Misrepresenting Commentary As Analysis

Martin & Rose (2007: 108-9):

Relations between activities are as follows. First meeting, beginning to relate and marrying are parts of a ‘romance’ field that expect one another in a sequence. In the description phase, each of the young man’s qualities is expected by the romantic field, and intensified by the girlfriends’ envying. A problem is signalled by then one day he said, and then going and won’t see are parts of ‘leaving’. Helena’s reactions include feelings (torn to pieces) and action (married to forget).  The ‘consequences’ phase again begins with a setting, of which learning for the first time is expected by meeting. Then as parts of the Truth and Reconciliation field, operating overseas expects not being punished. This time Helena’s reactions include saying (can’t explain), feeling hurt and bitter, and seeing what was left. Finally saw what was left expects a description, in which we have unpacked desire as ‘wanting’, must be told as ‘wanting to tell’, didn’t matter as ‘didn’t care’, and only a means to the truth as ‘only wanted to tell truth’. These are analysed as various processes of desire, which elaborate each other in this phase.

Blogger Comments:

To be clear, this misrepresents mere commentary as analysis.  As Halliday (1985: xvii) pointed out:

A discourse analysis that is not based on grammar is not an analysis at all, but simply a running commentary on a text … the exercise remains a private one in which one explanation is as good or as bad as another.

Moreover, Martin & Rose use the metaphor of 'expecting' to make (sometimes ludicrous) bare assertions masquerading as theoretical analysis:

1. meeting, beginning to relate and marrying expect one another in a sequence;
2. the romantic field expects each of the young man’s qualities;
3. the girlfriends’ envying intensifies the young man’s qualities;
4. meeting expects learning for the first time;
5. operating overseas expects not being punished;
6. saw what was left expects a description.

See a previous post for the authors' misunderstanding of the text in their unpacking of what they regard as metaphor.

Original Text:

My story begins in my late teenage years as a farm girl in the Bethlehem district of Eastern Free State. As an eighteen-year-old, I met a young man in his twenties. He was working in a top security structure. It was the beginning of a beautiful relationship. We even spoke about marriage. A bubbly, vivacious man who beamed out wild energy. Sharply intelligent. 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'. 'We won't see each other again...maybe never ever again.’ I was torn to pieces. So was he. An extremely short marriage to someone else failed all because I married to forget. More than a year ago, I met my first love again through a good friend. I was to learn for the first time that he had been operating overseas and that he was going to ask for amnesty. I can’t explain the pain and bitterness in me when I saw what was left of that beautiful, big, strong person. He had only one desire - that the truth must come out. Amnesty didn't matter. It was only a means to the truth.