ABSTRACT
Our section is labelled linguistics. Since the symposium is dedicated to Japan, linguistics in this case is intended obviously as linguistics of the Japanese language. Today this expression in English has two corresponding terms in Japanese: kokugogaku and nihongogaku. Thirty or forty years ago very few would have hesitated to identify the expression with kokugogaku, but now along with it we have also nihongogaku. Their object of study is the same Japanese language. Then why is it that two disciplines, so easily confused, exist at all? And what are the differences between the two? It is not my purpose to discuss here these points in detail, and yet I think it better to explain briefly my interpretation of the linguistics of the Japanese language in this paper.
