Misconstruing Subtypes Of Variation And Addition (Extension) As Subtypes Of Comparison (Enhancement)

Martin & Rose (2007: 137):

What of difference? As we saw for lexical contrasts in Chapter 3 (Section 3.2), differences are either oppositions or converses. We can oppose ideas using rather, by contrast, on the other hand:

This is not a frivolous question,
rather it is a very serious issue.
To this point we have looked at clauses and their elements from the perspective of discourse. Grammarians, on the other hand, look at elements of clauses from the perspective of the grammar

Conversely is used to reverse two aspects of a message. In this example Malinowski interprets texts from the perspective of social contexts, whereas we suggest that contexts can only be interpreted as they are manifested in texts:

Malinowski interpreted the social contexts of interaction as stratified into two levels, 'context of situation' and 'context of culture', and considered that a text (which he called an 'utterance') could be understood only in relation to both these levels.

Conversely, we could say that speakers' cultures are manifested in each situation in which they interact, and that each interactional situation is manifested verbally as unfolding text.

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[1] This not true. In Section 3.2, converses were construed as a subtype of oppositions, a subtype of contrast (Figure 3.6, p81).

[2] To be clear, in SFL Theory, rather typically marks replacive variation (extension), whereas by contrast and on the other hand mark adversative addition (extension), in cohesive conjunction (textual metafunction); see Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 612-3). Here Martin & Rose have misconstrued these two distinct relations as one subclass of comparison, which, in SFL Theory, is a subclass of enhancement, not extension, and rebranded their misunderstanding of Halliday's grammatical relations as Martin's discourse semantic relation.

[3] To be clear, in SFL Theory, conversely also typically marks adversative addition (extension) in cohesive conjunction (textual); see Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 612-3). Here Martin & Rose have misconstrued different markers of one relation (adversative addition) as two distinct subclasses (oppose vs converse) of comparison, which, in SFL Theory, is a subclass of enhancement, not extension, and rebranded their misunderstanding of Halliday's grammatical relations as Martin's discourse semantic relation.

[4] To be clear, Malinowski's model of context has become part of the theoretical architecture of SFL, with the important qualification that 'context of situation' and 'context of culture' are not levels, but opposite poles on the cline of instantiation at one level (the context plane). On this model, language realises culture (potential pole) and text realises situation (instance pole).

Because realisation is an identifying relation between two levels of symbolic abstraction, either level can be used to identify the other:

• language/text (Token) is decoded by reference to culture/situation (Value), and/or
• culture/situation (Value) is encoded by reference to language/text (Token).

Malinowski's notion of 'understanding a text in relation to context' corresponds to the decoding option above.

[5] To be clear, the authors' notion that "contexts can only be interpreted as they are manifested in texts" corresponds to the encoding option above. However, this does not accurately characterise what was said in the quoted text; see [6] and [7].

Note also that the authors' interpretation of context as "manifested in texts" involves modelling context as (types of) texts, genre and register, thereby incongruously conflating two distinct levels of symbolic abstraction: context and language.

[6] To be clear, in SFL Theory, culture is instantiated in situation, not "manifested" in it. Instantiation is a theoretical attributive relation, whereas manifestation is a non-theoretical identifying relation.

[7] To be clear, this confuses two theoretical dimensions at the instance pole of the cline of instantiation: stratification (situation realised as text) and logogenesis (unfolding text). In SFL Theory, the unfolding of a situation is realised by the unfolding of a text. Moreover, contrary to the implicit claim explicated in [5], this does not single out the encoding option, above.