Confusing Material And Semiotic Phenomena In Misunderstanding Context

Martin & Rose (2007: 321-2):

In our discussion of mode above we talked about the way in which the exophoric references in Vincent Lingiari’s speech made it ‘context dependent’ — dependent on our being there or on reading images of what was going on. Another way of putting this would be to say that more than one modality was involved, using the term modality here in the sense of a modality of communication such as language, music, image or action. To understand Lingiari, in other words, we need to process language in relation to image, or language in relation to action. There are two modalities co-articulating what is going on. In register terms what this suggests is that we need to expand our conception of mode to embrace multimodal discourse analysis (hereafter MDA). This entails moving beyond linguistics into social semiotics and taking into account as many modalities of communication as we can systematically describe.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, Martin & Rose model context as register and genre (varieties of language), but here contradict their own model by using 'context' to mean both the first-order material setting ("being there") and the second-order co-text (images).

[2] To be clear, by 'action' here, Martin & Rose mean the material setting. That is, they misconstrue first-order material experience (phenomena) as second-order semiotic experience (metaphenomena). Meanings projected from the material setting are another matter.

[3] To be clear, despite conventional opinion, music itself — unlike musical theory, notation and lyrics — is not a semiotic system. If it were, it would have long been possible to construct system networks of the meaning contrasts realised by sound contrasts. Instead, as a perceptual phenomenon, music potentially induces mental processes of emotion, desire and cognition.

[4] To be clear, inconsistent with the opening sentence, here Martin & Rose return to their own model of context, which misconstrues culture as functional varieties of language (registers).

[5] Trivially, SFL Theory models language as a social semiotic system. That is, the linguistics deployed by Martin & Rose is already within social semiotics.

Seriously Misunderstanding Projection

Martin & Rose (2007: 319-20):

In Chapters 2 and 3 we described how processes of saying and sensing can project locutions (what is said) or ideas (what is sensed), and also attribute the source of saying or sensing, as well as locating it in time. So if we say Bakhtin argued that creativity depends on mastery of the genre, then the projecting clause Bakhtin argued:

• projects the locution that creativity depends on mastery of the genre, through the process argue
• places the saying in the past (argued) with respect to if we say
• sources the locution to Bakhtin.

The projecting clause in other words provides a frame for interpreting its projection. By analogy, we can argue that genesis projects language, register and genre by conditioning the semantic oppositions that hold sway at one or another point of time, with respect to the unfolding of a text, with respect to interlocutors’ subjectivities and with respect to the meanings at risk in the relevant discourse formations. 

Blogger Comments:

[1] As previously noted, the logico-semantic relation of projection does not feature in the authors' model of logical discourse semantics: conjunction. This is because Martin's model derives from Halliday & Hasan (1976), where conjunction is a non-structural (cohesive) relation, and projection is not a cohesive relation.

[2] To be clear, this misunderstanding seriously misrepresents projection. The projecting clause construes the first-order symbolic processing that brings the second-order projected clause into symbolic existence; see, e.g. Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 110, 129). Importantly, only mental and verbal processes project, and projection is a relation between two different orders of experience.

[3] To be clear, this analogy seriously misunderstands semogenesis and projection. Logogenesis, ontogenesis and phylogenesis do not project language — and register and genre are (varieties) of language, not distinct from it. Instead, mental and verbal processes project the content plane of language. In contrast, logogenesis is the instantiation of the linguistic system in text, ontogenesis is the development of the linguistic system — not just "interlocutors' social subjectivities" — in the individual, and phylogenesis is the evolution of the linguistic system — not just "discourse formations" — in the species.

Confusing Context And Language In Misunderstanding The Cline Of Instantiation

Martin & Rose (2007: 312-3):

To make all this a little more concrete, at the level of instance we’ve read the mix of spoken and written discourse in Mandela’s Meaning of Freedom recount as a novel pattern, a kind of fusion of written discourse like Tutu’s exposition, with spoken discourse like Lingiari's hand-over speech. This fusion was designed especially by Mandela in his autobiography to drive his message home. 

At the level of text type we'd be looking for this kind of pattern to recur across a set of recounts (or other genres) and it might be worth exploring spoken texts as well as written ones, especially those written to be spoken aloud on public occasions. 

At the level of register, after a lot more analysis of a lot more discourse, we might be tempted to propose a new mode, blending features we’ve traditionally associated with either spoken and written text (cf. Halliday 1985). This may be something that’s been evolving all along in the rhetoric of certain kinds of religious and political discourse. 

Eventually, along this imaginary evolutionary journey, we might discover that the system itself had changed, that the systemic probabilities associated with negation, concession and elaboration for example just weren’t the same anymore. We’d be living in a different world, where speaking and writing weren’t just complementary fashions of meaning, where there was something in the seam, engendered through expanding electronic modalities of communication perhaps. Who knows? 

