Confusing Orientation Distinctions With Judgement Distinctions

Martin & Rose (2007: 68-9):

The kinds of judgement speakers take up is very sensitive to their institutional position. For example only journalists with responsibility for writing editorials and other comment have a full range of judgmental resources at their disposal; reporters writing hard news that is meant to sound objective have to avoid explicit judgements completely (Iedema et al 1994; Martin and White 2005). The distinction between social esteem and social sanction in other words has important implications for the subjective or objective flavour of an appraiser's stance.

Blogger Comments:

This simply confuses two distinct dimensions of orientation:

• subjective vs objective, and
• explicit vs implicit

with the judgement distinction between social esteem and social sanction.

To be clear, none of the following three oppositions between social esteem and social sanction enacts the distinction between subjective and objective orientation:

• Trump is stupid (social esteem) vs Trump is dishonest (social sanction)
• I think Trump is stupid (social esteem) vs I think Trump is dishonest (social sanction)
• It is widely acknowledged that Trump is stupid (social esteem) vs It is widely acknowledged that Trump is dishonest (social sanction).