An invisible virtue: slušnost as a key Czech cultural value

Abstract

This paper aims to examine the concept of slušnost in the Czech linguistic worldview. It is hypothesised that slušnost might be a Czech cultural key word, or, in this case, a key moral value of Czech linguaculture, resulting from a specific historical experience of the community of Czech speakers. This study, based mainly on the data from Czech language corpora, analyses two human-related meanings of slušnost and explicates them through the universal and elementary Natural Semantic Metalanguage. This methodological tool, developed mainly by Anna Wierzbicka and Cliff Goddard, makes it possible not only to clarify the complex and culture-specific concept of slušnost, but also to explicate it in a simple, universal, and non-ethnocentric way.