Misunderstanding The Engagement Function Of Scare Quotes

Martin & Rose (2007: 52):

Finally we need to consider cases where punctuation is used to signal that someone else’s words are being used. Helena does this several times in her story:

Even if he was an Englishman, he was popular with all the 'Boer' Afrikaners. And all my girlfriends envied me. Then one day he said he was going on a 'trip'.

Abruptly mutter the feared word 'trip' and drive off.

The role of 'those at the top', the 'cliques' and 'our men' who simply had to carry out their bloody orders... like 'vultures'. And today they all wash their hands in innocence and resist the realities of the Truth Commission. Yes, I stand by my murderer who let me and the old White South Africa sleep peacefully. Warmly, while 'those at the top' were again targeting the next 'permanent removal from society' for the vultures.

... there must have been someone out there who is still alive and who can give a face to 'the orders from above' for all the operations.

This device is sometimes referred to as ‘scare quotes’, and warns readers that these are not Helena’s words but someone else’s, for example the wording of her second love or white South African leaders. In spoken discourse speakers might use special intonation or voice quality to signal projection of this kind, and sometimes people use gesture to mimic quotation marks, acting out the special punctuation. The effect of this is to disown the evaluation embodied in the highlighted terms, attributing it to an alternative, unspecified, but usually recoverable source.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, scare quotes are quotation marks placed round a word or phrase to draw attention to an unusual or arguably inaccurate use.

[2] To be clear, scare quotes can serve many functions, and although they may sometimes indicate that an author is using someone else's term, this is by no means always the case:

Scare quotes (also called shudder quotes, sneer quotes, and quibble marks) are quotation marks a writer places around a word or phrase to signal that they are using it in a non-standard, ironic, or otherwise special sense. 

• Scare quotes may express that the author is using someone else's term, similar to preceding a phrase with the expression "so-called"; 
• they may imply skepticism or disagreement, belief that the words are misused, or 
• that the writer intends a meaning opposite to the words enclosed in quotes. 

Writers use scare quotes for a variety of reasons. 

• They can imply doubt or ambiguity in words or ideas within the marks, or even outright contempt. 
• They can indicate that a writer is purposely misusing a word or phrase or 
• that the writer is unpersuaded by the text in quotes, and 
• they can help the writer deny responsibility for the quote. 

In general, they express distance between writer and quote. …  

An author may use scare quotes not to convey alarm, but to signal a semantic quibble. Scare quotes may suggest or create a problematisation with the words set in quotes.

[3] There is no evidence in the text that any of these quotes are attributable to either Helena's second love or to white South African leaders; but see [5] below.

[4] In this instance, the scare quotes mark a simile deployed by Helena herself, and so, do not mark it as attributable to either Helena's second love or to white South African leaders; but see [5] below.

[5] This is the exact opposite of what is true.  The effect of Helena's use of scare quotes is not to 'disown the evaluations embodied in the highlighted terms' but to enact evaluations of them herself.  In highlighting with scare quotes, she expresses her own attitude.

Projections "Within Clauses" [2]

Martin & Rose (2007: 51-2):

The Act also uses projections within clauses in relation to claims of victimhood, and in relation to the powers of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission:

... the gathering of information and the receiving of evidence from any person, including persons claiming to be victims of such violations or the representatives of such victims ...

establish such offices as it may deem necessary for the performance of its functions

... conduct any investigation or hold any hearing it may deem necessary and establish the investigating unit referred to in section 28

These are examples of ‘saying’ and ‘thinking’ (claiming to be, may deem).

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, the "projection within a clause" here is the projection relation between claim and be in the verbal group complex serving as identifying Process in the embedded clause persons claiming to be victims of such violations or the representatives of such victims:

persons	claiming	to	be	victims of such violations or the representatives of such victims
Token	Process: relational			Value
	a	"	b

[2] To be clear, the "projection within a clause" in both these cases is the assignment of an attributive relation by cognitive projection:

as	it	may deem	necessary for the performance of its functions
	Attributor	Process: relational	Attribute

it	may deem	necessary
Attributor	Process: relational	Attribute

Projections "Within Clauses" [1]

Martin & Rose (2007: 51):

Projections can also be found within clauses, where they explicitly assign responsibility for opinions to sources. Tutu uses this resource four times in relation to claims of innocence, the meaning of ubuntu, reputations and the values of the new South African democracy:

Amnesty is not given to innocent people or to those who claim to be innocent.

This is a far more personal approach, which sees the offence as something that has happened to people and whose consequence is a rupture in relationships.

