Tóm tắt tiếng anh: Đối chiếu thành ngữ Việt – Anh về tình yêu, hôn nhân và gia đình

Đối chiếu thành ngữ Việt – Anh về tình yêu, hôn nhân và gia đìnhĐối chiếu thành ngữ Việt – Anh về tình yêu, hôn nhân và gia đìnhĐối chiếu thành ngữ Việt – Anh về tình yêu, hôn nhân và gia đìnhĐối chiếu thành ngữ Việt – Anh về tình yêu, hôn nhân và gia đìnhĐối chiếu thành ngữ Việt – Anh về tình yêu, hôn nhân và gia đìnhĐối chiếu thành ngữ Việt – Anh về tình yêu, hôn nhân và gia đìnhĐối chiếu thành ngữ Việt – Anh về tình yêu, hôn nhân và gia đìnhĐối chiếu thành ngữ Việt – Anh về tình yêu, hôn nhân và gia đình

VIETNAM ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES

GRADUATE ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES

NGHIEM THI BICH DIEP

A COMPARATIVE STUDY ON IDIOMS ABOUT LOVE, MARRIAGE AND FAMILY IN VIETNAMESE AND ENGLISH

Major: Comparative linguistics Code: 9 22 20 24

SUMMARY OF PHD THESIS LINGUISTICS

HA NOI - 2022

The thesis was completed at: Graduate Academy of Social Sciences – Vietnam Academy of Social Sciences

Supervisor 1: Assoc Prof Dr Nguyen Xuan Hoa

Supervisor 2: Assoc Prof Dr Lam Quang Dong

Reviewer 1: Prof Dr Le Quang Thiem

Reviewer 2: Assoc Prof Dr Hoang Tuyet Minh

Reviewer 3: Assoc Prof Dr Pham Van Tinh

The thesis will be defended at the Thesis Assessment Board of the Graduate Academy of Social Sciences at on

The thesis may be found at:

-Graduate Academy of Social Sciences Library

-Vietnam National Library

- Many domestic and foreign studies have conducted descriptions andsurveys of Vietnamese idioms and English idioms from different aspects

of linguistics and cultology However, there are currently not enoughstudies comparing idioms in two languages on the topic of love, marriageand family

-Idioms about love, marriage and family have a significant position inthe idiom treasure of each language, but the study of this group of idioms

in Vietnam as well as in the world has not been paid enough attention atthe doctoral level in linguistics, especially in the field of comparing twolanguages This is the reason why we chose the topic "A comparativestudy on idioms about love, marriage and family in Vietnamese andEnglish" to develop into a doctoral thesis on the basis of inheriting theachievements of the predecessors in research works on Vietnameseidioms and English idioms

2.Research objectives and scope of thesis

The thesis focuses on surveying idioms that are limited to the scope

of being collected about love, marriage and family from reliablepublications

3.Research aims and tasks

3.1.Research aims

The thesis aims to studying, comparing and contrasting thestructural and semantic features, thereby discovering the culturalcharacteristics and national thinking of Vietnamese and English idiomsabout love, marriage and family; at the same time, finding out the

similarities and differences, helping to identify, understand the meaningand effectively use this group of idioms in communication.

3.2.Research tasks

(1) Overviewing research in the world and in Vietnam on idioms ingeneral and Vietnamese idioms and English idioms about love, marriageand family in particular

(2)Presenting the theoretical basis of idioms and issues related to idioms,meanings and means of meaning transformation, and the relationshipbetween language and culture

(3) Surveying, describing and comparing the grammatical structurefeatures of Vietnamese idioms and English idioms about love, marriageand family

(4)Surveying, describing and contrasting analysis of semantic features ofVietnamese idioms and English idioms about love, marriage and family

4.Methodology and research methods

The thesis uses the following research methods: descriptivemethod, structure analysis method, contrastive method, statistical methodand classification

5.New scientific contributions of the thesis

5.1In theory

Theoretically, the thesis contributes to clarifying the theory ofstructural and semantic features in idiom comparison research Theresearch results of the thesis contribute to promoting the comparativestudy of idioms in two or more languages and from an interdisciplinaryperspective of linguistics - culture – national studies

5.2In practice

In practical terms, the research results of the thesis helpresearchers and users of Vietnamese idioms and English idioms have abasis to identify, classify, and understand the meanings of idioms in twolanguages more precisely The thesis also brings out findings about somecultural characteristics, national thinking of Vietnamese and Britishpeople through idioms about love, marriage and family, in which thereare both similar characteristics and distinctive features only found inVietnamese or British culture

