"Tracking By Possession"

Martin & Rose (2007: 176-7):

In relation to evaluation, the other tracking pattern we should look at is the frequent use of possessive reference connecting her second love to friends and relations and to his anguish and fear. Possessive reference is a key feature of the second Incident and Coda:

'operations'
'Now, now my darling. We are real policemen now.'
He and his friends would visit regularly
no other life than that of worry, sleeplessness, anxiety about his safety
And all that we as loved ones knew.. .was what we saw with our own eyes 

'repercussions'
After about three years with the special forces, our hell began
Sometimes he would just press his face into his hands and shake uncontrollably
He tried to hide his wild consuming fear, but I saw it.
I jolt awake from his rushed breathing
The terrible convulsions and blood-curdling shrieks of fear and pain from the bottom of his soul
I never knew. Never realised what was being shoved down his throat during the 'trips'
He's going to haunt me for the rest of my life if I leave him 

Coda
I end with a few lines that my wasted vulture said to me one night
The problem is in my head, my conscience.
There is only one way to be free of it. Blow my brains out. Because that’s where my hell is.

The extensive use of possessive reference in these phases focuses on the interpersonal relations between Helena, her man and their friends, and on her man’s relations to his body, his reactions and his consciousness.

Blogger Comments:

To be clear, textual reference "connects" a reference item to its referent. In the quoted text:

• my (darling) refers anaphorically to another policeman
• his (friends) refers anaphorically to another policeman
• his (safety) refers anaphorically to another policeman
• our (own eyes) refers anaphorically to loved ones
• our (hell) refers exophorically to the author and anaphorically to loved ones
• his (hands) refers anaphorically to another policeman
• his (wild consuming fear) refers anaphorically to another policeman
• his (rushed breathing) refers anaphorically to another policeman
• his (soul) refers anaphorically to another policeman
• his (throat) refers anaphorically to another policeman
• my (life) refers exophorically to the author
• my (wasted vulture) refers exophorically to the author
• my (head) refers anaphorically to another policeman
• my (conscience) refers anaphorically to another policeman
• my (brains) refers anaphorically to another policeman
• my (hell) refers anaphorically to another policeman

That is, reference alone does not "connect her second love to friends and relations and to his anguish and fear" and does not focus "on the interpersonal relations between Helena, her man and their friends, and on her man’s relations to his body, his reactions and his consciousness".

Misconstruing The Deictic Function Of Determiners As Their Referential Function

Martin & Rose (2007: 176):

The second point we need to make has to do with that beautiful, big, strong person. This reference is heavily evaluated, and harks back to the starry-eyed picture Helena paints of her first love at the beginning of the story (young, bubbly, vivacious, wild energy, sharply intelligent, popular). Her point is to contrast that man with what was left after his operations overseas. So another function of using full nominal groups to track participants is evaluation, as Helena shapes the point of the story for her readers.

We can see closely related functions (of framing phases and evaluating people) at work with Helena’s second love. He’s introduced as another policeman, referred to as the man when he becomes too much to handle, and as my wasted vulture the last time Helena mentions him:

I met another policeman
I can't handle the man anymore!
I end with a few lines that my wasted vulture said to me one night

The second and third of these are also evaluative, referring to her second love as the man expresses the distance in their relationship, while my wasted vulture registers her sympathy with his living hell.

 Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, this confuses textual reference with the use of nominal groups to realise participants (ideational denotation) and the use of attitudinal Epithets in nominal groups to enact interpersonal assessments.

[2] To be clear, the reference in another policeman is to the first policeman — which provides the frame of reference for the comparison — not the second. Martin & Rose have once again misunderstood the deictic function of the determiner (another) — in a nominal group realising a participant (ideational denotation) — as its referential function.

[3] To be clear, the reference in my wasted vulture is to the author — not her second love. Martin & Rose have once again misunderstood the deictic function of the determiner (my) — in a nominal group realising a participant (ideational denotation) — as its referential function.

Confusing Textual Reference With Ideational Denotation And Deixis

Martin & Rose (2007: 175-6):

Now let’s narrow the focus and have a look at how reference and lexical resources are used to introduce and track people through one phase of a story. We saw earlier how Helena’s first love is tracked through Incident 1; these references to him are presented again in Table 5.7. Like Helena, he’s tracked initially through a pronoun sequence: he, his, we. Then he’s referred to as a kind of person, with a full nominal group: my first love, that beautiful, big, strong person, and finally as my first love again.

 

There are two points we can make here. The first is that referring to characters with names or full nominal groups, instead of pronouns, is associated with phases of storytelling. So we get Helena’s name to introduce her story and sign off; and we get a young man to introduce the first love and my first love the last time he’s mentioned; and my first love is also used when Helena meets him once again after many years. What we’re looking at here is the use of pronouns to sustain reference within phases and nouns to frame phases in story telling.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, "lexical resources" ('content' words) do not refer in the textual sense, but only refer in the sense of ideational denotation. The items that refer in the textual sense are grammatical ('function' words and morphemes).

[2] As previously explained, the introduction of a participant is reference in the ideational, not textual, sense: the first mention of an ideational denotation, and the reference relation between a reference item and its referent is not the tracking of ideational denotations.

[3] To be clear, the reference in my first love is to the author, Helena, not to her lover. Here Martin & Rose have once again confused the deictic function of a determiner in a nominal group — to sub-classify the Thing — with its function as a reference item.

[4] As previously explained, names and "full nominal groups" refer only in the sense of ideational denotation — realising a semantic element — not in the textual sense. It is only reference items that refer in the textual sense.

[5] This is misleading, because it is untrue. As the previous table (Table 5.6) demonstrates, pronominal reference transcends phase boundaries in the text.