Our point here is only to illustrate a range of vantage points on data, the way in which instances can impact on systemic change and the monumental cost of doing as much discourse analysis as we’d like.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, this extract is meant to explain points on the cline of instantiation, from instance to system. But see below.

[2] To be clear, in SFL Theory, instantiation is the process of selecting features and activating realisation statements in systems. An instance of language, a text, thus comprises the selected features and activated realisation statements from the systems of content: semantics and lexicogrammar. This is clearly not understood by Martin & Rose, who instead discuss the mode of a text. Mode is a system of context, not language, both in the authors' stratified model and in SFL Theory. From the perspective of SFL Theory, Martin & Rose are here actually concerned with an instance of context: a situation.

[3] To be clear, in SFL Theory, text type is register viewed from the instance pole of the cline of instantiation. Here again Martin & Rose misunderstand "patterns" of mode, context, as linguistic features shared by texts of a text type. From the perspective of SFL Theory, Martin & Rose are here actually concerned with situation type.

[4] To be clear, in SFL Theory, register is text type viewed from the system pole of the cline of instantiation. On the one hand, here again Martin & Rose misunderstand features of mode, context, as linguistic features shared by texts of a register. From the perspective of SFL Theory, Martin & Rose are here actually concerned with subculture.

On the other hand, any proposed new mode is modelled by the networking of features at the system pole of the cline of instantiation, culture, not subculture (the authors' register). Since a subculture (or register) is a sub-potential of the overall system, it is nonsensical to claim that features are networked in the sub-potential but not the overall potential (of which it is a variety).

[5] To be clear, here Martin & Rose are concerned with the phylogenesis of the language system, rather than instantiation (or mode).

∞

Cf Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 384):

Seriously Misunderstanding The Cline Of Instantiation

Martin & Rose (2007: 310, 333n):

Halliday’s … cline of instantiation includes system (the generalised meaning potential of a language), register (sub-potentials of meaning characterised as registers and genres), text type⁴ (generalised instances, a set of texts that actualise the potential of the system), and finally text (the meanings actually afforded by an instance). And we could add at the end of the cline reading (the meaning taken from a text according to the subjectivity of the reader):

⁴ Halliday and Matthiessen in fact discuss registers as sub-potentials in relation to system, and text types as super-potentials in relation to text, at the same level of generality along the cline; we’ve taken the liberty of adding a rung here by making text type more specific than register.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, the cline of instantiation does not just apply to language, but to context as well. The poles of the cline and its intermediate point of variation is given by Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 20) as

potential ~ subpotential/ instance type ~ instance

Applying the cline of instantiation to the SFL stratification hierarchy yields the following matrix: 

Applying the cline of instantiation to Martin's stratification hierarchy exposes its inconsistency with SFL Theory:

In Martin's model, sub-systems and instance types of language, registers and genres (text types) are misconstrued as systems of context. Moreover, Martin regards instances of his context as texts, despite the fact that texts are instances of language, not context. And of course, what would constitute sub-systems/instances types of genre and register is not explored in this work or in Martin (1992).

[2] This misrepresents Halliday's model. To be clear, genres are not sub-potentials of meaning, but instance types of meaning and wording. That is, genres are registers viewed from the instance pole of the cline of instantiation.

[3] To be clear, in SFL Theory, a text type (genre) is not "generalised instances" but a type of which some instances are members on the basis of shared patterns of instantiation.

[4] To be clear, in SFL Theory, texts are not "the meanings actually afforded by an instance", but the meanings and wordings of the system that are instantiated (selected) during logogenesis.

[5] This is a serious misunderstanding of the cline of instantiation. A reading of a text is an interpretation of an instance, not an instantiation of it.

[6] This misrepresents Halliday & Matthiessen. Text type is the view of of register from the instance pole, but in characterising text type in terms of potential, the authors have instead viewed it from the system pole. That is, Martin & Rose do not understand the difference between viewing from the system and instance poles.

[7] To be clear, Martin & Rose misunderstand the cline of instantiation as a scale from general to specific, as if it were a scale of delicacy. Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 14):

Note that it is important to keep delicacy and instantiation distinct. In early work on semantic networks, they were sometimes neutralised. The difference is essentially that between being a type of x (delicacy) and being a token of x (instantiation). Both may be construed by intensive ascription.

[8] To be clear, this "liberty" has not been supported by argument. Moreover, it is a misunderstanding that derives from not understanding the different polar perspectives on the cline of instantiation, as demonstrated in [6] above.