The thesis can be a useful document promoting confidence inusing idioms in daily communication, contributing to improving thequality in translation and in teaching and learning Vietnamese and Englishidioms in general, idioms about love, marriage and family in particular

6.Structure of the thesis

Apart from Introduction and Conclusion, the thesis consists of 3 chapters:

Chapter 1: Overview of research and theoretical base

Chapter 2: Comparing structural features of Vietnamese idioms and

English idioms about love, marriage and family

Chapter 3: Comparing semantic features of Vietnamese idioms and

English idioms about love, marriage and family

Chapter 1 LITERATURE OVERVIEW AND THEORETICAL BASE

1.1Overview of research on Vietnamese idioms and English idioms

in the world and in Vietnam

1.1.1Research situation of English idioms

Up to now, there have been many works in the worldinvestigating English idioms from different angles and with differentresearch methods The first studies on English idioms tended to focus onphenotypes based on syntactic and formal criteria: Makkai (1972),Weinreich (1969) In the late 20th century and early 21st century, Moon(1998) studied English idioms as a lexical phenomenon These studiesagree on the view that the ability to understand and use idioms correctly

is the key to fluent use of the language like a native

Later studies, possibly since Strässler's (1982), turned to analysis

of idioms with pragmatic, interactive, and discursive features withMcCarthy (1998) In English, idioms have been studied in many aspectssuch as structure, pragmatics and functional grammar: Fernado (1981)When cognitive linguistics has attracted the attention of linguisticresearchers, idioms have also begun to become an object of study from acognitive perspective Among these studies, emerging is the study ofmetaphor and conceptual metonymy of Lakoff (1987), Wright (1999).Researching the metaphor of idioms, Giffs (1990) is a pioneer and so farthe figurativeness of idioms is widely accepted and considered as one ofthe characteristics of idioms

At the end of the 20th century and the beginning of the 21st century,research works on the relationship between language and other fieldssuch as culture, psychology, ethnography, and ethnography haveflourished Notable works can be mentioned such as Brown (1986),James O'discoll (1995), Robert (1988), Wierzbicka (1997) and Ying(2007) Also in this historical period, it is noteworthy that the emergence

of interlanguage and intercultural studies, as early as Rosch (1977),

Hofstede (1980), Emanatian (1995), Levin, D et al (1980) These studieshave illuminated many aspects of life with the light of language, culture,and national thinking It is possible to find studies that choose researchsubjects that are linguistic and cultural factors that reflect people'semotions, social relationships, love, marriage, and family Someprominent research works can be mentioned such as McGoldrick, Pearce

& Giordano (1982), Skogrand, Hatch & Singh (2008)

Thus, the history of language research in general and idioms inparticular shows that idioms have been studied quite fully and deeply atdifferent angles and with different contents, in relation to differentbranches of science and its comparative relationship with otherlanguages However, studies comparing idioms about love, marriage, andfamily in different languages are still very limited, if any, they only stop

at a somewhat related angle such as: Compare and contrast idiomsindicating feelings or just social relationships

1.1.2Research situation of Vietnamese idioms

From the early period of the history of studying idioms, Vietnameseresearchers have approached idioms from the perspective of vocabulary,structure and morphology There are a series of studies by Do Huu Chauthat refer to idioms as a phenomenon of vocabulary and grammaticalstructures: Do Huu Chau (1997, 1998, 1981, 2001a, 2001b), NguyenThien Giap (1999), 2000, 2010), Hoang Van Hanh (1976), etc Whatthese studies have in common is that the analysis of Vietnamese idiomshas a fixed phrase structure that is not easy to change, and the meaning ofidioms is the meaning of the whole phrase, not the aggregate meaning ofindividual words This is an extremely important research result, whichhas the foundation for idiom studies at the same time and in later periods

In the 80s and 90s of 20th century, many idiomatic studies in Vietnamappeared from a semantic perspective The meaning of idioms has beennoticed as a special phenomenon in language The meaning of idioms is notattached to the original meaning of the constitutive word but is a kind offigurative meaning, meaning transferred by means of meaning transfer such

as metaphor and rhetorical metonymy It is possible to mention the works ofstudying idioms from a semantic perspective such as Nguyen Duc Dan(1986), Nguyen Cong Duc (1995) Regarding the semantics of idioms, thework of Trinh Cam Lan (1995) is remarkable with the emphasis on thesymbolic value of Vietnamese idioms The author emphasizes thatsymbolism is the decisive factor to the semantics of idioms

