TEMPORAL USES OF TRƯỚC AND SAU: AN ANALYSIS OF TEMPORAL FRAMES OF REFERENCE IN VIETNAMESE

Abstract

This paper aims at studying the temporal meanings of trước and sau in Vietnamese concerning temporal frames of reference. These words are respectively to FRONT and BEHIND terms. They originally mean spatial directions with a deictic center. When being transferred to the domain of time, they appear in three situations: 1. Expressing the ‘future/past’ meanings correlating with an absolute frame of reference which motivates both dynamic and static temporal events, the orientation of the absolute frame of reference in Vietnamese is provided by the arrow of time; 2. Expressing the ‘past/future’ meanings correlating with an intrinsic frame of reference, this frame of reference applies for binary temporal relations which encompass deictic events and earlier/later relations, FRONT is mapped onto the past in both cases.; 3. Expressing ternary temporal relations correlating with a relative frame of reference: we argue that two variants of the relative frame of reference proposed by Bender and colleagues [1, 2] cannot be applied to describe ternary temporal relations in Vietnamese. In this language, if G occurs in the future, FRONT is assigned to the past of G which is the V’s future, and BEHIND to G’s future, whereas if G occurs in the past, FRONT is assigned to the G’s past, and BEHIND to G’s future which is also Ego’s past. The only difference between the intrinsic and the relative frame of reference in Vietnamese, therefore, is whether or not the Ground coincides with the Ego.