Misrepresenting Hasan's Model Of Generic Structure Potential

Martin & Rose (2007: 309):

Another perspective on the relationship between register and generic structure is proposed by Hasan and her colleagues, who model it on the ‘axial’ relationship between system and structure. In this model, obligatory elements of genre structure appear to be determined by field, and the presence of optional ones by tenor and mode. The question of relationships among genres is thus a question of the field, tenor and mode selections that genres do and do not share. 

This contrasts with the model developed by Martin (1992), where choices among genres form a system above and beyond field, tenor and mode networks at the level of register. 

Because field, tenor and mode remain relatively underspecified theoretical constructs in SFL, it is difficult to evaluate the relative strengths and weaknesses of these modelling strategies (inter-stratal vs axial realisation) at this stage. 

Martin’s model has certainly been influenced by our work in educational linguistics where mapping relationships among genres across disciplines has been a central concern (Martin 2001a, 2002a, b; Martin and Plum 1997). For further discussion see Matth[ie]ssen (1993), Martin (1999c, 2001d), Hasan (1995, 1999), Martin and Rose (2005, 2007).

Blogger Comments:

[1] This is misleading. Hasan's model of Generic Structure Potential (1985/9) is an unacknowledged source of Martin's model (1992). Without Hasan's prior work, Martin would have no model.

[2] This is misleading, because it misrepresents Hasan. Hasan's model is concerned with the relation between cultural context and semantics. More specifically, it proposes that potential semantic structures vary according to the contextual configurations of field, tenor and mode features that a genre (text type) realises.

[3] This is misleading, because it repeats the misunderstanding previously expressed in Martin (1992). Hasan does not relate the obligatoriness of elements to the metafunctional dimensions of context. For Hasan (1985/9: 62), the obligatory elements of text structure are the elements that define the genre (text type):

So, by implication, the obligatory elements define the genre to which a text belongs;

[4] To be clear, this only presents a contextual perspective on how genres (text types) are related in SFL Theory. From the perspective of language, text types (genres) are related to each other by the relative frequencies of selected semantic and lexicogrammatical features.

[5] For a detailed examination of the model of genre in Martin (1992), see the posts here.

[6] To be clear, the authors' genre system, which is not provided anywhere in this publication or Martin (1992), is a simple taxonomy of genre classifications — narrative, anecdote etc. — rather than a system network of conjunct and disjunct features that specify different genres. Moreover, on this model, genre choices are realised by field, tenor and mode choices, where, as previously demonstrated, field is confused with ideational semantics, and tenor is confused with social structure.

[7] To be clear, in SFL Theory, field, tenor and mode are specified as the metafunctional dimensions of the culture as a semiotic system. However, the degree of specification of these terms is not criterial in assessing the relative strengths of Hasan's model — properly understood — and Martin's model. Hasan's model is (largely) consistent with SFL Theory, whereas Martin's model is neither consistent with SFL Theory nor consistent with itself, as demonstrated in previous posts. Internal consistencies include modelling varieties of language (genre, register) as context, as opposed to language, and yet claiming that instances of context are instances of language (texts).

[8] To be clear, the work that Martin & Rose have done in educational linguistics is not evidence of the theoretical validity of Martin's model.

The Relation Between Levels

  Martin & Rose (2007: 308-9):

Note however that the relation between levels is realisational, not a hierarchy of control; genre does not determine register variables, any more than register determines linguistic choices. Rather a genre is construed, enacted, presented as a dynamic configuration of field, tenor and mode; which are in turn construed, enacted, presented as unfolding discourse semantic patterns. Relations among genre, register, discourse and grammar are to some extent predictable for members of a culture, but at the same time they are independently variable; these complementary characteristics give language and culture the capacity for both stability and change.

 

Blogger Comments:

[1] This requires a minor qualification. In SFL Theory, some features on a higher stratum may 'preselect' features on a lower stratum in the sense that the selection of the former also entails the selection of the latter. Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 375):

More specifically, inter-stratal realisation is specified by means of inter-stratal preselection: contextual features are realised by preselection within the semantic system, semantic features are realised by preselection within the lexicogrammatical system, and lexicogrammatical features are realised by preselection within the phonological/ graphological system. This type of preselection may take different forms between different strata! boundaries, but the principle is quite general.

[2] To be clear, on the authors' model, genre is realised by register, and register by discourse semantics. On this model, it is register that construes genre, not the reverse, and discourse semantics that construes register, not the reverse. The terms 'enacted' and 'presented' are not synonyms for 'realised', since neither term expresses a relation between two levels of symbolic abstraction.

