Misleading Through Misrepresentations, Misunderstandings And A Logical Fallacy

Martin & Rose (2007: 331-2):

From our own vantage point, there have been some interesting shifts of focus in discourse analysis over the four decades of Jim’s involvement and two decades of David’s. In the 1970s, cohesion was the favoured episteme, as grammarians cast their gaze outwards beyond the clause. In the 1980s it was genre that came to the fore, fostered in important respects by work on literacy development in the Sydney School, English for Academic Purposes and New Rhetoric traditions (Hyon 1996). The 1990s saw the emergence of evaluation as a major theme, as analysts developed models of attitude in functional and corpus linguistics (Hunston and Thompson 2000, Martin and Macken-Horarik 2003). Currently we are in the midst of a surge of interest in multimodal discourse analysis, inspired by the ground-breaking work of Kress and van Leeuwen (1996/2006, 2001) on images. Looking ahead, we can probably expect an emerging rapprochement between qualitative and quantitative approaches to text analysis, depending on the kinds of technology that can be brought to bear in large-scale studies of many and longer texts. Just how this will tend to focus discourse analysis epistemes is harder to predict. Our own approach, in this book and beyond, contrasts strikingly with current trends, which for operational reasons (or worse) tend to elide discourse semantics in favour of word counts, collocations and colligations — as if texts where random sequences of words, phases or clauses. As analysis technologies develop, we need to ensure these trends do not become entrenched in the field in the long term.

 

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, in SFL Theory, discourse analysis is the use of linguistic theory (potential) to analyse texts (instances of language).

[2] This is misleading. Four decades before the first edition of this book Jim Martin turned 13 years old. David Rose, on the other hand, completed his PhD — describing an Australian language — only 5 years before the first edition of this book.

[3] On the one hand this is misleading, and on the other hand, this misunderstands the term 'episteme'. Firstly, it is misleading because it falsely claims that discourse analysis was restricted to cohesive analysis, which is merely the non-structural component of the textual metafunction. Discourse analysis potentially involves all of theory, but crucially, it deploys the grammar. As Halliday (1985: xvii) made clear:

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.

Secondly, the use of 'episteme' is inconsistent with its use in philosophy, whether by Plato or Foucault, the latter being the more likely source for Martin & Rose. For Foucault, 'épistémè' means the epistemological assumptions on which meaning-making is based, as exemplified by the SFL Theory assumption that meaning is immanent of semiotic systems, not transcendent of them.

More generally, 'episteme' means a principled system of understanding, such as a science, and it contrasts with 'techne', an applied practice. In talking of the practice of discourse analysis, Martin & Rose are concerned with techne, not episteme. However, Plato distinguishes 'episteme' from 'doxa', common belief or opinion. In tracing a history of "favoured epistemes", Martin & Rose are actually concerned with doxa (with regard to techne).

[4] This is misleading. Here Martin & Rose are presenting Martin's personal trajectory of interests as if they were the prevailing trends in the worldwide SFL community as a whole.

[5] This is misleading, because here Martin & Rose fallaciously argue for the value of their own approach, discourse semantics, by contrasting it with a straw man: non-existent Systemic Functional linguists who analyse texts as if they "random sequences of words, phases or clauses."

Firstly, as this blog and the review of Martin (1992) have demonstrated, Martin's model of discourse semantics is his misunderstandings of Halliday's speech function (interpersonal semantics) and Halliday & Hasan's cohesion (non-structural textual lexicogrammar), rebranded as his own systems, and as such, as Martin's theoretical insights.

Secondly, in SFL Theory, the quantitative approach is used to distinguish texts according to register. Texts differ by the frequencies of feature selection, across all systems of the content plane, and these frequencies instantiate the probabilities of feature selection by which registers of language differ. This is, of course, all lost on those who cannot distinguish registers of language from the cultural context of language, such as Martin & Rose.

Inadvertently Arguing Against Their Own Model

 Martin & Rose (2007: 312):

What this all means is that we have to be very clear how we position ourselves on the instantiation cline when collecting data and analysing it. 

In contrast to some views on analysing discourse, we do believe it is important to analyse instances in individual texts. 

