"The Discourse Analysis Doesn’t Really Tell Much That Hasn’t Already Been Accounted For In Grammatical Analysis"

Martin & Rose (2007: 185):

In ‘little texts’ such as headlines, telegrams, SMS messages on mobile phones, titles, labels, diagrams, billboards and so on, determiners are more often than not left out, so the distinction between presenting and presuming is neutralised. For example, ‘the’ is left out of the headings in the Act but included in the paragraphs,

CHAPTER 2
Ø Truth and Reconciliation Commission
Ø Establishment and Ø seat of Ø Truth and Reconciliation Commission
2. (1) There is for the purposes of sections 10(1), (2) and (3) and II and Chapters 6 and 7 hereby established a juristic person to be known as the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.
(2) The seat of the Commission shall be determined by the President.

We should also observe that various pronouns are commonly used in a generalised way that doesn’t presume the identity of anyone in particular:

You don't know who your friends are 'til you're down and out.
We just don't behave like that round here!
They're double parking both sides of the street again!
It's too damn hot!

Finally, there are various kinds of structural it, which presume information in the same grammatical configuration; these can be treated as text reference if desired. As with esphora, the discourse analysis doesn’t really tell much that hasn’t already been accounted for in grammatical analysis. Examples include:

It's Tutu who forgave them
It pleased me he forgave them
I like it he forgave them
it's good he forgave them
It's reported he forgave them
It appears he forgave them

Blogger Comments:

[1] As previously explained, 'presenting' reference is reference in the sense of ideational denotation — a nominal group realising a participant — not reference in the textual sense of a referential relation between a reference item and its referent.

[2] To be clear, the unacknowledged source here is once again Halliday & Hasan (1976) who refer to this as generalised exophoric reference; see the discussion in Halliday & Hasan (1976:53).

[3] To be clear, genuine cases of this sort are termed 'structural cataphora' (Halliday & Hasan 1976: 56-7) and do not function cohesively.

[4] To be clear, the authors' 'text reference' is their rebranding of 'extended reference' (Halliday & Hasan 1976: 66-7) and is distinct from structural cataphoric reference and, unlike the latter, does function cohesively.

[5] This is misleading. To be clear, the authors' discourse analysis is merely a rebranding of the grammatical analysis of Halliday & Hasan (1976).

[6] To be clear, the reference of it is to who forgave them, not to Tutu… .

[7] To be clear, it does not refer to he forgave them, as demonstrated by what would be an agnate clause if this were the case:

* he forgave them appears.