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Abstract
The numerous Japanese dialects exhibit phonological, lexical and morphosyntactic variation. The dialects can vary in frequency of post-nominal particle omission, a phenomenon conditioned by many extra-linguistic and linguistic factors. In this thesis, a quantitative analysis of particle omission in transcribed natural conversation data from the COJADS corpus (NINJAL 2021) will inform a syntactic analysis of the phenomenon. Data from four prefectures (Hokkaido, Tokyo, Osaka, and Fukuoka) will be examined. I address two key research questions: Does evidence in the COJADS data uphold prior conclusions that particle omission varies by dialect and linguistic and extra-linguistic factors? How can we explain the phenomenon via traditional generative analysis? The quantitative analysis confirms dialectal variation and variation based on extra-linguistic factors. These results inform an analysis of particle omission in the Minimalist framework, and it is suggested that the particle omission phenomenon can be explained in terms of phases and Merge.