Expressions of Caused Motion in Vietnamese: A Perspective from Cognitive Linguistics

Abstract

This paper examines how Vietnamese speakers express caused motion by applying cause verbs. The theory of cognitive linguistics is adopted to shed light on the properties of semantics and syntax of Vietnamese expressions of caused motion. The data consists of expressions of caused motion, verbs and spatial prepositions taken from twelve Vietnamese stories. The results of this study present numerous lexicalization patterns of motion with the different causes that show the conflation of semantic components into verbs and spatial prepositions. Furthermore, this study presents the construction grammar of expressions of caused motion in Vietnamese referring to speakers’ knowledge about caused motion. More importantly, this paper shows how ideas of caused motion are expressed in different ways in Vietnamese based on the comparison with ones in English. Therefore, this study is expected to provide a background for identifying the typologies of caused-motion patterns in Vietnamese.