Knowledge Bank

This study deals with expressions containing the adverb futsū-ni 'ordinarily/usually' in Japanese. In the last decade this adverb gained more meanings that it did not have before. This expanded meaning of futsū-ni has become extremely common among relatively young people. This study tries to find out some of the meanings that this adverb can include by using corpus data and a questionnaire. The results indicate that this new use of futsū-ni has been utilized in a statement that is made with a reason, cause, or situation that is believed to be common to most people in the language community.