What is unique about a specific text may be just what matters; we don’t want to lose what’s special by only valuing generalisations across a text corpus. 

Beyond this, as discourse analysts generalise, the tendency at this stage of our work is to lose sight of how texture is construed as a text unfolds, through its particular logogenetic contingencies. 

We can tend to lose sight in other words of the very kinds of analysis we’ve been promoting in this book. 

So the text and reading end of the instantiation cline is an important one, however reluctant journal editors may be about publishing analyses of a single text, as if they believe climate is all that matters and weather doesn’t count.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, it is language (and other semiotic systems) that is on the cline of instantiation, and data is at the instance pole of the cline.

[2] To be clear, analysing discourse — individual texts — is analysing instances.

[3] This is an instance of the logical fallacy known as attacking a straw man, the 'straw man' here being the unattributed claim that only generalisations across a text corpus are valued. To be clear, a specific text (the instance pole) and "generalisations across a a text corpus" (above the instance pole) are not in competition but are complementary perspectives on language.

But here, also, Martin & Rose are confusing two different perspectives on the instance, text vs discourse, which Halliday (2008: 78) explains as follows:

I do make a distinction between these two; but it is a difference in point of view, between different angles of vision on the phenomena, not in the phenomena themselves. So we can use either to define the other: “discourse” is text that is being viewed in its sociocultural context, while “text” is discourse that is being viewed as a process of language.

That is, Martin & Rose are interested in text in its socio-cultural context (discourse), and the view they are arguing against is simply the complementary perspective of discourse as a process of language (text).

Moreover, since the authors' model of genre is itself an example of generalising across a text corpus, in this instance they are actually arguing against the approach they themselves have taken.

[4] Again, this misconstrues complementary perspectives as competing alternatives; see [3]. Amusingly, the authors' claim can applied to their own model through the following paraphrase:

as we generalise texts into genres, the tendency at this stage of our work is to lose sight of how texture is construed as a text unfolds, through its particular logogenetic contingencies.

[5] To be clear, this confuses the totality of metafunctional systems on Martin's discourse semantic stratum with texture, which is created through the textual systems on the lexicogrammatical stratum, namely: those of theme, information and cohesion.

[6] As previously demonstrated, the authors' notion of reading as a pole of the cline of instantiation is invalidated by their misunderstanding of both instantiation and reading, the latter being confused with attitudinal stances towards texts, and with textual responses to texts.

[7] To be clear, relating a specific text to the systems it instantiates is viewing language as both weather (instance) and climate (system). But, in any case, Halliday cautions against restricting our angle of vision to one pole on the cline of instantiation. Halliday (2008: 85, 126, 192):

… whichever of these rôles [grammarian or discourse analyst] we are adopting, we need to observe from both ends. The grammarian, however system-oriented he may be, has to monitor instances of discourse; the discourse analyst, however text-oriented, has to keep an eye on the overall potential. The complementarity means that, unless you shift your angle, you will distort the picture: you cannot know all that is going on if you keep to just one observational perspective.  …

To revisit my earlier analogy of climate and weather: the power of weather to influence our daily lives, through storms and floods and droughts and all the rest, derives from the fact that it is the instantiation of something we call “climate” — because it is climate that has shaped our evolution and so determines the effect on us, and indeed on all of nature, of all the fluctuating processes and forces that we call “weather”. In the same way the power of the text resides in the system, because it is the system that determines the meaning and the significance of the ongoing choices made by writers and speakers. It is a mistake to restrict our angle of vision to just one perspective or the other, or to treat the discourse analyst and grammarian as if they inhabited two different realms of intellectual being. …

The system and the text are not two different phenomena: what we call the “system” of a language is equivalent to its “text potential”. Analysing discourse means, first and foremost, relating the text to the potential that lies behind it. There are perhaps three areas of discourse analysis that have figured prominently in systemic-functional research: literary-æsthetic, technical-scientific, and sociopolitical. In the first of these, the text carries value in its own right; when you analyse texts of this kind, you are aiming to explain not only why and how the text means what it does but also why it carries the value that it does. […] In analysing scientific and technical texts, the linguist is likely to be foregrounding the special properties that distinguish these texts from other varieties of written and spoken language, such that they are able to play a central part in the creation and transmission of knowledge. Scientific theories evolve from the conjunction of material and semiotic processes, and the advancement of science is powered by linguistic as well as technical resources. […] On the socio-political side, the researcher is investigating how discourse creates, maintains and transmits the social order (and hence may also be used to subvert it).