The Deployment Of Lexical Resources

Martin & Rose (2007: 173-5):

After Helena’s name is presented by Tutu in his introduction to her letter, she is referred to with first and second person pronouns throughout the other stages.

Lexical resources are used to introduce her two loves (a young man, another policeman) and they are then tracked with pronouns until lexical resources are needed again to evaluate them (that beautiful big strong man and my murderer, my wasted vulture). Incident I is about Helena’s first love, and he is tracked through it and also mentioned once at the beginning of Incident 2. Her second love is then introduced and tracked through Incident 2 and also plays a role in two phases of the Interpretation.

The minor characters are more local. First the three friends are tracked through the early phases of Incident 2. The Interpretation introduces the other players in turn: ‘those at the top’ when she discusses her new found ‘knowledge', together with her second love who is re-presented as my murderer. Then the people of the struggle are introduced and tracked through her discussion of the ‘black struggle’. In the ‘white guilt’ phase, ‘those at the top' are re-presented as our leaders and Mr F. W. de Klerk. Finally she re-presents her second love as my wasted vulture in the Coda when he describes his mental torture.

Globally then such a table lets us survey the role in the development of the story by different characters, as they are presented and re-presented in each phase in turn. Locally, it lets us examine the way in which participants are introduced and tracked within each phase. This kind of display also lets us monitor the use of lexical resources instead of pronouns once a participant has been introduced, which as we’ve noted is connected with evaluation in Helena’s narrative.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, the reference of first and second person pronouns is exophoric to the environment of the text, and so is not textually cohesive.

[2] To be clear, a young man and another policeman are grammatical units, nominal groups, not "lexical resources". It would appear that by "lexical resources" Martin & Rose mean 'content' words (like young, man, policeman, beautiful, big, strong, murderer, wasted, vulture) rather than 'function' words (like a, another, that, my). More importantly, the introduction of 'her two loves' is not textual reference, but ideational denotation: the realisation of a semantic element as a nominal group, and, as previously explained, textual reference is not the tracking of ideational denotations.

[3] To be clear, the presentation and re-presentation of characters in the text is not textual reference but ideational denotation, the realisation of a semantic element as a nominal group, in the instantiation of the text. Textual reference involves a relation between a reference item and its referent.

Identifying And Story Phases

Martin & Rose (2007: 173, 174):

Table 5.6 gives an overview of the resources used to introduce and track the main characters in Helena’s story.

 

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, Table 5.6 confuses personal and demonstrative reference items (my, I, our, the etc) with ideational denotations (a young man, Mr F.W. de Klerk etc.). Moreover, four of the six columns (Helena, 1st love, 2nd love, those at the top) contradict both of the authors' previous claims (p173) that:

reference helps construct the Act’s staging, using pronouns and determiners to track information within sections but not between, relying on names to refer between sections.

[2] To be clear, as previously explained, 'introducing a participant' is not textual reference, but the first instance of a specific ideational denotation.

[3] To be clear, reference is a textually cohesive relation between a reference item and its referent, and does not involve the tracking of participants. The authors' absurd claim is that Helena keeps track of herself through her text.

Tracking And Genre

Martin & Rose (2007: 173):

The way in which participants are identified is an important aspect of how a text unfolds. Of all genres, stories make by far the greatest use of reference resources to introduce and track participants through a discourse. In other genres, such as Tutu’s exposition and the Act, general participants are presented and only briefly tracked. We’ve also already looked at the way in which reference helps construct the Act’s staging, using pronouns and determiners to track information within sections but not between, relying on names to refer between sections. So we'll concentrate on Helena’s story here.

Helena is in one sense the main character in her story. Tutu introduces us to her by name, and she uses this pseudonym to sign off at the end of her letter. In the story itself she appears more often than anyone else, always as pronouns (I, my, we, our and also you when she’s quoting from her second love). Helena, however, is not so much telling us a story about herself as about her two loves, and the devastating effect their bloody work has had on them. Not surprisingly, the way in which these two key protagonists are tracked is more varied and more interesting than the steady pronominal reference to Helena. In addition other key participants are introduced and tracked through various phases, including her second husband’s three friends, ‘those at the top’ and the people of the struggle.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, as the authors' own exposition demonstrates, the referents of reference items are not limited to participants.

[2] To be clear, in SFL theory, 'genre' is Hasan's term for text type, which is register viewed from the instance pole of the cline of instantiation. Martin (1992) models genre, not as a sub-potential of language, but as a system at one level of the context that is realised by language, but which, in contradiction, is instantiated as text: an instance of language, not context. Moreover, when Martin & Rose apply their notion of genre to analysis (e.g. 'staging', 'sections', 'phases'), they are actually concerned with the semantics of a given text type/register.

[3] To be clear, as previously explained, reference resources neither introduce nor track participants. The 'reference' of introducing a participant is ideational denotation: a nominal group realising a participant. The notion of reference as tracking is most clearly seen as absurd when applied to first-person reference items, where the authors' claim is that the speaker/writer tracks herself through her text, or keeps track of herself for the listener/reader.

[4] To be clear, this has not even been discussed, let alone validated. Moreover, the claim is invalidated, in the authors' own terms, by Helena's use of I and my throughout her entire text ("the steady pronominal reference to Helena").

[5] To be clear, names do not include reference items, and only refer in the sense of ideational denotation.

[6] To be clear, first and second person pronouns are exophoric to the environment of the text, and so do not function cohesively (textually). Martin & Rose present the system of identification as a textual system.

Types Of Reference As Recoverability

Martin & Rose (2007: 172-3):

The reference terms we have introduced above were nouns: cataphora, anaphora, exophora, etc. But each also has an adjective, which is more common than the noun, including cataphoric, anaphoric, exophoric. Here’s a table summarising what each term means. In Table 5.5, esphora is treated as a kind of pointing forward, and bridging as a type of pointing back. We can refer to the system as a whole as RECOVERABILTY.