In terms of SFL Theory, on the other hand, field, tenor and mode are the metafunctional dimensions of the culture as a semiotic system, and genre (text type) and register are two perspectives on functional variants of language — rather than systems of context — and modelled as a point of variation on the cline of instantiation. Different configurations of field, tenor and mode system features are realised by different registers/text types, which means different selection probabilities/frequencies on the strata of semantics and lexicogrammar.

[3] To be clear, on the authors' model, the relation between adjacent pairs of these four strata is invariably one of realisation. However, from the perspective of SFL Theory, what Martin & Rose might be trying to articulate here, without understanding instantiation, is that selections across strata are probabilistically linked, and that members of a culture — in their model: members of genre and register (!) — are implicitly aware of those probabilities, but that probabilities in the system can nevertheless be altered by changing selection frequencies in instances, thereby providing both system stability and change. If this is the intended meaning, then such change is merely changes in the probabilities of feature selection in existing systems, not the expansion of the systems themselves.

Why Martin's Model Of Register And Genre Is Theoretically Invalid

Martin & Rose (2007: 308, 309):

Register analysis then gives us another way of thinking about context, alongside genre. The main difference is that register analysis is metafunctionally organised into field, tenor and mode perspectives whereas genre analysis is not. For us the relationship between the register and genre perspectives is treated as an interstratal one, with register realising genre (as in Figure 9.2). The relationship between register and genre in other words is treated as similar to that between language and context, and among levels of language (as outlined in Chapter 1).

 

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, Martin & Rose model culture as varieties of language, genre and register, and do not model these varieties of language as language. This latter is analogous to not construing types of fruit as fruit.

Moreover, modelling varieties as stratal systems sets up a theoretical inconsistency with other strata, including their own discourse semantics, because other strata are not varieties, but full systems.

In SFL Theory, these varieties of language, text type (genre) and register, are the same phenomenon viewed from opposite poles of the cline of instantiation: text type (genre) is the view of register from the instance pole, whereas register is the view of text type (genre) from the system pole.

[2] To be clear, in SFL Theory, field, tenor and mode are the metafunctional system of context, which the authors' have misconstrued as register, a functional variety of language. In SFL Theory, different configurations of these contextual features are realised by different registers of language.

[3] To be clear, the fact that the authors' model of genre is not 'metafunctionally' organised is yet another dimension of theoretical inconsistency, since, not only are all other strata 'metafunctionally organised', but the metafunctions are a central tenet of SFL Theory.

As previous posts have demonstrated, from the perspective of SFL Theory, the authors' notion of genre is a confusion of different dimensions of the theory. For example,

• their 'genre' is text type, which is register viewed from the instance pole of the cline of instantiation;
• their 'generic purpose' is a culture stratum system, language rôle, within  the textual system of mode;
• their 'generic stages' are semantic stratum units, oriented to mode.

On this basis, it might be said that the authors' genre is at least partially 'metafunctionally organised', if inadvertently, though on strata other than genre.

[4] To be clear, from the perspective of SFL Theory, Martin & Rose misconstrue two perspectives on the same point of variation on the cline of instantiation of language, register and genre (text type), as two different levels of symbolic abstraction, strata, that are more abstract than language.

Moreover, as previously demonstrated, because Martin & Rose confuse their register system of tenor with social structure, they model genre (e.g. narrative) as realised by social structure.

The Authors' Self-Contradictory Claim That Register Is Realised In Genre

Martin & Rose (2007: 307):

By working along these parameters of activities and participants, and their realisation across the range of relevant genres, we can explore different domains of life, particularly the differences between everyday, technical and institutional domains, and the kinds of apprenticeship required for participation in them. 

Blogger Comments:

To be clear, here Martin & Rose propose that their discourse semantics (activities and participants), which they misunderstand as their higher stratum, register, is realised by their highest stratum, genre. That is, the authors invert their own model, proposing that register is realised by genre, instead of genre by register.

From the perspective of SFL Theory, what can be said is that processes and participants of the semantic stratum are instantiated in texts that vary in type (genre).

Misconstruing Ideational Semantics As Ideational Context (Field)

Martin & Rose (2007: 307):

Distinctive sequences implicate distinctive events, linked by expectations derived from participation in a field:

They posed for pictures together

signed autographs

compared callouses on their fingertips

Vincent Lingiari, a Gurindji elder, led his people off the cattle station

They subsequently sent a petition to the Governor-General

And events implicate distinct participants, arranged in relation to one another according to the classifications and compositions of a given field, for example, blues guitarists and their songs ...

blues guitarists

Eric Clapton, Robert Cray, Buddy Guy, Stevie Ray Vaughan, Jimmie Vaughan

SRV set list (partial)

Texas Flood, Pride and Joy, Riviera Paradise, Crossfire, Couldn't Stand the Weather, Goin' Down, Voodoo Chile, Sweet Home Chicago

... vs prospective mates bearing gifts:

mates

the prime minister Gough Whitlam/Vincent Lingiari

important White men/us Aboriginals

White men, White/Aboriginals, Black

gifts

land, country; cattle, horses, bores, axes, wire

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, in terms of SFL Theory, here Martin & Rose misconstrue the stratum of semantics as the stratum of context, mistaking ideational meaning (sequence and figures) of a text for its cultural field.