After the results of scientific research on the elements and the way

to create the meaning of idioms, which are the path that comes fromsymbols and concepts, a series of idiom studies in Vietnam focus oncognitive and conceptual levels These include Phan The Hung (2008),Tran Ba Tien (2012), Vi Truong Phuc (2013), Tran The Phi (2016).Thus, Vietnamese idioms have attracted the attention of researchersfor decades Through each historical period, idioms have beeninvestigated with different angles, and emerging are structural, semanticand cognitive aspects Besides the studies dedicated to Vietnameseidioms, there have also been studies comparing Vietnamese idioms withidioms of other languages such as Russian, Chinese, French, etc

1.1.3 Research situation of English idioms and Vietnamese idioms about love, marriage and family

Love, marriage and family are great topics in any ethnic group orcountry These contents have attracted the interest of researchers from variousscientific fields such as sociology, psychology, anthropology and linguistics

Around the world, we can find a lot of works and articles in thefield of linguistic research on English idioms and proverbs about love,gender, marriage, family and relationships

In Vietnam, we have found a number of magazine articles by authorsNguyen Xuan Hoa, Nguyen Huu Tuong (2014) discussing Vietnamese words,idioms and proverbs about love, marriage and conjugal affection NguyenVan Trao (2019) has compared metaphors of the concept of love in Englishand Vietnamese idioms The outstanding feature of these studies is that therehave been new perspectives and new research directions for Vietnamese andEnglish idioms about emotions, love, and relationships These studies juststopped at the scope of classifying idioms according to individual contentsuch as love, friendship, social community relations or just surveying idioms

in a language without any comparative research or studied from a structural,semantic or conceptual perspective There has not been an in-depth study with

a large enough scope to survey and compare groups of Vietnamese idiomsand English idioms about love, marriage and family

Therefore, a comparative study of Vietnamese idioms andEnglish idioms more fully in terms of research materials, surveyperspectives and research methods will make useful contributions interms of theory and research

1.2Theoretical base

1.2.1 Comparative analysis method in comparative study of Vietnamese-English idioms about love, marriage and family

Principle of comparison: When comparing Vietnamese idioms and

English idioms about love, marriage and family, it is necessary to ensure

a complete and accurate description of popular concepts, definitions, andaspects of marriage in each of these languages At the same time, it isnecessary to ensure the consistency in the selection of the field and basis

of comparison (structure, semantics, etc.) throughout the comparativeresearch process

Research objectives: In a comparative study of Vietnamese idioms

and English idioms about love, marriage and family, Vietnamese idiomsand English idioms about love, marriage and family are key is the subject

of study Vietnamese idioms and English idioms about love, marriageand family are described respectively based on pre-defined criteria ofstructural and semantic characteristics so that there is a basis for thecomparison of this group of idioms in Vietnamese and English, findingout similarities and differences

Research scope: The aspects targeted in this comparative study are:

structural morphology and semantics In addition to the research aspects,the comparative scope of this study is the group of Vietnamese idiomsand English idioms with meanings about love, marriage and family

In the thesis "A comparative study on idioms about love,marriage and family in Vietnamese and English", we respectivelydescribe the two structural and semantic aspects of the Vietnameseidioms and the English idioms about love, marriage and family; then,compare the structural and semantic features of this group of idioms inboth Vietnamese and English languages to find out the similarities anddifferences between these two research objectives Choosing thisresearch approach will result in a more complete, detailed and objectivesurvey of both groups of research objectives (Vietnamese idioms andEnglish idioms about love, marriage, and family) as an objective andreliable basis for conclusions

1.2.2Theory of idioms and issues related to idioms

1.2.2.1Vietnamese idioms

In Vietnamese, there are many different definitions of idioms.Depending on the approach, Vietnamese linguists have given differentdefinitions The works can be mentioned: Hoang Phe (2002), Mai NgocChu et al (1990), Nguyen Cong Duc (1995), Hoang Van Hanh (1980)

Nguyen Thien Giap writes: "Idioms distinguish themselves from other nominal units in their symbolic nature Figurativeness is the basic feature of idioms Idioms denote certain concepts based on specific

images or symbols The figurativeness of idioms is built on the basis of comparative and metaphorical phenomena.” (1978).