Problems With The Authors' Notion Of Shunting Back And Forth Between ‘Texts’ And ‘Readings’

Martin & Rose (2007: 312):

Introducing readings as a final step in the instantiation cline of course begs the question of how we determine what those readings are.  

And there is no doubt in our mind that we need to explore compliant, resistant and tactical responses on the basis of how those readings are materialised in texts, whatever the modalities involved. 

And this means looking at the readings the texts themselves afford, shunting back and forth between ‘texts’ and ‘readings’, until we feel we’ve said enough about the negotiation of meanings among them, as diverse social subjectivities engage.  

This produces in effect a kind of recursive loop at the end of the instantiation cline; but that is just what we want here: readings feeding back into texts, texts feeding back into text types, text types into registers and so on.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, 'to beg the question' is a technical term for a type of circular reasoning (logical fallacy) in which the conclusion of an argument is smuggled into its premisses.

[2] Amusingly, the two authors admit to having only one mind between them.

[3] To be clear, here Martin & Rose again confuse readings of texts (mental projections) with responses to texts (verbal projections). Importantly, a verbal response to a text is another text — another instance — not something further down the cline of instantiation than a text.

[4] To be clear, this is simply "shunting" between different texts at the instance pole of the cline of instantiation. There is no "recursive loop" between two different points on the cline of instantiation.

[5] To be clear, a genuine example of a reading "feeding back" into a text is the process of an editor reading and editing a written text.

[6] To be clear, in SFL Theory, the sense in which texts "feed back" into text types is that selection frequencies in each text potentially alter the selection frequencies of the text type of which they are instances.

[7] To be clear, in SFL Theory, text type and register are the same phenomenon viewed from opposite poles of the cline of instantiation: text type is register viewed from the instance pole, whereas register is text type viewed from the system pole.

Importantly, inconsistent both with SFL Theory and with the authors' own cline of instantiation, Martin & Rose model text type (genre) and register as systems of contextual strata, outside language.

Introducing Other People

Martin & Rose (2007: 158):

Moving on to her second love, Helena introduces him as follows:

I met another policeman.

Another identifies him in two ways. First an is indefinite like ‘a’, so we know we can’t assume this identity; secondly other tells us that he is different from the first policeman. These two meanings (indefiniteness and difference) are fused together as another. …

A third man whom she briefly marries is introduced indefinitely as someone, i.e. nobody we know; and is also distinguished from her first love as someone else:

An extremely short marriage to someone else

Blogger Comments:

[1] This is self-contradiction. To be clear, if no identity is recoverable, then there is no identification.

[2] To be clear, other and else are markers of comparative reference, where what is presupposed is another referent of the same class. Contrary to Martin's model of identification, the 'semantics of reference', the domain of comparative reference is not restricted to nominal groups. Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 633):

The Argument For 'Outer' Circumstances

Martin & Rose (2007: 94):

Finally, associated with a process are various kinds of Circumstances that vary in their degree of involvement in it. Circumstances of Place, Time and Cause do not participate in the activity, but are more peripherally associated with it: 

 

As they are peripheral to the process, we can call these 'outer Circumstances'.

Blogger Comments:

[1] Trivially, by convention, the term 'circumstance' is not capitalised in SFL theory, because it is a class of element rather than an element of function structure (like Location or Cause).

[2] To be clear, no circumstances participate in the Process; that is what makes them circumstances rather than participants.

[3] To be clear, the theoretical term for 'activity' here is 'Process'.  As previously demonstrated, the theoretical valeur of authors' term varies from instance to instance.

[4] To be clear, all circumstances are peripheral to the process, so peripherality does not distinguish outer circumstances from inner circumstances.

