吉田 昌平

This essay reports the author's personal experience and attempts concerning TJFL in the Middle East in recent years. Section 1 briefly describes the state of TJFL in the Middle East and points out its significant role in cultural diplomacy. Section 2 reports the activities in which the author has been involved in anticipating further cooperation between Japan and the Middle East. Section 3 summarizes information obtained through those activities. Section 4 shows problems to be solved and some future plans.

How many syllable does the word 'cat' consist of? The generally accepted answer is "one" . This is due to the assumption that a 'word-final' consonant is truly domain final and the 'final' consonant and the vowel immediately preceding it belong to the same syllable. Couched within the framework of Government Phonology, I argue that the generally accepted syllabic affiliation of the final consonant is ungrounded. Instead, I show that the so-called final consonant belongs to the onset of an independent syllable followed by an empty nucleus. As a result, the word 'cat' is analysed as containing two syllables (ca.tφ.), the second syllable consisting of [t] followed by an empty category.