In terms of the authors' own model, Martin & Rose misconstrue their stratum of discourse semantics as their stratum of register, mistaking experiential language (activity sequences) for ideational context (field).

[2] And again, in terms of SFL Theory, here Martin & Rose misconstrue the stratum of semantics as the stratum of context, mistaking ideational meaning (participants) of a text for its cultural field.

And again, in terms of the authors' own model, Martin & Rose misconstrue their stratum of discourse semantics as their stratum of register, mistaking experiential language (participant taxonomies) for ideational context (field).

Misunderstanding Field

Martin & Rose (2007: 306-7):

This brings us to the final register variable, field, which is concerned with generalising across genres according to the domestic or institutional activity that is going on. By definition a field is a set of activity sequences that are oriented to some global purpose within the institutions of family, local community or society as a whole. The activity sequences, the figures in each step of a sequence, and their taxonomies of participants create expectations for the unfolding field of a discourse. On this basis, when identifying fields we need to consider expectations about what is going on … 

 

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, in SFL Theory, 'field' is the ideational dimension of culture, whereas register is a functional variety of language, modelled as a point of variation on the cline of instantiation.

Martin & Rose, on the other hand, misunderstand cultural context as register, while simultaneously claiming that their context is instantiated as text, which is an instance of language, not of context. In discussing field, the authors most often misconstrue it as the ideational semantics of a text, as demonstrated below, and previously on this blog, and in the critique of Martin (1992) here.

[2] To be clear, in SFL Theory, field is not concerned with generalising across text types (genres) according to the "institutional activity that is going on". On the contrary, field is a means of differentiating text types (genres) according to the situation types they realise.

In the stratification model of Martin & Rose, on the other hand, where register realises genre, field is the ideational realisation of genre. That is, even on their own model, field cannot be said to "generalise across genres", because a metafunctional system of a lower stratum (e.g. phonology) does not generalise across a higher stratum (e.g. lexicogrammar).

[3] To be clear, in SFL Theory, field is not "by definition" a set of activity sequences, no matter how they are "oriented". This is because, for Martin & Rose, activity sequences — along with figures and participant taxonomies — are located in the discourse semantic stratum of language: the experiential system of IDEATION. That is, by defining their register (context) system of field in terms of a discourse semantic (language) system, Martin & Rose are not only inconsistent with SFL Theory, they are also inconsistent in terms of their own model.

[4] To be clear, if activity sequences, figures and participant taxonomies are located on the discourse semantic stratum, as in the authors' model, then what unfolds (in logogenesis) is the experiential meaning of a text, not the field of its context. Incidentally, it might be asked why logical meaning, Martin's system of conjunction, is excluded from this misunderstanding of field.

[5] To be clear, in SFL Theory, identifying the field of a text is identifying the ideational dimension of the culture that the text construes.

[6] To be clear, the expectations of a listener are not criterial in identifying the field of a speaker's text, since field classifies the cultural situation, not the mental states of a listener.

Misanalysing Textual Reference And Confusing It With Ideational Denotation

Martin & Rose (2007: 305-6):

Where cultural difference comes into play, contracted realisation can be particularly excluding. We can take a moment to resolve the exophoric reference in Lingiari’s speech:

But this simply introduces a pulse of homophoric reference that many (but not all) Australians and few others can resolve.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, using SFL Theory, the exophoric reference items in this extract are the demonstratives:

• the (important white men)
• this (land)
• here (Wattle Creek)

and the endophoric reference items are:

• they (anaphoric to the important white men)
• it (anaphoric to this land)
• it (anaphoric to this land)
• the (anaphoric to the important white men)
• it (anaphoric to this land)
• the (cataphoric to us Aboriginals all around here)

That is, neither important white men nor us nor land nor today are textual references.

[2] To be clear, the concern with these glosses is 'reference' in the sense of ideational denotation, not reference in the textual sense. As previously demonstrated, this basic confusion permeates and undermines Martin's IDENTIFICATION, his textual system of his discourse semantic stratum.

