Sunday 22 July 2018

Nuclear Relations: Misapplied Logical Relations Rebranded As Experiential Discourse Semantics

Martin & Rose (2007: 73-4): 
Section 3.4 describes lexical relations between processes, people, things, places and qualities within each clause. As they are more or less central in the clause, these are known as nuclear relations. … 
Section 3.4 includes methods for analysing nuclear relations in a text, that display how people and things participate in activities, and how lexical elements are related across different parts of grammar

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, the relations here are logical, not lexical, and they obtain between grammatical functions in clause structure, not lexical items.  Moreover, the logical relations between grammatical elements within the clause are misunderstood and rebranded as experiential discourse semantics — a model purportedly concerned with meaning beyond the clause.

[2] To be clear, logical relations between experiential functions do not display how — the manner in which — participants participate in processes, as will be demonstrated in future posts.

[3] To be clear, logical relations between experiential grammatical functions do not display how lexical elements are related across different parts of grammar.  Moreover, any relations between lexical elements across the grammar are a feature of lexicogrammar, not discourse semantics.  The confusions here thus involve two theoretical dimensions: metafunction and stratification.

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