Yoshio Yamada was born in Sougawa, Toyama in 1873. After dropping out of Toyama Jinjou Middle School, he studied on his own to become an elementary and middle school teacher in the Toyama, Hyogo, Nara, and Kouchi prefectures. Meanwhile, he also studied Japanese Language and Literature independently. At the age of 27, he published the first half of “Japanese Grammatical Theory,” which he completed 6 years later.
After working as an elementary and middle school teacher, Yamada worked for the Japanese Language Research Committee and taught at Japan University. Eventually, in 1927, he became a professor at Tohoku Imperial University (present-day Tohoku University). In 1929, at the age of 54, he obtained a doctoral degree for his achievements with “Japanese Grammatical Theory.” As a professor, he conducted extensive research in a wide range of areas, including Japanese Language, Literature, History, Bibliography, and Morality Studies. While he left his professorship in 1933, his research extended throughout and beyond this time.
His publications included works on Japanese grammar and colloquialism such as “A Lecture on Japanese Grammar” (1922), “A Lecture on Japanese Colloquialism” (1922) and “Outline of Japanese Grammar” (1936); investigations of changes in language such as “Grammatical Usage in Heike Monogatari” (1914), “Grammatical History of the Nara Period” (1913) and “Grammatical History of the Heian Period” (1913); and literary analyses such as “Lectures on Manyoshu” (1928-1937) and “A Study on Heike Monogatari” (1911).
Later, Yoshio Yamada became the President of Jingu Kogakkan University. In 1953, Yamada was officially recognized as a Person of Cultural Merit, and in 1957, he received an Order of Culture award. Yamada passed away in Sendai in 1958.
For further information see:
https://www.library.toyama.toyama.jp/collection/yamada
https://kotobank.jp/word/%E5%B1%B1%E7%94%B0%E5%AD%9D%E9%9B%84-144166
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