Moreover, because Martin & Rose do not understand the principles underlying source of "their" ideas, they misrepresent an inner circumstance (Location: directional), to a special unit,  as an outer circumstance. Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 175):

Misunderstanding Halliday's Transitivity Model Of The Clause To Rebrand The Ergative Model As Discourse Semantics

Martin & Rose (2007: 94):

The other two kinds of inner Range are a class or part of the Medium. Again the process is one of ‘being' or ‘having', that relates the class or part to the Medium:

 

Blogger Comments:

[1] Again, this is a bare assertion: no argument is provided as to why these "kinds of Range" are to be regarded as inner.  The source of the author's ideas — e.g. Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 174) — makes no distinction between inner and outer Range.  Any change to that model needs to be supported by valid argument.

[2] To be clear, here again, Martin & Rose confuse Halliday's particularised transitive model (Attribute of intensive and possessive relational clauses) with Halliday's generalised ergative model (Range), and use the former to elaborate the latter as their means of rebranding of Halliday's grammar as Martin's discourse semantics (nuclear relations).

Moreover, the authors misunderstand Halliday's particularised model. On the one hand, all attributive clauses construe class membership — not just intensive clauses (those labelled 'class' above).  On the other hand, in SFL theory, the 'class vs part' distinction that the authors use to subcategorise the Range is actually the intensive vs possessive distinction of relational clauses, which, in these instances is realised through the Process.

Using The Transitive Model To Rebrand The Ergative Model

Martin & Rose (2007: 94):

In addition there are three kinds of Range that are central to the Process, that we can call ‘inner Ranges'. The first is where the lexical process is very general, such as do, have, go, play and so on, and the Range specifies the type of process, such as do a dance, have a bath, play tennis. Dancing, bathing and tennis are of course actually activities, but they can be realised as nouns that combine with general processes. These are known as Range:process.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, this is merely a bare assertion, since no argument is provided as to why these kinds of Range are central to the Process.  As an argument, it is one instance of the logical fallacy known as Proof By Assertion.  Cf Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 348):

[2] Here again Martin & Rose misconstrue a grammatical category ('Process') as lexical.

[3] To be clear, here again, Martin & Rose confuse Halliday's particularised transitive model (Scope: process of material clauses) with Halliday's generalised ergative model (Range), and use the former to elaborate the latter as their means of rebranding of Halliday's grammar as Martin's discourse semantics (nuclear relations).

do	a dance
have	a bath
play	tennis
Process:	Range
material	Scope: process

Misconstruing Nuclearity As Predictability

Martin & Rose (2007: 93-4):

Lexical relations between the central elements of these activities are widely predictable across fields, i.e. the processes of exchanging (applying for, granting, giving, refusing). Relations between central and nuclear elements are predictable within the general field of granting amnesty (a common practice). But relations between these activities and more marginal elements are only predictable within the particular field of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission (e.g. who the Commission can and cannot grant amnesty to).

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, what Martin & Rose term the 'central element', a Process, is an element of a grammatical structure, the clause, not of an "activity", and relations between such grammatical elements are logico-semantic, not lexical.

[2] Here Martin & Rose misunderstand the principle of nuclearity as one of predictability.  To be clear, in Halliday's model of clause ergativity, nuclearity measures the degree of participation in a process. Moreover, the proposed relative gradings of predictability are based on misunderstandings; see below.

[3] The claim here is that the relation between Processes like granting (central) and amnesty (nuclear) is predictable within the "general" field of granting amnesty.  There are four basic problems with this:

• Firstly, this is an instance of the logical fallacy known as circular reasoning: if granting + amnesty, then granting + amnesty.
• Secondly, the relation between central and nuclear elements is always the same, and thus always "predictable", irrespective of field, since it is a relation between clause elements (Process and Medium).
• Thirdly, Martin & Rose misunderstand the relation between Process and Medium as one of extension, in contradiction of the definition of Medium as the participant through which a Process is actualised.
• Fourthly, amnesty does not serve as Medium of the Process granting, 

[4] Trivially, the granting of amnesty is not a common practice; see for example the discussion here.

