OBLIGATION MODALITY INSTEAD OF THE IMPERATIVE: HOW UZBEK DOCTORS FORMULATE RECOMMENDATIONS FOR OLDER PATIENTS
Keywords:
Keywords: directives, deontic modality, imperative, politeness, age hierarchy, medical discourse, UzbekAbstract
Abstract. This article examines the grammatical form of treatment recommendations that Uzbek doctors address to older patients. The data come from Andijan, Uzbekistan: 21 consultations observed without audio recording (9 with patients aged 60–65), yielding 98 handwritten quotations, and surveys of 99 doctors and 22 patients and relatives. With patients aged 60 and over, the main recommendation form was deontic obligation modality, a verbal noun with a possessive suffix plus kerak ‘necessary’ (ichishingiz kerak ‘you need to take [it]’), in 7 of 9 consultations, against 3 of 12 with younger patients (Fisher’s exact test, p = 0.03). The imperative was the main form in 1 and 6 consultations respectively, and many imperatives in the material were leave-taking wishes. The construction keeps the recommendation binding while leaving its source unexpressed. Russian obligation constructions have been described as intensifying authoritarian force; the Uzbek construction appears to work as negative politeness.
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