Acronyms As Incisive Membership Signals

Martin & Rose (2007: 305):

Contraction refers to the amount of work it takes to exchange meanings, and the idea that the better you know someone the less explicitness it takes. Poynton exemplifies this in part through naming, pointing out that knowing someone very well involves short names, knowing them less well longer ones. For outsiders, Stevie might be introduced as Texas bluesman Stevie Ray Vaughan for example, whereas for hardcore fans just his initials will do:

Texas bluesman Stevie Ray Vaughan

Stevie Ray Vaughan

Stevie Ray

Stevie

SRV

Technically speaking, the less information a homophoric reference contains, the tighter the community it constructs and the more people it excludes. Acronyms in general are incisive [sic] membership signals in this respect, as are all of the resources noted in Martin 2000a under the heading of involvement (e.g. swearing, slang, antilanguage, specialised and technical lexis).

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, this is "reference" in the sense of ideational denotation, which Martin & Rose confuse with textual reference — homophoric or otherwise — in their model of textual discourse semantics, IDENTIFICATION, as explained in the examination of that system (Chapter 5).

[2] To be clear, acronyms do not contain less information, they express the same amount of information in reduced form. In any case, this bare assertion is invalidated by all the acronyms that are not inclusive membership signals, such as:

• ASAP
• AWOL
• ATM
• PIN
• SCUBA
• LASER
• RADAR
• NASA
• NATO
• UN
• UNESCO
• CIA
• FBI

The Authors' Notion That Genre Is Realised By Social Structure

Martin & Rose (2007: 303-4):

The horizontal dimension of tenor, solidarity, is used to generalise across genres with respect to the alignment of social subjects into communities of all orders: networks of kith and kin, and collegial relations associated with more and less institutionalised activity (leisure and recreation, religion, citizenship and work).

There are degrees of integration into these communities related to the range and frequency of activities undertaken together and also to shared feelings about the value of what is going on. For example, a hardcore fan of Stevie Ray Vaughan will listen to more of his recordings more often and with more pleasure than ‘softcore' SRV fans, and will have more books and memorabilia, will spend more time on his websites, may even have made a pilgrimage to his grave and so on. The rave reviews of his recordings and videos on Amazon’s website suggest a finely tuned sense of membership which, quoting from his fans, we might scale from nucleus to periphery along the following lines:

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, in SFL Theory, the contextual dimension of tenor is concerned with the enactment of speaker–addressee relations through language.

[2] To be clear, here Martin & Rose misconstrue social structure (their tenor) as their register (a functional variety of language) and propose, on their stratified model, that their genre (a type of text) is realised by social structure.

Martin & Rose "Attempting To Construe A Sliver Of Equality" With Their Readers

Martin & Rose (2007: 303):

This is a huge research area; but one point we can make is that writing is not an option available to everyone in South African or Australian society since it depends on some form of institutionalised learning, and illiteracy is found in both societies. 

Beyond this, the modes of writing Tutu and Mandela control depend on a tertiary education and apprenticeship into one or more professions. And only a minority of South Africans or Australians can read discourse of this kind, let alone compose it as eloquently as we have witnessed here. So we have dealt mainly with discourses of power in our analyses. 

There are lesser voices too, of course. But Helena speaks courtesy [sic] of those more powerful than her (the SABC and Bishop Tutu) and Lingiari’s Indigenous Australian voice has always been projected to the wider world through the transcriptions of non-Indigenous academic scribes and political activists. 

If you have read this far in our book then you are reciprocating in ways to which certainly Lingiari, and probably Helena did not have access — whether you actually ever get around to responding directly to David and Jim or not. And note that by first-naming ourselves we are attempting to construe a sliver of equality that might make responding possible.

Blogger Comments:

[1] This is manifestly untrue. A significant majority of Australians, at least, have literacy skills far beyond those required to read the writings of Tutu and Mandela.

[2] This is manifestly untrue. As her text demonstrates, the woman identified as 'Helena' is a literate South African from a relatively privileged background.

[3] As a reader, it is indeed an honour and a privilege to be offered a "sliver of equality" by authors as far up the power hierarchies as 'David' and 'Jim'.

Misunderstanding Bernstein

 Martin & Rose (2007: 302):

There are five main dimensions of inequality in post-colonial societies, by which we are all positioned, very early in life in the home: generation, gender, ethnicity, incapacity and class. By generation we refer to inequalities associated with maturation; gender covers sex and sexuality-based difference; ethnicity is concerned with racial, religious and other ‘cultural’ divisions; incapacity refers to disabilities of various kinds; class is based on the distribution of material resources and arguably the most fundamental dimension since it is the inequality on which our post-colonial economic order ultimately depends. 

We should stress that we understand all of these as social semiotic coding orientations, which are thus materialised through both physical embodiments and semantic styles. The ways in which they operate is of course culturally specific, and far beyond the scope of this book to consider further here. 