 

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, there are several misunderstandings in Table 5.5. Firstly, the examples of cataphoric and esphoric reference are both instances of the same time of reference: structural cataphora. Secondly, in the cataphoric example, the reference of the is resolved by following, not by the next occurrence of Act. Thirdly, homophoric reference, as the prefix homo- makes clear, is self-specifying. Fourthly, exophoric reference is to the perceptual field of the interactants. This is distinct from the situation, which is an instance of the culture as semiotic system, as construed by the meanings of a text. For (more on) esophoric and bridging reference, see [2] and [3] below.

[2] On the one hand, this is inconsistent with the authors' own characterisation of esphora as self-reference ('point into themselves'). On the other hand, it is consistent with Halliday & Hasan's original idea, structural cataphora, which Martin (1992) rebranded as esphora.

[3] As previously demonstrated, 'bridging' is a confusion of reference and lexical cohesion. To the extent that the reference component involves 'pointing back', it is anaphoric. The term 'bridging' is anomalous here because, unlike all the other types, it is not a type of 'phora'.

[4] This term is inconsistent with what it encompasses. To be clear, 'recoverability' is an ability to recover, whereas the types of phora are 'directions of pointing'. (Martin & Rose do not, in any case, represent this as a system.)

Esphoric Reference: Confusing Structural Cataphora And Homophora

Martin & Rose (2014: 172):

Finally there is one resource that identifies participants without us having to look elsewhere in the text. This happens when one thing modifies another one and answers the question ‘Which one?’. If for example Helena had referred simply to the Bethlehem district, the realities, the people or the answer we might have been entitled to ask ‘Where’s that?, ‘Which realities?’, ‘Which people?’, ‘Which answer?' But Helena short-circuits the questions by expanding a thing with a qualifier which tells us which district, which realities, which people and which answer she means:

the Bethlehem district of Eastern Free State
the realities of the Truth Commission
the people of the struggle
the answer to all my questions and heartache

Facets of things work in the same way:

the bottom of his soul
the rest of my life
the role of 'those at the top'

So the information presumed by the in these elements is resolved by the time we get to the end of them. When elements simply point into themselves like this it’s called esphora.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, as the authors' exposition demonstrates, referents are not restricted to participants.

[2] It will be seen below that one variety of what Martin & Rose term 'esphora' is indeed resolved by looking "elsewhere in the text", specifically: forward in the text.

[3] To be clear, in the intellectual source of these ideas, Halliday & Hasan (1976: 68), this type of reference is termed structural cataphora — structural, because the reference is resolved within the same nominal group, which means it is not cohesive, and cataphora, because the reference item the refers forward to the Qualifier of the nominal group.

[4] To be clear, the only facet (partitive quality) expression here is the bottom of his soul; see Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 395). The nominal group the rest of my life is a portion (partitive quantity) expression. In such expressions, the Thing and Head of the nominal group are dissociated. However, this is not the case in the final nominal group the role of those at the top, where role serves as both Thing and Head of the nominal group. It is only this nominal group that demonstrates structural cataphora: 'which role? of those at the top'.

[5] To be clear, the demonstrative reference item the in these two nominal groups makes homophoric (self-specifying) reference. The words soul and life serve as the Thing of their nominal groups, rather than as (elements of a) Qualifier. The reference is not resolved by asking 'which bottom?' which rest?'

[6] To be clear, this mistakes the reference item the with the nominal group ('element') in which it occurs. The reference relation obtains between the Deictic and Qualifier of the nominal group, which is why the reference is structural rather than cohesive. That is, reference is not "to itself" — though, if it was, it would be an instance of homophoric reference.

[7] To be clear, 'esphora' is merely Martin's (1992: 123) rebranding (and misunderstanding) of Halliday & Hasan's (1976: 68) structural cataphora.

Bridging Reference: Confusing Reference With Lexical Cohesion

Martin & Rose (2007: 171-2):

To this point, the resources we’ve looked at refer directly to the participant they identify. Less commonly, participants can be presumed indirectly. To illustrate we can use some examples from other stories in Tutu’s book:

Tshikalanga stabbed first.., and he couldn't get the knife out of the chest of Mxenge [96]

In this story the identity of the knife is presumed even though it hasn’t been directly introduced before; but it has been indirectly introduced, since the most likely thing for someone to stab with is a knife.

Similarly with the plastic in the following example; it hasn’t been directly mentioned, but plastic bags are obviously made of plastic, and so its ‘presence’ is obvious:

they started to take a plastic bag ... then one person held both my hands down and the other person put it on my head. Then they seated it so that I wouldn't be able to breathe and kept it on for at least two minutes, by which time the plastic was clinging to my eyelids [105]

This kind of inferred anaphoric reference is called bridging. Helena uses this kind of reference to presume the bed from her second love’s sleeping habits in the following extract:

Instead of resting at night, he would wander from window to window. He tried to hide his wild consuming fear, but I saw it.
In the early hours of the morning between two and half-past-two, I jolt awake from his rushed breathing.
Rolls this way, that side of the bed.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, here Martin & Rose confuse lexical cohesion with reference. On the one hand, a relation of collocation obtains between stab(bed) and knife, and this is textually cohesive. On the other hand, the demonstrative reference of the in the knife is homophoric —'self-specifying; there is only one – or at least only one that makes sense in the context' (Halliday & Matthiessen 2014: 631) — which is exophoric, and therefore not textually cohesive.

[2] To be clear, referents are not restricted to participants, as the author's own exposition has demonstrated. The demonstrative reference item the in the plastic refers directly to the Classifier plastic in the nominal group a plastic bag (which plastic? the plastic of a plastic bag). Again, this is accompanied by lexical cohesion: the repetition of the lexical item plastic.

