Misconstruing Elaboration (And Modal Assessment) As Comparison And Misunderstanding The Ideational Content Of The Illustrative Text

 Martin & Rose (2007: 136): 

Expectancy may also be adjusted with in fact, indeed, at least. By repeatedly narrowing the conditions for a public hearing, Tutu leads us to expect that public hearings almost never occur. But he then counters this expectation by saying what happens in fact:

The Act required that the application should be dealt with in a public hearing

where the offence is a gross violation of human rights - defined as an abduction, killing, torture or severe ill-treatment

unless such a hearing was likely to lead to a miscarriage of justice

(for instance, where witnesses were too intimidated to testify in open session).

In fact, virtually all the important applications to the Commission have been considered in public in the full glare of television lights.

It is this strategy of leading us to expect one thing, and then countering it with ‘reality’, that enables Tutu to make his conclusion seem natural, simply by using Thus:

Thus there is the penalty of public exposure and humiliation for the perpetrator.

We don’t mean to imply that we think Tutu’s conclusion is wrong. Rather he has argued it effectively by pre-empting any objections and countering them.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, here Martin & Rose confuse the textual function of in fact and indeed (cohesive conjunction) with one of their two interpersonal functions (modal assessment) and misconstrue the type of expansion relation, verifactive clarification (elaboration), as a subclass of comparison (enhancement); see Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 189-91, 613).  Moreover, this confusion of textual and interpersonal grammar is misconstrued as logical, in terms of metafunction, and rebranded as discourse semantics.

With regard to the multifunctionality of these items, Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 614-5) explain:

Certain items that serve as ‘elaborating’ conjunctions that are ‘internal’ only in orientation may also serve as modal adverbs (e.g. actually, in fact, indeed, as a matter of fact), functioning either as mood Adjuncts of intensity or as comment Adjuncts of factuality.

With regard to the interpersonal function of these items, 'expectancy' is a feature of mood Adjuncts of intensity (counter-expectancy: exceeding), whereas the example provided, in fact, actually serves as a comment Adjunct (unqualified: factual).

[2] To be clear, here Martin & Rose misconstrue an item (at least) that marks corrective clarification (elaboration) as one that marks a subclass of comparison (enhancement). Moreover, this misconstrual of the textual grammar (cohesive conjunction) is itself misconstrued as logical, in terms of metafunction, and rebranded as discourse semantics.

[3] To be clear, here Martin & Rose completely misunderstand the ideational content of the illustrative text.  There is no repeated narrowing down of the conditions for a public hearing, and no implication that they almost never occur, and so, no countering of this false impression.

Instead, the gist is, to paraphrase: the Act stipulates that gross violations of human rights must be dealt with publicly, unless doing so would bring about a miscarriage of justice, and Tutu confirms that virtually all important cases have indeed been dealt with publicly.