Editing Japanese dialects (section)

===Eastern and Western Japanese{{anchor|Eastern Japanese}}{{anchor|Western Japanese}}===
A primary distinction exists between Eastern and Western Japanese. This is a long-standing divide that occurs in both language and culture.<ref>See also [[Ainu language]]; the extent of Ainu placenames approaches the isogloss.</ref> Tokugawa points out the distinct eating habits, shapes of tools and utensils. One example is the kind of fish eaten in both areas. While the Eastern region eats more salmon, the West consumes more seabream.<ref>Tokugawa (1981): Kotoba - nishi to higashi. Nihongo no sekai 8. Tokyo: Chuokoronsha. </ref><ref>{{Harvcoltxt|Shibatani|2008|pp=198–199}}</ref>

The map in the box at the top of this page divides the two along phonological lines. West of the dividing line, the more complex Kansai-type [[Japanese pitch accent|pitch accent]] is found; east of the line, the simpler Tokyo-type accent is found, though Tokyo-type accents also occur further west, on the other side of Kansai. However, this [[isogloss]] largely corresponds to several grammatical distinctions as well: West of the pitch-accent isogloss:<ref name=shibatani197>{{Harvcoltxt|Shibatani|2008|page=197}}</ref>

* The perfective form of ''-u'' verbs such as ''harau'' 'to pay' is ''harōta'' (or minority ''harota'' or ''haruta''), showing [[Onbin#Verb_stems|u-onbin]], rather than Eastern (and Standard) ''haratta''
** The perfective form of ''-su'' verbs such as ''otosu'' 'to drop' is also ''otoita'' in Western Japanese (largely apart from Kansai dialect) vs. ''otoshita'' in Eastern
* The imperative of ''-ru ([[Japanese consonant and vowel verbs|ichidan]])'' verbs such as ''miru'' 'to look' is ''miyo'' or ''mii'' rather than Eastern ''miro'' (or minority ''mire'', though Kyushu dialect also uses ''miro'' or ''mire'')
* The adverbial form of ''-i'' adjectival verbs such as ''hiroi'' 'wide' is ''hirō'' (or minority ''hirū''), showing [[Onbin#Adjective_endings|u-onbin]], for example ''hirōnaru'' (to become wide), rather than Eastern ''hiroku'', for example ''hirokunaru'' (to become wide)
* The negative form of verbs is ''-nu'' or ''-n'' rather than ''-nai'' or ''-nee'', and uses a different verb stem; thus ''suru'' 'to do' is ''senu'' or ''sen'' rather than ''shinai'' or ''shinee'' (apart from [[Sado Island]], which uses ''shinai'')<br/>[[File:Ja da ya.png|thumb|right|250px|Copula isoglosses. The blue–orange ''da/ja'' divide corresponds to the pitch-accent divide apart from Gifu and Sado.<br />(blue: ''da'', red: ''ja'', yellow: ''ya''; orange and purple: iconically for red+yellow and red+blue; white: all three.)]]
* The [[Copula (linguistics)|copula]] is ''da'' in Eastern and ''ja'' or ''ya'' in Western Japanese, though Sado as well as some dialects further west such as [[San'in region|San'in]] use ''da'' [see map at right]
* The verb ''iru'' 'to exist' in Eastern and ''oru'' in Western, though the Wakayama dialect also uses ''aru'' and some Kansai and Fukui subdialects use both
While these grammatical isoglosses are close to the pitch-accent line given in the map, they do not follow it exactly. Apart from Sado Island, which has Eastern ''shinai'' and ''da'', all of the Western features are found west of the pitch-accent line, though a few Eastern features may crop up again further west (''da'' in San'in, ''miro'' in Kyushu). East of the line, however, there is a zone of intermediate dialects which have a mixture of Eastern and Western features. Echigo dialect has ''harōta'', though not ''miyo'', and about half of it has ''hirōnaru'' as well. In Gifu, all Western features are found apart from pitch accent and ''harōta''; Aichi has ''miyo'' and ''sen'', and in the west ([[Nagoya dialect]]) ''hirōnaru'' as well: These features are substantial enough that Toshio Tsuzuku classifies Gifu–Aichi dialect as Western Japanese. Western Shizuoka (Enshū dialect) has ''miyo'' as its single Western Japanese feature.<ref name=shibatani197/>

The Western Japanese [[Kansai dialect]] was the [[prestige dialect]] when Kyoto was the capital, and Western forms are found in literary language as well as in honorific expressions of modern Tokyo dialect (and therefore Standard Japanese), such as adverbial ''ohayō gozaimasu'' (not ''*ohayaku''), the humble existential verb ''oru'', and the polite negative ''-masen'' (not ''*-mashinai''),<ref name=shibatani197/> which uses the Kyoto-style negative ending -n. Because the imperial court, which put emphasis on correct polite speech, was located in Kyoto for a long time, there was greater development of honorific speech forms in Kyoto, which were borrowed into Tokyo speech.<ref name=":2">Shibatani (2008: 200)</ref> Another feature that the modern Tokyo dialect shares with Kyoto is the preservation of the vowel sequences {{IPA|/ai/}}, {{IPA|/oi/}}, and {{IPA|/ui/}}: in Eastern dialects, these tend to undergo coalescence and be replaced by {{IPA|[eː]}}, {{IPA|[eː]}} and {{IPA|[iː]}} respectively.<ref>Shibatani (2008: 199)</ref>  Examples of words that originated in Kyoto and were adopted by Tokyo are ''yaru'' ("to give"), ''kaminari'' ("thunder") and ''asatte'' ("two days from today").<ref>Shibatani (2008: 200)</ref>