The main influence on our thinking in this area is the sociologist Bernstein, as has perhaps become apparent to readers familiar with his work. For some of our dialogue with him, see Christie (1999). All five dimensions condition access to the hierarchies we encounter outside the home in education, religion, recreation and the workplace and so for most texts we have to consider power carefully in relation to field.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, in Bernstein's model, such social variables are factors that orient different language users to different language codes. Halliday (1978: 106):

What Bernstein’s work suggests is that there may be differences in the relative orientation of different social groups towards the various functions of language in given contexts, and towards different areas of meaning that may be explored within a given function.

[2] To be clear, the orientations of social groups to different language codes are not materialised through semantic styles, not least because semantic styles are not material but semiotic. Instead, from the perspective of SFL Theory, the codes themselves are actualised in language through register. Halliday (1978: 68):

The code is actualised in language through register, the clustering of semantic features according to situation type. 

[3] To be clear, these five social dimensions do not "condition access to the hierarchies we encounter". Instead, we are necessarily already located within these hierarchies (social dimensions).

[4] To be clear, Bernstein's codes affect all contextual systems: field, tenor and mode. Halliday (1978: 67):

In terms of our general picture, the codes act as determinants of register, operating on the selection of meanings within situation types: when the systemics of language — the ordered sets of options that constitute the linguistic system — are activated by the situational determinants of text (the field, tenor and mode […]), this process is regulated by the codes.

That is, the authors' locating of coding orientation within tenor misunderstands the relation of Bernstein's model to SFL Theory.

Reducing Tenor To Power And Solidarity

Martin & Rose (2007: 302):

The key variables in tenor are power and solidarity, the vertical and horizontal dimensions of interpersonal relations. The power variable is used to generalise across genres as far as equalities and inequalities of status are concerned.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, in SFL Theory, 'tenor' refers to the interpersonal dimension of the cultural context that language construes. Martin & Rose misunderstand it as the interpersonal dimension of register, which they misunderstand as context.

Importantly, 'tenor' refers to the relations between speaker/writer and listener/reader. Halliday (1994: 390):

Tenor refers to the statuses and role relationships: who is taking part in the interaction.

Importantly, the common feature of tenor variables is not power and solidarity, but degree of social distance. Halliday & Matthiessen (2004: 631):

the contextual variables of tenor … are status, formality and politeness. What they have in common is a very general sense of the social distance between the speaker and the addressee.

Importantly, tenor is particularly concerned with the roles created by language. Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 320):

the tenor of the relationship between the interactants, between speaker and listener, in terms of social roles in general and those created through language in particular ('who are taking part?').

Importantly, not all types of social relation are necessarily relevant to the tenor of a given situation. Halliday & Hasan (1976: 22):

[2] To be clear, in SFL Theory, different tenor variables distinguish the different text types (genres) that realise them. In the authors' stratified model, however, it is not genres that realise tenor, but tenor that realises genre.

Mode: Misconstruing Culture As The Authors' Register Instead Of The Authors' Genre

Martin & Rose (2007: 302):

So cutting across genres then, we have the question of the role language is playing, i.e. mode. And we can explore the effect of technologies of communication on texture with respect to two clines: degrees of abstraction (action/reflection) and degrees of interactivity (monologue/dialogue). This is an area that needs a lot more research, but there are hints of progress in Halliday and Martin (1993), Martin and Veel (1998), Martin (2001a) and Christie (2002).

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, in SFL Theory, mode is a system of the cultural context. However, Martin & Rose misunderstand context as register, and so misconstrue mode as a system of register.

Adding to the confusion, as previously explained, the SFL notion of mode, the rôle language is playing, corresponds to the authors' notion of the purpose of a genre. So by construing mode as a system of register, instead of genre, Martin & Rose are inconsistent even in terms of their own modelling.

To be clear, in SFL Theory, register is a sub-potential of language, not a system of context, and 'genre', in the sense of text type, is register viewed from the instance pole of the cline of instantiation.

[2] To be clear, once again, the unacknowledged sources of these ideas are Hasan (1989 [1985]: 58-9) and Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 354).

[3] To be clear, 'language in action' and 'language in reflection' do not differ in terms of abstraction. Both are construed as the same level of abstraction, but are opposite poles on a cline representing the degree to which discourse contributes to the total activity.

Misunderstanding The Mode Distinction Between Monologue And Dialogue

Martin & Rose (2007: 301-2):

Even where a response is not expected, as in prayers and various forms of public address, an interlocutor may be invoked as in Helena’s quoted prayer for example:

And both Mandela and Lingiari exhort an audience in their speeches, without giving up the floor:

Written discourse can also imitate dialogue, for rhetorical effect, as when Tutu asks a question, then answers it himself; or when Mandela replaces a mistaken proposition with its contradiction:

For something virtually monologic we probably need to turn to the Act, where propositions and proposals are enacted as performed. There is no right of reply:

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, in SFL Theory, the mode distinction between monologue and dialogue is the distinction between a text being created by one speaker and a text being created by more than one speaker. Each of these texts is a monologue, in terms of mode, because each is created by one speaker, namely: Helena, Lingiari, Mandela, Tutu and Mandela respectively.

