A discourse analysis of Syntactic and semantic features of instructions for use of drugs In english and vietnamese

Abstract

Based on the theories of discourse analysis, the study examined the typical discourse features of English instructions for use of drugs (EIUDs) and Vietnamese instructions for use of drugs (VIUDs). This thesis aimed to discover the similarities and differences between two languages in terms of the layout, syntactic features and semantic features at discourse level and suggest some implications for teaching, learning and translating the foreign language of English, especially English for medicines and pharmacy. The research was carried out based on the combination of a variety of methods, namely descriptive, qualitative, quantitative, analytic, comparative, contrastive, and inductive. The data for analysis in this thesis were 140 samples of IUDs (70 in English and 70 in Vietnamese) collected from drugstores, pharmaceutics of hospitals and internets. The findings show that instructions for use of drugs in both languages display a structure of seventeen parts, including Name of the Medicine, Composition, Pharmaceutical form, Presentation, Indications, Dosage and Method of Administration, Contraindications, Special Warnings and Precautions for use, (Pregnancy and Lactation), (Effects on Ability to Drive and Use Machines), Adverse Reactions, Interactions, (Overdose), (Pharmacodynamic and Pharmacokinetic properties), Storage, Self-life and Name and address of individuals, organizations responsible for the medicinal product. In addition, modal expressions, conditional sentences, passive voices, imperatives and simple sentences are prominent syntactic features analyzed and compared. Finally, the analysis of semantic features reveals that speech acts such as directives, speech act conditionals, modality and voice were dominant semantic features used in English and Vietnamese instructions for use of drugs.