Modal expressions of CHẾT in Vietnamese

Abstract

This study analyzes epistemic and deontic modalities regarding CHẾT (to die) in Vietnamese using Scopus texts to gain cultural insights on mortality conceptualizations. The linguistic theories of researchers like Nuyts, Bybee and Fleischman, and Vietnamese scholars inform the frameworks concerning epistemic factuality judgments and deontic necessity/permissibility assessments. Methodologically, statistical and descriptive modal expression analysis combined with comparative, contextual and quality assessments elucidate patterns conveying evidential reasoning, social norms, obligations and existential perspectives tied to dying. Quantifying and detailing prevalent grammatical structures and semantic nuances of key modal terms used in death discussions reveals hybrid interfacing of traditional morality and modern rationality markers. Results should enrich philosophical, anthropological and linguistic perspectives on this profound existential domain by uncovering enduring belief systems, values and symbolic meanings regarding Vietnamese interpretations of mortality’s ontology. Findings elucidate how modal verbal processes linguistically embed cultural conceptualizations of the fundamental experience of human dying. Implications encompass enhanced scholarly views on Vietnamese thought across the spectrum from moral propriety to logical probability in the pivotal context of inevitable mortality. This investigation into modal linguistic forms represents an insightful conduit for expanding academic understandings of Vietnamese social psychology regarding mortality.