[3] To be clear, here again Martin & Rose confuse lexical cohesion with reference. On the one hand, a relation of collocation obtains between rest and bed, and this is textually cohesive. On the other hand, the demonstrative reference of the in the bed is homophoric — there is only one that makes sense in the context — which is exophoric, and therefore not textually cohesive.

Misrepresenting Endophoric Reference As Exophoric Reference

Martin & Rose (2007: 170-1):

The second type of reference outside the text is harder to illustrate from our examples, because these written texts are so self-sufficient; the story, argument and act don’t depend on accompanying images or action to make their meaning. So let’s imagine that we are right now in Australia looking at an Aboriginal flag outside our window If so, when we say the black band, the red band or the yellow circle in the following text, then we are referring outside what we are saying to something we can sense (see, hear, touch, taste or feel):

The black band stands for Australian indigenous people (and for the night sky on which the Dreaming is written in the stars); the red band stands for the red Australian earth (and for the blood that Aboriginal people have shed struggling to share it with Europeans); and the yellow circle symbolises the sun (and a new dawn for social justice for Aboriginal people).

Likewise, if Helena had read her story to us over the radio, then we could argue that her reference to herself is exophoric (from her words to the person speaking):

My story begins in my late teenage years as a farm girl in the Bethlehem district of Eastern Free State.

The Act also refers to itself in a similar way, using both locative and demonstrative reference:

It is hereby notified that the President has assented to the following Act which is hereby published for general information:
1. (1) in this Act, unless the context otherwise indicates

This kind of reference from language to outside the text is called exophora.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, if 'accompanying images' are part of the text, reference to them is endophoric, not exophoric.

[2] To be clear, this is true whether or not 'Helena had read her story to us over the radio', since my refers exophorically to the creator of the text.

[3] To be clear, the Act does not refer to itself, if only because a text is not a reference item. If a text could refer to itself, the reference would be endophoric, not exophoric.

[4] To be clear, hereby generally means 'by this' and, as such, makes demonstrative reference to the text itself. That is, the reference is again endophoric, not exophoric.

[5] To be clear, this makes demonstrative reference to the text itself. That is, the reference is again endophoric, not exophoric.

Misunderstanding Homophoric Reference

Martin & Rose (2007: 170):

It may also be the case that presumed identities are to be found outside the verbal text. There are two main places to look for these identities: outside in the culture or outside in the situation of speaking. The first involves information which is to be found in the cultural knowledge that writer and reader share. Examples are Helena’s reference to the Boer Afrikaners and F. W. de Klerk, who her readers are aware of. Proper names are usually used in this way, and so align a group of people who know who’s being talked about, for example Eastern Free State, God, Mpumalanga, Steve Biko.

Definite reference can also be used in this way when the reference is obvious; Helena talks about the truth, ‘those at the top' ‘the cliques', the Truth Commission, the operations, the old White South Africa and the struggle in this way. The scare quotes around those at the top and the cliques indicate that she is addressing a special group of readers in the know. This communal reference, whether realised through names or definite nominal groups, is called homophora.

Blogger Comments:

[1] Here Martin & Rose misunderstand both homophoric reference and the architecture of SFL Theory. Homophoric reference is the subtype of exophoric reference that does not depend on a specific situation (Halliday & Hasan 1976: 71). Culture, on the other hand, is potential at the level of context, and "cultural knowledge" is language that construes context.

[2] To be clear, proper names do not refer in the textual sense, because they do not presume information, they provide it.  Again, this is reference in the sense of ideational denotation: words realising ideational meanings.

[3] To be clear, the vacuous claim here is that the use of proper names, such as Donald Trump, aligns those who know who such people are.

[4] Here Martin & Rose misunderstand the function of scare quotes, and as a consequence, misunderstand the text. It is not a matter of "addressing a special group of readers in the know":

Scare quotes are quotation marks that writers place around a word or phrase to signal that they are using it in a non-standard, ironic, or otherwise special sense. Scare quotes may indicate that the author is using someone else's term, similar to preceding a phrase with the expression "so-called"; they may imply skepticism or disagreement, belief that the words are misused, or that the writer intends a meaning opposite to the words enclosed in quotes.

Mistaking Post-Deictics And Numbering Systems For Reference Items

Martin & Rose (2007: 169-70):

As we noted in section 5.2, some tracking devices tell us where to look for presumed information. When we read the said period we look back in the preceding text to find the time referred to:

gross violations of human rights committed during the period from 1 March 1960 to the cut-off date contemplated in the Constitution
acts associated with a political objective committed in the course of the conflicts of the past during the said period

We may also be given instructions to look forward, although this is less common in most registers, except in legal and administrative discourse. For example, at the beginning of the Act the following Act refers forward to the Act itself that follows:

It is hereby notified that the President has assented to the following Act which is hereby published for general information:
ACT
To provide for the investigation and the establishment of as complete a picture as possible of the nature, causes and extent of gross violations of human …

Legal and administrative discourse also depends quite a lot on its numbering system for forward reference. This allows specific connections to be made to following discourse:

1. (1) In this Act, unless the context otherwise indicates -
(i) "act associated with a political objective" has the meaning ascribed thereto in section 20(2) and (3)

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, in SFL Theory, reference is not concerned with "tracking participants". The textual function of reference is to create cohesion in the text by presuming information that is recoverable from elsewhere in the text itself. Speakers do not need to "keep track" of participants, since they already know who they are talking about, and if speakers wanted to "track" participants for listeners, there are far more efficient ways of doing so than deploying potentially ambiguous reference items.

[2] To be clear, the only reference item in the said period is the demonstrative the. In this instance the reference is resolved by the post-Deictic within the nominal group — 'which period? the said period' — and so exemplifies structural cataphora, which does not function cohesively.