[5] The claim here is that the relation between Processes like granting and the participants Agent (e.g. the Commission) and Beneficiary (e.g. to those who plead guilty) is only predictable within the "particular" field of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission.  There are two basic problems with this:

• Firstly, the relation between central and marginal elements is always the same, and thus always "predictable", irrespective of field, since it is a relation between clause elements.
• Secondly, Martin & Rose mistake the Medium of the Process, the Commission, as Agent; i.e. as the cause of the granting process rather than the medium through which granting is actualised, and thus, as marginal ("only predictable within the particular field") rather than nuclear ("predictable").

[6] To be clear, here the meaning of activities has shifted again, this time from clause to Process.

[7] To be clear, on the authors' analysis, the Commission itself is just as marginal as those it can grant amnesty to.

Misrepresenting Grammarians

Martin & Rose (2007: 1):

In this book we are concerned with interpreting discourse by analysing it. For us this means treating discourse as more than words in clauses; we want to focus on meaning beyond the clause, on semantic resources that lead us from one clause to another as a text unfolds. … In a sense then this book is an invitation to grammarians to reconsider meaning in the clause from the perspective of meaning in texts;

Blogger Comments:

[1] The discourse of this Martin & Rose text begins with four claims about the 'social activities' of grammarians:

1. grammarians treat discourse as just words in clauses;
2. grammarians don't focus on meaning beyond the clause;
3. grammarians don't focus on semantic resources that lead from one clause to another as a text unfolds;
4. grammarians don't already consider meaning in the clause from the perspective of meaning in texts.

The validity of such claims depends on the meaning of the word 'grammarian' in this context: the field of Systemic Functional Linguistics.  In the view of the theorist who created SFL theory, a grammarian is a linguist who is concerned with both strata of the content plane: lexicogrammar and semantics.  Halliday (2008: 85):

…and I should say, by the way, that by “the grammarian” here I understand one who works in lexicogrammar and semantics: the systems thinker on the content plane…

As this quote also suggests, Halliday uses the term 'grammarian' for linguists who are primarily concerned with the system pole of the cline of instantiation — language as system — in contrast to the term 'text linguist' or 'discourse analyst', which he uses for linguists who are primarily concerned with the instance pole of the cline of instantiation — language as text.

Importantly, Halliday (2008: 85, 126) stresses that both of these complementary perspectives, of the grammarian and of the discourse analyst, are necessary:

… whichever of these rôles we are adopting [grammarian or discourse analyst], we need to observe from both ends. The grammarian, however system-oriented he may be, has to monitor instances of discourse; the discourse analyst, however text-oriented, has to keep an eye on the overall potential. The complementarity means that, unless you shift your angle, you will distort the picture: you cannot know all that is going on if you keep to just one observational perspective. …

It is a mistake to restrict our angle of vision to just one perspective or the other, or to treat the discourse analyst and grammarian as if they inhabited two different realms of intellectual being.

In stark contrast, Martin & Rose simply use the term 'grammarians' for linguists who prefer to use Halliday's theory of grammar (1985, 1994, 2004, 2014) instead of Martin's theory of discourse semantics (1992)* in the analysis of texts.  In doing so, they also, therefore, confuse (system-oriented) grammarians with (text-oriented) discourse analysts.

In short, Martin & Rose have used a type of 'straw man' argument to promote the use of Martin's model:

A straw man is a common form of argument and is an informal fallacy based on giving the impression of refuting an opponent's argument, while actually refuting an argument that was not advanced by that opponent.  One who engages in this fallacy is said to be "attacking a straw man". … This technique has been used throughout history in polemical debate, particularly in arguments about highly charged emotional issues where a fiery, entertaining "battle" and the defeat of an "enemy" may be more valued than critical thinking or understanding both sides of the issue.

[2] By the same token, the discourse of this Martin & Rose text begins with four claims that set out what is to be achieved:

1. Martin & Rose will treat discourse as more than words in clauses;
2. Martin & Rose will focus on meaning beyond the clause;
3. Martin & Rose will focus on semantic resources that lead from one clause to another as a text unfolds;
4. Martin & Rose will consider meaning in the clause from the perspective of meaning in texts.

In making these claims, Martin & Rose have provided four criteria by which to judge the success or failure of their enterprise — in their own terms.


* For the theoretical inconsistencies in Martin's theory, see the 2,000+ arguments at the blog Martin's Discourse Semantics, Register & Genre here.