Many of those who have come forward had previously been regarded as respectable members of their communities

the new culture of respect for human rights and acknowledgment of responsibility and accountability by which the new democracy wishes to be characterised

These projections within clauses include ‘saying’ claim to be, ‘seeing’ sees, been regarded as and ‘feeling’ wishes to be.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, the "projection within a clause" here is the verbal projection relation between claim and be in the verbal group complex serving as attributive Process in the embedded clause who claim to be innocent:

who	claim	to	be	innocent
Carrier	Process: relational			Attribute
	α	"	β

[2] To be clear, the "projection within a clause" here is the assignment of an attributive relation by cognitive projection:

which	sees	the offence	as	something that has happened to people and whose consequence is a rupture in relationships
Attributor	Process: relational	Carrier		Attribute

[3] To be clear, the "projection within a clause" here is the assignment of an attributive relation by cognitive projection:

Many of those who have come forward	previously	had been regarded	as	respectable members of their communities
Carrier	Location	Process: relational		Attribute

[4] To be clear, the "projection within a clause" here is the desiderative projection relation between wishes and be characterised in the verbal group complex serving as identifying Process in the embedded clause by which the new democracy wishes to be characterised:

by which	the new democracy	wishes	to	be characterised
Token	Value	Process: relational
		α	'	β

Misunderstanding Projection

Martin & Rose (2007: 50-1):

In Helena’s narrative, projection doesn’t just happen within sentences, from ‘saying' to ‘what is said'. It can also happen across whole texts and text phases. For example Helena begins by presenting herself as narrator (my story begins):

My story begins in my late teenage years as a farm girl in the Bethlehem district of Eastern Free State.

The rest of her story then is what she tells. And she closes her story by handing over to her second love (a few lines…):

I end with a few lines that my wasted vulture said to me one night

In both cases Helena’s sentence ‘projects’ the sentences that follow, just as the SABC ‘projected’ Helena’s story:

they broadcast substantial extracts

And Tutu in turn projects the SABC broadcast:

The South Africa Broadcasting Corporation's radio team covering the Truth and Reconciliation Commission received a letter from a woman calling herself Helena

So ultimately we have Tutu saying that the SABC said that Helena said that her second love said what he said. This is managed between sentences by naming ‘speech acts’, such as my story, a few lines, a letter, substantial extracts. This kind of projection between sentences is often associated with the beginning and end of texts.

Blogger Comments:

[1] This misconstrues the projection relation between the author and her text as a projection relation within the text projected by the author.

[2] This misunderstands projection, which is a relation between different orders of experience.  In the text, the opening sentence and "the rest of her story" are construed as the same order of experience.  That is, "what she tells" includes the opening sentence, not just "the rest of her story".

[3] This misconstrues an Actor (Agent) they as a Sayer (Medium), a material Process broadcast ('transmitted') as a verbal Process, and a Goal (Medium) substantial extracts as Verbiage (Range).

[4] This misconstrues the projection relation between the speaker and his text as a projection relation within the text projected by the speaker.

[5] The naming of "speech acts" (speech functions) metaphorically construes verbal processes as participants, and as such, does not construe projection relations between "sentences".

[6] This misconstrues the names of projected locutions (my story, a few lines, a letter, substantial extracts) as the naming of "speech acts" (speech functions) — the latter being the naming of the processes that project locutions.  The confusion is thus between orders of experience.

[7] This unsupported claim is invalidated by the misunderstandings identified in [5] and [6].

The Absence Of Projection From Logical Discourse Semantics

Martin & Rose (2007: 48-9):

One thing we are able to do in discourse is quote or report what people say or think. Halliday and Matthiessen (2004) call this type of linguistic resource ‘projection’. Projection is the relation between he says in the example above, and what he said: He and three of our friends have been promoted. 'We’re moving to a special unit. Now, now my darling. We are real policemen now!

Blogger Comments:

[1] This highlights a serious deficiency in Martin's model of discourse semantics.  Although "one thing we are able to do in discourse is quote or report what people say or think" through projection, the logical relation of projection is not included in Martin's discourse semantic system of the logical metafunction, conjunction, either in this publication or the work on which it is based (Martin 1992).  The absence can be explained by the fact that Martin's system of conjunction is a rebranding, misunderstanding and relocation (stratally and metafunctionally) of Halliday's lexicogrammatical system of cohesive conjunction — a non-structural resource of the textual metafunction — in which only the resources of expansion are deployed.

[2] The cited example is:

Then he says: He and three of our friends have been promoted. 'We're moving to a special unit. Now, now my darling. We are real policemen now.'

Here Martin & Rose missed an opportunity to claim that the three quoted projections demonstrate "meaning beyond the clause", since none of the quotes are presented as structurally connected to the projecting clause Then he says in the preceding hypotactic clause nexus.