[3] To be clear, the only reference item in the following Act is the demonstrative the. In this instance the reference is again resolved by the post-Deictic within the nominal group — 'which Act? the following Act' — and so again exemplifies structural cataphora, which does not function cohesively.

[4] As previously explained, such numbering systems do not refer, since they do not include a reference item that presumes information.

Resources For Identifying Things And People

Martin & Rose (2007: 168):

Let’s now sum up the resources we’ve seen for identifying things and people, and add a few more, in Table 5.4.

Blogger Comments:

As previously demonstrated:

1. 'Presenting reference' is not reference in the textual sense at all, since non-specific determiners do not specify a referent. This is reference only in the sense of ideational denotation: the realisation of ideational meaning in wording.
2. 'Presuming reference' is Martin's rebranding of Halliday & Hasan's co-reference, personal and demonstrative, with the following caveats. (a) The post-Deictic said does not serve as a reference item. (b) The non-specific Deictics each, both, neither, either do not serve as reference items. Even in terms of the authors' own model, these are be 'presenting' resources, not 'presuming'. (c) First and second person pronouns do not function cohesively, because they presume information that is exophoric (the speaker and addressee), not endophoric. (d) The wordings Helena and Section 5 do not presume recoverable information, they provide it. Again, this is reference only in the sense of ideational denotation.
3. 'Possessive reference' is Martin's rebranding of Halliday & Hasan's personal co-reference, with the following caveats. (a) First person my does not function cohesively, because it presumes information that is exophoric (the speaker), not endophoric. (b) The Deictic Helena's does not serve as a reference item, because instead of presuming recoverable information, it provides it. Again, this is reference only in the sense of ideational denotation.
4. 'Comparative reference' is Halliday & Hasan's comparative reference, with the following caveats. (a) Wordings like as inhumane as…  are instances of structural cataphora, and so do not function cohesively. (b) Ordinative numeratives (first, second, third, next, last, preceding, subsequent) and post-Deictics (former, latter) do not serve as reference items, because they do not presume information that can only recovered elsewhere in the text. (c) Superlatives (best, most) do not serve as comparative reference items, because (i) they are not comparatives, and (ii) they do not presume information that can only recovered elsewhere in the text.
5. 'Text reference' is a confusion of Halliday & Hasan's (1976: 52-3) text reference and extended reference, with a further caveat. Wordings like all my questions do not make either text or extended reference, since the only reference item is my, an instance of personal reference, which, unlike instances of text and extended reference, does not function cohesively, since its reference is exophoric to the speaker.

"Identifying Things By Comparing Their Order"

Martin & Rose (2007: 167-8):

So things can be identified by comparing the intensity of their qualities, with words like better and best. They can also be identified by comparing their quantity, with words like most, more, fewer, less; so much, so little:

Spiritual murder is more inhumane than a messy, physical murder. 

What's wrong with him?

Could he have changed so much?

And they can be identified by comparing their order:

As an eighteen-year-old, I met a young man in his twenties.
An extremely short marriage to someone else failed all because I married to forget
More than a year ago, I met my first love again through a good friend.

Helena refers to him as her first love to distinguish him from someone else she later married. Other resources for identifying things by their order include first second, third; next, last; preceding, subsequent, former, latter.

Tutu also uses comparison to identify things:

the application should be dealt with in a public hearing
unless such a hearing was likely to lead to a miscarriage of justice

Here such a refers to a particular class of hearing (a public one), and no other.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, the function of comparative reference is not to identify things by comparing their qualities or quantities, but to create cohesion in the text by presuming information from the text itself. Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 632-3):

Comparative reference items function in nominal and adverbial groups; and the comparison is made with reference either to general features of identity, similarity and difference or to particular features of quality and quantity.

[2] As previously noted, words like best and most are superlatives, not comparatives, and do not make comparative reference.

[3] To be clear, this is an instance of structural cataphora — since the presumed information is provided within the same nominal group — and so, not an instance of cohesive reference.

[4] To be clear, this is not an instance of comparative reference, since what's wrong with him provides no frame of reference by which so much makes a comparison.

[5] To be clear, Numeratives do not serve as comparative reference items, because they do not make a comparison in general terms of identity, similarity or difference, or particular features of quantity or quality; see Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 632).

[6] To be clear, merely distinguishing one person from another does not, in itself, constitute an instance of comparative reference. For example, Helena could have distinguished her 'loves' using Classifiers, such as  'English' vs 'Boer', neither of which is a comparative reference item.

[7] To be clear, the function of comparative reference is not to identify things, but to create cohesion in the text by presuming information from the text itself.

[8] To be clear, the comparative reference item such functions cohesively by presuming a standard of reference in the preceding text: public.

Comparative Reference

Martin & Rose (2007: 167):

Now that we’ve looked at how various things are identified (concrete objects, abstractions, institutions, and things that people say) we need to look at ways that these things can be compared. Helena uses several comparative references in some parts of her story:

I finally understand what the struggle was really about.
I would have done the same had I been denied everything.
If my life, that of my children and my parents was strangled with legislation.
If I had to watch how white people became dissatisfied with the best
and still wanted better
and got it.

She begins by presenting the struggle as though we all know what she means, and then refers to it as the same. Later she presents what white people already had as the best, and identifies what they still wanted as better. She doesn’t need to say what is better, because words like better and best are resources for comparative reference, like same, other, else.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, the function of reference — personal and demonstrative co-reference — is not simply to identify "things", since this is an experiential relation that can be achieved in many ways, most obviously through identifying process clauses. What makes reference a textual resource is its function of creating cohesion in the text by presuming information from the text itself.

