`transcontextually invariant', the numerous self-referential expressions of
Vietnamese depend, for the semantic correctness of their application, upon
features of the context of utterance other than those determined by the
English `I'.

In Corless' priceless quip, "Descartes said, `I think therefore I am,' but
Buddhism replies, `Think again.'" [5] Following the Buddhist advice, let us
begin this rethinking by considering the Vietnamese counterparts of the
Cartesian cogito. Each of the Vietnamese sentences,

　　 Bo suy-nghi　　 (spoken by a father)
　　 Me suy-nghi　　 (spoken by a mother)
　　 Con say-nghi   (spoken by a child)
　　 Anh suy-nghi   (spoken by an elder brother)
　　 Chz say-nghi   (spoken by an elder sister)
　　 Em suy-nghi　　 (spoken by a younger sibling)

in company with numerous similar variants, has its counterpart either in
the English sentence, `I think (am thinking)' or in `You think (are
thinking)', depending upon whether the first word of the sentence is used
to refer to the speaker or to the person addressed. The word `say-nghi,
(think) offers little resistance to translation. The words `bo', `me',
`anh', `chz', `em', etc., are particularly recalcitrant. Each is used
self-referentially by the present speaker. Thus, each has its counterpart
in the English `I'. Yet each `refers' [6] to the present speaker only
within a certain delimited context in which speaker and interlocutor stand
in a given familial relation.

This, of course, contrast vividly with the impoverished English `I', which
may be employed self-referentially with no more knowledge of the speaker's
relationship to the person addressed than that the person addressed is,
indeed, the person addressed. `I' has a use in soliloquy, and may, it might
be claimed, be gainfully employed even by the most rigorous of solipsists
(were any extant). In Vietnamese, on the contrary, the self-referential use
of `me' by a child in addressing a parent is not merely an insufferable
breach of etiquette, but a violation of semantic proprieties as well. While
it is not a condition of the truth of a sentence such as `me suy-nghi'
(very roughly: `I-as-your mother think') that the speaker is the
addressee's mother, it is, as we shall see, an entailment of its use.

The Vietnamese language displays within its system of self-reference and
address (loixu'ng-ho) a profoundly Confucian influence. For every type of
familial relation which figures significantly in the Confucian scheme of
things (e.g. being-the-father-of, being-the-mother-of,
being-the-elder-brother-of, being-the-elder-sister-of, etc.), and its
converse (being-a-child-of, being-a-younger-sibling-of, etc.), there exists
a unique pair of self-referential/addressive expressions.

Nozick's unlikely "child who thinks his name is `I'" [7] might, were he or
she sufficiently precocious, take part in the following dialogue:

　　 A: I'm thinking about the Cartesian cogito.

　　 B: (the child): What makes you think I'm thinking about the cogito?
　　 I'm doing no such thing!

V-expressions are not, of course, proper names. [8] But our brief dialogue
equally illustrates a principle which does govern the use of V-expressions:
If speaker A uses a given V-expression for self-reference within a
particular dialogical context, B cannot use the same V-expression for
self-reference within that context (and conversely). One could imagine a
comic variant of English purged of the second-personal pronoun, `you', and
employing `I' to serve double duty as both a first-and a second-personal
pronoun. We need go no farther than `I love I' to appreciate the abundant
confusions which such an `English' would engender. Vietnamese first- and
second-personal pronouns can, as in this fanciful variant of English, be
used to refer to the speaker of the particular sentence in which they are
embedded, as well as to the individual to whom the sentence is addressed.
This, of course, stands in sharp contrast to the English `I' which never
refers--indeed, cannot refer--to anyone but the present speaker (or
writer). Vietnamese escapes the perplexities caused by the employment of
the same expression for both first-and second-personal reference, not by
dividing personal pronouns into those used for first-, second-, and
third-personal reference (as does English), but by prohibiting participants
in a given dialogue from using the same self-referential expression and
sorting personal pronouns into speaker/addressee pairs. Thus, for example,
a mother speaking to one of her children would refer to herself by using
`me' (or one of several alternatives: `ma', `me', etc.) and would refer to