[2] To be clear, these examples misrepresent the original texts by placing the speakers (material order) in the texts they project (semiotic order), as if they were characters in a play, further demonstrating the inability of Martin & Rose to distinguish different orders of experience.

[3] To be clear, since 'enact' and 'perform' are synonyms, this is, at best, a tautology.

[4] To be clear, a 'right of reply' is irrelevant to the mode distinction between monologue (single-authored text) and dialogue (multi-authored text). In this instance, what is true is that, in terms of Hasan's original model, the graphic channel does not afford process sharing; see previous post.

Problems With The Authors' Notion That Grammatical Metaphor Unties Texts From Situations

Martin & Rose (2007: 299, 332n):

Taking this a step further, the key resource which unties texts from situations is grammatical metaphor because of its power to reconstrue activities as things and thus break the iconic connections between linguistic and material activity.¹ This transforms social action into another realm of discourse in which abstractions enter into relations of various kinds with one another.

¹ By iconic we mean matching relations between the world as we perceive it and ideation, i.e. between people and things as nouns, actions as verbs and so on.

Blogger Comments:

Reminder: This is purportedly a discussion of mode, the textual dimension of context — 'culture' in SFL Theory, but misunderstood as 'register' by Martin ± Rose. In SFL Theory, 'situation' is the term for an instance of culture, but since Martin & Rose have replaced culture (field, tenor, mode) with register, and regard 'text' as an instance of their context, the term 'situation' can not mean an instance of context. In the preceding posts, Martin & Rose have used 'situation' to mean, on the one hand, the material environment of the speech/writing event, and on the other hand, the ideational meaning of the text, which they usually confuse with field instead. It is against this background of complicated theoretical misunderstandings — along the dimensions of stratification, instantiation and orders of experience — that the untangling of the confusions in the excerpt above is attempted below.

[1] To be clear, from the perspective of SFL Theory, the notion that a text can be "untied" from a situation is nonsensical, because it is the text that construes the situation.

[2] To be clear, this seriously misunderstands grammatical metaphor. Grammatical metaphor is not a "non-iconic" relation between "linguistic and material activity", but an incongruent relation — within language — between semantics and grammar. Moreover, this characterisation reduces grammatical metaphor to ideational metaphor, and reduces ideational metaphor to elemental metaphor (processes incongruently realised as things). Importantly, grammatical metaphor is semantically junctional. Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 243):

When this happens, it is a signal that a phenomenon of this other kind — quality, or process — is being treated as if it was a thing. The grammar has constructed an imaginary or fictitious object, called shakiness, by transcategorising the quality shaky; similarly by transcategorising the process develop it has created a pseudo-thing called development. What is the status of such fictitious objects or pseudo-things? Unlike the other elements, which lose their original status in being transcategorised (for example, shaker is no longer a process, even though it derives from shake), these elements do not; shakiness is still a quality, development is still a process — only they have been construed into things. They are thus a fusion, or 'junction', of two semantic elemental categories: shakiness is a 'quality thing', development is a 'process thing'. All such junctional elements involve grammatical metaphor.

[3] To be clear, as explained above, this is a nonsensical claim. Elemental ideational grammatical metaphor does not "transform social action" into anything. Instead, it reconstrues the congruent model of experience into a metaphorical model which is further removed from everyday experience. Cf Halliday & Matthiessen (2004: 646):

As we have seen, grammatical metaphor of the ideational kind is primarily a strategy enabling us to transform our experience of the world: the model of experience construed in the congruent mode is reconstrued in the metaphorical mode, creating a model that is further removed from our everyday experience – but which has made modern science possible.

[4] To be clear, in SFL Theory, "the world as we perceive it" is the construal of experience as ideational meaning. In these terms, the authors' nonsensical claim becomes:

• By iconic we mean matching relations between ideational meaning and ideation

where 'ideation' is Martin's discourse semantic system, which, as demonstrated here, is his misunderstanding of Halliday & Hasan's (1976) lexical cohesion (textual lexicogrammar) rebranded as his experiential semantics.

[5] To be clear, the relation here is the stratal relation within language between meaning (people, things, actions) and grammatical form (nouns, verbs). As such, it does not exemplify a relation between "the world as we perceive it" and Martin's experiential discourse semantic system of ideation.