[2] Likewise, the function of comparative reference is not simply to compare "things" in the construal of experiential meaning, but to create cohesion in the text by presuming information from the text itself. Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 632-3):

Whereas personals and demonstratives, when used anaphorically, set up a relation of co-reference, whereby the same entity is referred to over again, comparatives set up a relation of contrast. In comparative reference, the reference item still signals ‘you know which’; not because the same entity is being referred to over again but rather because there is a frame of reference – something by reference to which what I am now talking about is the same or different, like or unlike, equal or unequal, more or less. Comparative reference items function in nominal and adverbial groups; and the comparison is made with reference either to general features of identity, similarity and difference or to particular features of quality and quantity.

[3] To be clear, words like best are superlatives, not comparatives, and do not make comparative reference; see [2] above.  (The the of the best is homophoric (self-referencing), which is a type of exophoric reference, and so: not textually cohesive.)

[4] To be clear, in SFL Theory, the reference function of the in the struggle — if not anaphoric to earlier in the text — is homophoric, and so: not textually cohesive.

[5] To be clear, the same does not refer to the struggle. This is to treat comparative reference as if it were co-reference; see [2] above.

[6] To be clear, the comparison made by the comparative reference item better is with the best — that is, the author says that white people wanted, and got, better than the best.  Here, the best is the frame of reference by which the reference item better makes a comparison.

Mistaking A Verbal Process For A Reference Relation

Martin & Rose (2007: 166-7):

Another important aspect of the Act’s specialised tracking resources is its elaborate naming system:

• sections 1, 2, 3…49
• sub-section (1), (2), (3)
• paragraphs (a), (b), (c)
• sub-paragraphs (i), (ii), (iii)
• sub-sub-paragraphs (aa), (bb), (cc).

This allows the authors to refer exactly to certain paragraphs later (or earlier) in the document. So for example, section 3, subsection (3), paragraph (d) of Chapter 2 refers to sections 5(d) and 28(4)(a):

3 (3) (d) the investigating unit referred to in section 5(d) shall perform the investigations contemplated in section 28(4)(a)

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, the system of IDENTIFICATION (Martin 1992: 93ff) is presented as 'reference as semantic choice', and in this chapter, IDENTIFICATION is said to be 'concerned with tracking participants (p155ff). In these examples, no references are made, since there are no reference items that presume identities recoverable elsewhere in the text, and no participants are tracked, since there are no processes to be participated in.

[2] To be clear, 'naming' is reference in the sense of ideational denotation: the assigning of wordings to meanings.

[3] To be clear, here Martin & Rose confuse a verbal Process (referred) in the experiential structure of an embedded clause with the textually cohesive relation between reference item and referent.

Spatial And Temporal Reference

Martin & Rose (2007: 166):

Another example of specialised reference is the tracking device therewith, which refers to a specific ‘location' in the text. This is used to keep things open, to refer generally to the processes that have to be undertaken to establish the Commission and Committees and empower them:

and for the said purposes to provide for the establishment of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission
and to confer certain powers on, assign certain functions to and impose certain duties upon that Commission and those Committees
and to provide for matters connected therewith.

Reference to location in space (here, there) and time (now, then) is also found in non-specialised discourse. It is used by Tutu to refer to restorative justice (here):

I contend that there is another kind of justice, restorative justice, which is characteristic of traditional African jurisprudence.
Here the central concern is not retribution or punishment but, in the spirit of ubuntu

As with therewith in the Act, identifying by location in space or time is a little more general than using a demonstrative. It treats discourse as a region of meaning that we can be oriented to, as opposed to a collection of people and things we pick out and name.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, in this instance therewith serves the same function as 'with that', and as such, makes anaphoric specific demonstrative reference to a Truth and Reconciliation Commission. The authors' mistaken notion that therewith refers to a location derives from giving priority to form (there-) over function in their analysis — the opposite of the SFL approach.

[2] To be clear, the temporal demonstratives now and then function 'conjunctively rather than referentially' (Halliday & Matthiessen 2014: 632).

[3] To be clear, in this instance, here also serves as a conjunctive Adjunct of matter. Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 620):

Here cohesion is established by reference to the ‘matter’ that has gone before. As noted earlier, many expressions of matter are spatial metaphors, involving words like point, ground, field; and these become conjunctive when coupled with reference items. …

||| Without chlorine in the antarctic stratosphere, || there would be no ozone hole. ||| (Here “hole” refers to a substantial reduction below the naturally occurring concentration of ozone over Antarctica.) |||

[4] To be clear, here and there are demonstratives — locative demonstratives — and the reference they make is demonstrative reference.

[5] This attempted hedge is invalidated by the exemplifying texts, wherein:

• there(with) specifically refers to a Truth and Reconciliation Commission, and
• here specifically refers to (another kind of justice,) restorative justice.

It also flatly contradicts the authors' opening claim — [1] above — that therewith refers to a specific ‘location' in the text.

The Authors' Claim That '(Afore)said' Is A Specialised Version Of 'The'

Martin & Rose (2007: 165-6):

In legal and administrative discourse quite a lot of pressure is put on identification resources in order to be precise. This includes some specialised features which we can see in the Act which established the Truth and Reconciliation Commission. The word said for example is used alongside the to refer precisely to what has just been said, specifying dates:

... the nature, causes and extent of gross violations of human rights committed during the period from I March 1960 to the cut-off date contemplated in the Constitution
... acts associated with a political objective committed in the course of the conflicts of the past during the said period

And specifying purposes:

To provide for the investigation and the establishment of as complete a picture as possible of the nature, causes and extent of gross violations of human rights committed and for the said purposes to provide for the establishment of a Truth and Reconciliation Commission, a Committee on Human Rights Violations, a Committee on Amnesty and a Committee on Reparation and Rehabilitation;

The words said or aforesaid are specialised versions of the, specifying that the identity presumed can be found in the preceding text.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, identification (reference) does not increase the precision of the meaning being made, because it involves the use of reference items whose identity may or may not be resolved by the reader.