The thesis accepts Nguyen Thien Giap's viewpoint on idioms toanalyze the grammatical structure and semantic characteristics ofVietnamese idioms about love, marriage, and family relationshipsthrough translations: metaphor and metonymy

From the above definitions and viewpoints on Vietnamese idioms,

we determine that idioms are fixed word combinations, including fixed wordcombinations with subject-predicate structure and figurative meaning

Classification of Vietnamese idioms

Vietnamese idioms are divided according to many differentcriteria Some authors divide idioms according to the criteria of origin;other authors divide idioms according to semantics, and there are authorswho divide idioms according to structural features However, in general,from a structural perspective, Vietnamese idioms are divided into threemain categories: idioms with symmetrical structure, idioms withasymmetrical structure and idioms with comparative structure From asemantic point of view, Vietnamese idioms are studied with metaphoricaland metonymy transliteration

The way to divide Vietnamese idioms according to the structure

of symmetric idioms, asymmetrical idioms and comparative idioms issometimes difficult to distinguish because the symmetry can besymmetric about the number of words on both sides or symmetric in themeaning of both sides In terms of symmetry, the meaning of the twosides is symmetrical because elements are synonymous or part of a whole

or things of the same kind, and symmetry due to opposites on both sides.Therefore, in order to facilitate the comparison of Vietnamese idioms andEnglish idioms in this study, we propose to classify idioms according tothe structure of 3 main categories: idioms with conjugated structure,idioms with conjugation structure, and idioms with a phrasal verbstructure and idioms with a subjunctive structure

Distinguishing Vietnamese idioms from proverbs and fixed idioms

Idioms distinguished from proverbs:

"Proverbs are short sentences, often rhyming, summarizing people's knowledge, life experiences and practical ethics." (Hoang Phe,

2002) Meanwhile, idioms are fixed word combinations that have beencommonly used, whose meaning cannot be explained simply by themeanings of the words that make it up Grammatically, it cannot be acomplete sentence, so it is only equivalent to one word Idioms do not

state a comment, a life experience, a moral lesson or a criticism at all, so

it only has the function of identifying things and phenomena

Idioms distinguished from fixed identifiers:

Identifiers are fixed phrases, but are built in a similar way tocreating compound words that people often call secondary compoundwords The main element is usually always the naming element.Identifiers are not as prominently symbolic as idioms However, there arealso fixed idiomatic phrases, whose figurativeness reaches the equivalent

of real idioms, which can very well be included in the ranks of idioms:

For example: honeymoon, wine daughter, etc.

1.2.2.2English Idioms

In English Idioms in Use, Cambridge University Press, Michael

McCarthy and Felicity O'Dell (1998) explain how to understand English

idioms: "Idioms are expressions which have a meaning that is not obvious from individual words".

Jackson and Amvela and Palmer are of the same opinion when it

comes to defining idioms According to Jackson and Amvela (1998) "an idiom can be defined as a phrase whose meaning cannot be guessed from the individual meanings of the morphemes that make it up".

Studying the different views of scholars on English idioms, it ispossible to draw out three important features of idioms that many

scholars come to consensus on, namely: First, idioms often mean figurative meanings, difficult to guess the meaning from the meaning

of the component words; Second, idioms are often structurally fixed; Third, an idiom is a phrase consisting of at least two words.

Distinguishing English idioms from proverbs and fixed phrases According to Hornby (1995), "a proverb is a short well-known sentence that states a general truth about life or give advice".

According to Greenbaum (1994) “Collocations can be understood

as sequences of lexical items which habitually co-occur in a language so that the occurrence of one item can often predict the presence of the other.”

1.2.2.3Vietnamese idioms and English idioms about love, marriage and

family

One of the first tasks of the comparative study on Vietnameseand English idioms about love, marriage and family is to survey andcollect idioms about love, marriage and family in Vietnamese andEnglish as research objectives

There are many different definitions of love, marriage and familydepending on the research angle The research objectives of the thesis is

a group of Vietnamese idioms about the emotions, situations andbehaviors of couple's love, marital love, and family relationships inextended families.

1.2.3Characteristics of idiomatic meaning

When studying the meaning of idioms, in addition to the twoelements of metaphor and metonymy, Gibbs (1990) has added a very

important factor, which is traditional knowledge: "Most idioms are carried

in them metaphor, metonymy, or traditional knowledge” The role of the

two modes of transference metaphor and metonymy in understanding themeaning of idioms is shown in most languages, however, in many cases,idioms can only be properly understood and explained based on theunderstanding of cultural traditions, customs, people, way of life, and evenhistorical traditions and folktales of native peoples

Researching the meaning of idioms, Nguyen Thien Giap (1973)

also emphasized: "More than any other language field, Vietnamese idioms show bold characteristics of Vietnamese national culture Characteristics of people's culture The ethnicity of the idiom is also expressed in the symbolic meaning of the idiom.”

