But I think that being forced to do this can be very positive
and feel liberating.

Acknowledgments
The following institutions supported the original study, which was carried out in the autumn of 1998: the
School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London; and the Japan Foundation Endowment
Committee. Here, I once again acknowledge their generosity. Equally generous have been all the learners
participating in this study, whom only the pledge of anonymity prevents me from acknowledging more
openly—they submitted themselves to my pedantic and punctilious questioning with considerable patience. I
hope that some of my thoughts on this matter will be as engaging to them as their thoughts have been to me.

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