ABSTRACT
This chapter examines morpho-syntactic characteristics of Japanese mimetics, or sound-symbolic expressions, focusing on their position within the sentence structure. It presents a representation called the layered structure of the clause (LSC), as assumed in Role and Reference Grammar. The chapter provides the result of a textual count of mimetics, on the basis of which several questions are generated on their position and marking. It also examines the syntactic positions that mimetics occupy. The chapter provides terms such as ‘mimetic adverb’ and ‘mimetic adjectival,’ it uses ‘mimetic’ if the classic categorization fails to capture the characteristics or the function of the mimetic. The mimetics must occur at the immediately preverbal positions. The preceding argument about pragmatic requirement on focus structure seems to account for the large portion of mimetics at the immediately preverbal position, as it permits more varied mimetic-verb combinations than those accounted for by the structural requirements.
