DOCTOR TALK AT CONSULTANCY IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE: AN INTERPERSONAL COMPARISON APPROACHED FROM THE PERSPECTIVE OF SUBJECT USES

Abstract

This paper includes a detailed analysis of subject deployments realized in English and Vietnamese doctor talks at consulations with patients. The focus is to base on doctor’s uses of subject to compare interpersonal meanings hidden behind doctors’ consultation of the two selected languages. The theoretical framework used in the current study is the mood system of SFL (systemic functional linguistics) which includes four main types of subject: (1) subject explicits, (2) subject implicits, (3) subject interactants, and (4) subject non-interactants (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2004; Hoang Van Van, 2017). The data was collected by note taking and recording of 120 conversations (60 English conversations downloaded from Youtube; and 60 Vietnamese conversation recorded from real sites of consultation). This study not only finds out the similarities and differences of interpersonal meanings hidden behind doctors’ uses of subject but also confirms the necessity of change of subject deployments in medical discourse that lead to the movement of patient-centeredness mood.