Thus, it can be asserted that the meaning of an idiom is not themeaning of each lexical element that makes it up, but rather the process

of visualization of things, phenomena, attributes, processes, etc., by the

units conveying vocabulary The meaning of idioms is figurative meaning It can be understood that the figurative meaning of an idiom is

the way people take a specific object, phenomenon or an appropriateproperty to suggest, associate it with a certain abstraction that has beeningrained in the collective subconscious of native speakers associatedwith cultural characteristics and national thinking

In order to create figurative or translational meanings, people mustrely on association relations, which can be similar associations(metaphors) or equivalence associations (metonymy) However, there is asubtle distinction between the phenomenon of transliteration and figurativemeaning: The meanings are often specific; and figurative meanings areconventional and represent general and abstract phenomena The creation

of figurative meanings is also completely conventional of each nativespeaker community Accordingly, each ethnic group will have its ownhabits and customs in visualizing things and phenomena of the real world

Metaphor and metonymy are two common modes of meaningtransference in many languages around the world Metaphor is a rhetoric,

a means of developing meaning, in function metaphor is a way of

looking at one object through another; metonymy is a method that takesthe name A of x to call y if x and y go together in reality (Do Huu Chau).However, in the thesis, we choose the traditional approach, consideringmetaphor as a rhetorical transformation to find out the mechanisms andcommon metaphorical methods in Vietnamese and English idioms about

love, marriage and family Thereby, the thesis examines themechanisms and ways of translating similar and differentmeanings in idioms of the two languages

Through the study of theories on meanings and methods ofmeaning translation, the meanings of Vietnamese idioms and Englishidioms about love, marriage and family have been investigated and can

be concluded: idiomatic meanings are built from metaphors, metonymyand knowledge about national cultural traditions

1.2.4The relationship between language and culture

Language and culture have been confirmed by many studies to

be closely related M.Clyne (1991) said: “Language is the deepest expression of a culture, a value system including those inherited from the community, and has a great influence on the way in which not only the first language is used, but also the languages acquired later.”

Considering the different ways of thinking and discoveringreality in each community of native speakers, Nguyen Xuan Hoa (2017)

also wrote: "The national cultural identity is "languageized" in that, when words or expressions in the utterance are conveyed to the receiver, the national image is immediately separated Recipients who are not native speakers often have difficulty understanding the semantic structure of idioms in practice because they cannot decipher its actual meaning used

in communication.”

Summary of chapter 1

Idioms and culture have a close relationship with each other.Idioms are born from culture, so learning idioms of another language canhelp us know about that country's culture accurately and vividly Idiomsalso contain in them typical features of language In other words, idiomsare books that record the cultural - people - country characteristics ofnative speakers

Through surveying the concepts and concepts of idioms inVietnamese and English, we found that although the interpretations aremore or less different in terms of scope, expressiveness, and symbolism,the concept about idioms in Vietnamese and idioms in English havemany similarities, of which two most important features emerge:

First, Vietnamese idioms and English idioms are composed offixed word combinations, including word combinations with subject -predicate structure.

Second, in terms of meaning, Vietnamese idioms and Englishidioms are both highly symbolic and often cannot be explained simply bythe meaning of the single words that make up them The meaning ofVietnamese idioms and English idioms can be explained throughmetaphorical and metonymic transitions

Chapter 2

A COMPARISON ON STRUCTURAL FEATURES

OF VIETNAMESE-ENGLISH IDIOMS ABOUT LOVE, MARRIAGE AND FAMILY

Chapter 2 focuses on analyzing the grammatical structurecharacteristics of Vietnamese idioms and English idioms about love,marriage and family with 3 main categories: idioms with conjugationstructure (co-ordination), idioms have a phrase structure and idioms have

a clause structure For each type, the idiom structure is further analyzedinto fixed phrase types, including: noun phrases, verb phrases, adjectivalphrases, and prepositional phrases

2.1Structural features of Vietnamese idioms about love, marriage

and family

Figure 2.1 Classification of Vietnamese idioms by structure

Vietnamese idioms about love, marriage and family have aconjugated structure which is a combination of words with iso-equivalence relations that often have an even number of words: 4 words,

6 words, 8 words or 10 words divided into two parts, texture 2-2 or 3-3

or 4-4 or 5-5 Vietnamese idioms about love, marriage, and family have aconjugated structure accounting for a large percentage (60%) In which,