[2] To be clear, the words said and aforesaid are not specialised versions of the, most obviously because they occur with the rather than in place of it. More importantly, what they have in common is that all serve as Deictic elements in the nominal group. Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 373, 374):

In addition to the Deictic element we have just discussed, there may be a second Deictic element in the nominal group, one which adds further to the identification of the subset in question. We will refer to these as post-Deictic or Deictic₂. The post-Deictic identifies a subset of the class of ‘thing’ by referring to its fame or familiarity, its status in the text, or its similarity/dissimilarity to some other designated subset.

As Deictic elements, the and said specify the Thing of their nominal groups — period and purposes. However, only the determiner the serves as a reference item that specifies a recoverable identity. This can be demonstrated by removing the determiner from the nominal groups in question:

• said period
• said purposes.

Here it is clear that said does not present a recoverable identity (cf the period — what period?). Once again, Martin & Rose have confused deixis with reference.

The Contraction And Expansion Of Meaning

Martin & Rose (2007: 165):

In abstract discourse such as Tutu’s argument, this kind of reference to what was just said is very common to refer to a point that’s just been made, possibly to evaluate it. What was said previously is typically tracked with demonstratives (this, that):

For some it has been so traumatic that marriages have broken up.
That is quite a price to pay. 

Amnesty is not given to innocent people or to those who claim to be innocent. It was on precisely this point that amnesty was refused to the police officers 

Once amnesty is granted,
and this has to happen immediately

The advantage of this kind of tracking is that stretches of meaning can be packaged up to play a new role as the argument unfolds. In the following passage, for example, Tutu packages up the effect of amnesty in order to expand on its consequences for civil damages (this means that...). These consequences are in turn packaged up to be evaluated (that is...) and identified (it is...):

The effect of amnesty is as if the offence had never happened, since the perpetrator's court record relating to that offence becomes a tabula rasa, a blank page.
This means... that the victim loses the right to sue for civil damages in compensation from the perpetrator.
That is indeed a high price to ask the victims to pay,
but it is the price those who negotiated our relatively peaceful transition from repression to democracy believed the nation had to ask of victims.

This kind of tracking of what was said is called text reference. As we’ve seen it is used to turn big meanings into smaller, more manageable ones, so that we can then make some more meanings with them. Meanings contract, in other words, so that new meanings can expand. The text is breathing, as the argument moves along.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, in terms of SFL Theory, each of these is a genuine instance of cohesive anaphoric reference. However, in terms of the authors' model, each is inconsistent with the notion of participant identification, since each of the referents is either a figure or a sequence, not a participant.

[2] To be clear, the unacknowledged intellectual source of this theorising is Halliday & Hasan (1976: 52), who, unlike Martin & Rose, make a distinction between text reference and extended reference.

[3] To be clear, it is not the meanings that become "smaller", but their realisation in wording, as when the meaning of a referent (marriages have broken up) is realised in wording by a reference item (that) which then serves as an element in another clause (that is a high price to pay).

[4] The text is farting, as the argument moves along.

Identifying What People Say: Text Reference

Martin & Rose (2007: 164-5):

Beyond abstractions, it’s possible to track things people say. Helena refers to her prayers for example as all my questions and heartache:

‘God, what's happening? What's wrong with him? Could he have changed so much? Is he going mad? I can't handle the man anymore! But, I can't get out. He's going to haunt me for the rest of my life if I leave him. Why, God?' Today I know the answer to all my questions and heartache.

And Tutu refers to the question he’s just asked as this:

So is amnesty being given at the cost of justice being done?
This is not a frivolous question, but a very serious issue

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, even in the authors' own terms (p155), the system of identification is concerned with tracking participants. For 'things people say' to qualify as participants, they must be construed as participating in a Process, most congruently as the Verbiage of a verbal Process.

[2] To be clear, the only reference item in the nominal group Qualifier to all my questions and heartache is the determiner my, which refers (non-cohesively) to the speaker, not to her prayers. Moreover, in terms of the authors' model, Helena's prayers are not a participant, but an extended quote of several figures:

‘God, what's happening? What's wrong with him? Could he have changed so much? Is he going mad? I can't handle the man anymore! But, I can't get out. He's going to haunt me for the rest of my life if I leave him. Why, God?'

And trivially, heartache is not a 'prayer'.

[3] To be clear, in terms of SFL Theory, this is a genuine instance of cohesive anaphoric demonstrative reference. However, in terms of the authors' model, it is inconsistent with the notion of  participant identification, since So is amnesty being given at the cost of justice being done? is a figure, not a participant.

Comparing Abstractions

Martin & Rose (2007: ):

Comparison can also be used to distinguish types of abstractions, for example kinds of justice:

Further, retributive justice — in which an impersonal state hands down punishment with little consideration for victims and hardly any for the perpetrator — is not the only form of justice. 

I contend that there is another kind of justice, restorative justice, which is characteristic of traditional African jurisprudence.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, this is reference in the sense of ideational denotation: a nominal group (form) realising a clause participant (function). The nominal group retributive justice does not include a reference item that presumes a recoverable identity.

[2] To be clear, this is a genuine instance of comparative reference. Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 633):

In comparative reference, the reference item still signals ‘you know which’; not because the same entity is being referred to over again but rather because there is a frame of reference – something by reference to which what I am now talking about is the same or different, like or unlike, equal or unequal, more or less. Comparative reference items function in nominal and adverbial groups; and the comparison is made with reference either to general features of identity, similarity and difference or to particular features of quality and quantity.

Presenting Less Concrete Things

Martin & Rose (2007: 164):

Less concrete things such as agencies (special forces) and abstractions (price, marriage, amnesty) are identified similarly to objects:

We're moving to a special unit
After about three years with the special forces, our hell began. 

