earticle

영어

Based on the text segmentation and integration resulting from the respective use of “Wa” and “Ga”, this paper tries to explore the problems of function division of absolute tense and relative tense in the Japanese attributive clause. Tense in attributive clause has close relationship with tense form and text features of segmentation and integration. The study shows that the segmentation of attributive clause and the main clause will increase when “Wa” is used following the noun group in the main clause, which will easily form absolute tense. That is to say, tense in the attributive clause is based on the time of utterance. On the contrary, a relative tense which has strong dependence on the tense of the main clause will be form when the noun group is followed by “Ga”, as the dependence of the attributive clause decrease and its interconnection with main clause increase. The perspective of text segmentation and integration can also be used in investigating the time relations of pure sequential order. That is to say, the effect of text properties on the tense will weaken when the forms of predicates “Ru” and “Ta” get off the tense and aspect in the attributive clause.