Our freedom has been bought at a very great price.
But to compute that price properly 

An extremely short marriage to someone else failed all because I married to forget
After my unsuccessful marriage, I met another policeman. 

It was on precisely this point that amnesty was refused to the police officers who applied for it for their part in the death of Steve Biko.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, all four non-specific nominal groups "reference" in the sense of ideational denotation; that is, they realise participants. None of the four include reference items whose identity is to be recovered elsewhere. The function of the three non-specific determiners is deictic, not referential.

[2] To be clear, the nominal group here is actually an extremely short marriage to someone else with to someone else serving as Qualifier.

Presenting "Plural Mass" Participants

Martin & Rose (2007: 163-4):

There are a few ways of introducing plural participants (things or people). One way is to use the plural with no determiner:

In the upper abdomen were twenty-five wounds.
These wounds indicated that different weapons were used to stab him…

For presenting participants, there is the plural of ‘a’, namely ‘some’:

they had some friends over
he had some milk for Helena

English uses the indefinite plural ‘some’ with things that can be counted like friends, and things that can’t like milk. Things like milk are ‘masses’. We can package them and then count the packages (two bottles of milk), but we can’t count a ‘mass’ (*two milks).

However with plural things or with masses we also have the option of presenting participants without ‘a’ or ‘the’:

I put garden shears through his neck
They were shot and massacred with AK47s
they poured acid on his face.

Plural things are presented with the ending ‘-s’, while plural masses are presented with neither an ending nor a determiner.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, this is reference in the sense of ideational denotation only: a nominal group realising a participant. The nominal group twenty-five wounds does not include a reference item whose identity requires recovering elsewhere.

[2] Again, this is reference in the sense of ideational denotation only: a nominal group realising a participant. The non-specific determiner some does not serve as a reference item, because it does not specify a recoverable identity.

[3] To be clear, this concerns the deictic function of non-specific determiners, which do not serve as reference items. Cf Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 368):

[4] Again, this is reference in the sense of ideational denotation only: a nominal group realising a participant.

[5] To be clear, here Martin & Rose inform their readers, who are necessarily literate in English, the most common way to mark plural number in English nouns. (Cf. also mice, geese, men, children, loaves, appendices etc.)

[6] Here, having informed the reader that "we can’t count a ‘mass’ (*two milks)", Martin & Rose nevertheless count them ("plural masses"). To be clear, mass nouns, like plural nouns, can be "presented" with a determiner, as the authors' own example some milk demonstrates. Again, this is deixis, not reference. Cf Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 369):

Presenting Concrete Objects

Martin & Rose (2007: 163):

In Chapter 3 we looked at different kinds of entities that can participate in figures, including people, objects, institutions and abstractions, as well as figures that function like things. Each of these different kinds of entities can be identified in different ways. 

Concrete objects, that we can touch, taste, hear, see or feel, are identified pretty much like people. They are introduced indefinitely, and then tracked with determiners like the or pronouns like it:

We used a yellow portable Robin generator to send electric shocks through his body when we put the generator on his body was shocked stiff…

they started to take a plastic bag then one person held both my hands down and the other person put it on my head. Then they sealed it so that I wouldn't be able to breathe and kept it on for at least two minutes…

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, the notion of 'figure' derives from the ideational semantics of Halliday & Matthiessen (1999) — not from Martin's (1992) discourse semantics — wherein the "different kinds of entities that can participate in figures" are elements, a different order of phenomenon from figures. "Figures that function like things" are instances of grammatical metaphor where what would congruently be realised as a clause is instead realised as a nominal group (the congruent realisation of an element).

[2] This claim, unsupported by evidence, is falsified by every single text, during the course of which, any inanimate object is initially realised by a specific nominal group — i.e. one featuring the determiners the, this, that, its, or the pronoun it.

Moreover, the realisation of concrete objects as non-specific nominal groups is reference in the sense of ideational denotation, not reference in the textual sense, since non-specific nominal groups do not include a reference item whose identity is recoverable elsewhere, since non-specific determiners do not specify.

The Apparent Anomaly Of Using Presuming Reference For First Mentions Of People

Martin & Rose (2007: 162-3):

Another apparent anomaly is the use of what looks like presuming reference the first time a character is mentioned. Some examples of this include the use of ‘the’, and a proper name, for first mentions:

He was popular with all the 'Boer' Afrikaners.
I can understand if Mr F. W. de Klerk says

What’s going on here is that Helena assumes that her readers will know who she’s talking about. The identity of the Boer Afrikaners will obviously be known to a South African audience, and the same for the name of a former prime minister. The point here is that speakers/writers make assumptions on the go about what listeners/readers can and can’t be expected to know. If someone's identity is as good as given then presuming reference is used, even where that character hasn’t been mentioned before.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, in SFL Theory, this is known as the homophoric reference (Halliday & Hasan 1976: 71), which is exophoric reference that is not dependent on the specific situation of the text. Like all exophoric reference, it is not textually cohesive.

[2] To be clear, proper names reference people in the sense of ideational denotation only, and lack reference items whose identities are resolved through textual relations with referents.

[3] To be clear, the so-called "anomaly" here is the use of a specific nominal group (presuming reference) for the first mention of a person — anomalous because it contradicts the authors' model that non-specific nominal groups (presenting reference) are deployed for the first mention of a person.

However, there are fundamental problems with both the authors' model and their explanation of the apparent anomaly. On the first point, non-specific nominal groups — such as a carpenter and someone — do not include reference items that present recoverable identities; non-specific nominal groups only 'reference' in the sense of ideational denotation (realising participants).

On the second point, exophoric the is not the only resource of presuming reference; Martin & Rose additionally list the following items: this, that, I, me, you, he, she, it, we, us, they, them. That is, every single first mention of the speaker as I is also an anomaly, on the authors' model, since it deploys presuming reference instead of presenting reference.