A Close Examination Of Martin's 2023 ISFC Plenary Abstract

Mapping Feeling: Attitudinal Relations

In this presentation I will review issues arising from the description of attitudinal relations proposed in Martin & White's The Language of Evaluation (2005). This will include issues having to do with 

• stratification (developing discourse semantic systems), 
• instantiation (multiple coding, the inscribe/invoke continuum, technicalisation and iconisation) and 
• individuation (bonds and bondicons). 

In doing so I will stress the importance of interpreting appraisal systems in relation to the Systemic Functional Linguistics theory that underpins the description and the challenge of dealing with applications and critiques of the framework which in effect disembody the description from this theoretical ground.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, in SFL Theory, stratification is the construal of language as different levels ('strata') of symbolic abstraction. Strata are thus different perspectives on the same phenomenon, like thespians and the roles they play are different perspectives on the same phenomenon. The relation between any two adjacent strata is one of (intensive) identity: a relation of realisation between a lower level Token and a higher level Value. As such, each level can be used to identify the other. For example, for the two strata of the content plane, the higher stratum, semantics, can be used to identify the lower stratum, lexicogrammar (decoding); and the lower stratum, lexicogrammar, can be used to identify the higher stratum, semantics (encoding).

In SFL Theory, the stratum of lexicogrammar (wording) is lexicogrammatical form (modelled as a rank scale) interpreted in terms of its function: its function in realising meaning. For example, a verbal group is interpreted in terms of its function of realising the meaning 'process'. Because of this functional interpretation, lexicogrammar (wording) and semantics (meaning) are in agreement ('congruent') in the absence of grammatical metaphor. It is the disagreement ('incongruence') between wording and meaning in grammatical metaphor that motivates modelling the content plane as two strata, rather than as function and form.

[2] When Martin developed his discourse semantic systems (Martin 1992), he gave the false impression (Chapter 1 Discourse semantics: A proposal for triple articulation) that stratifying the content plane was his own initiative, despite the fact that such a stratification was explicitly identified in the main source of his work, Halliday & Hasan (1976: 5).

Importantly, Martin's development of his discourse semantic systems (ibid.) was based on serious misunderstandings of stratification. Specifically, he misunderstood strata as interacting modules (pp 55, 77-8, 90, 268-9, 390, 488) rather than different levels of symbolic abstraction, and he misunderstood all strata as levels of meaning — even phonology! This latter misunderstanding derived from his confusion of 'realising meaning' (stratification) with 'making meaning' (semogenesis).

Martin (1992) presented 3 motivations for setting up a stratum of discourse semantics: semantic motifs, grammatical metaphor and cohesion. By 'semantic motifs' (1992: 16), Martin meant commonalities shared by partially agnate clauses: behavioural, mental and relational. Having been set up as a justification for a discourse semantic stratum, this was not addressed in the remainder of the book, and Martin's discourse semantics provides no means of modelling the agnation.

Martin's second motivation for setting up a discourse semantics stratum, grammatical metaphor (1992: 16-7), was merely Halliday's motivation for setting up a semantic stratum. Importantly, however, Martin's discourse semantic stratum undermines the systematic description of grammatical metaphor because it does not set up congruent relations between strata by which to contrast the incongruent relations of grammatical metaphor, and it sets up incongruent relations in the absence of metaphor.

Martin's third motivation for setting up a discourse semantics stratum was cohesion (1992: 17-9). Ignoring lexical cohesion, ellipsis-&-substitution and reference, Martin's argument was that agnate manifestations of expansion relations, logically in clause complexing and textually in cohesive conjunction motivate a discourse semantic stratum. However, as with grammatical metaphor, this only motivates Halliday's original semantic stratum, not a new and distinct discourse semantic stratum.

The original four discourse semantic systems set up by Martin (1992) were NEGOTIATION, IDENTIFICATION, CONJUNCTION & CONTINUITY and IDEATION. (CONJUNCTION & CONTINUITY was later renamed CONNEXION). All of these are rebrandings of systems originally set up by Halliday ± Hasan. While NEGOTIATION is a rebranding of a previous semantic system, Halliday's SPEECH FUNCTION, and its development by other scholars, the remaining three are rebrandings of previous lexicogrammatical systems, the systems of cohesion in Halliday & Hasan (1976). Specifically:

• IDENTIFICATION is Martin's rebranding of Halliday & Hasan's REFERENCE (and ELLIPSIS-&-SUBSTITUTION),
• CONJUNCTION & CONTINUITY, now CONNEXION, is Martin's rebranding of Halliday & Hasan's CONJUNCTION, and
• IDEATION is Martin's rebranding of Halliday & Hasan's LEXICAL COHESION.

In terms of metafunction, all the original systems of Halliday & Hasan are systems of the textual metafunction, but Martin distributes his discourse semantic rebrandings across the metafunctions, without providing supporting argument, thereby creating theoretical inconsistencies. While IDENTIFICATION, like REFERENCE (and ELLIPSIS-&-SUBSTITUTION), is presented as textual, CONJUNCTION & CONTINUITY, now CONNEXION, is presented as logical, and IDEATION is presented as experiential. 

Further theoretical misunderstandings in each of these discourse semantic systems serve to disguise the fact that they are indeed rebrandings of Halliday & Hasan's systems. For example, in setting up his textual IDENTIFICATION, Martin confuses REFERENCE with the interpersonal DEIXIS of nominal groups and confuses reference items with the nominal groups in which they occur, while also confusing REFERENCE with LEXICAL COHESION ('bridging').

In setting up his logical CONJUNCTION & CONTINUITY, now CONNEXION, Martin confuses cohesive CONJUNCTION (textual metafunction) with CLAUSE COMPLEXING (logical metafunction), and misinterprets and misapplies many of Halliday & Hasan's logical types. Moreover, because PROJECTION does not feature in Halliday & Hasan's model, since it does not function cohesively, Martin's logical discourse semantic system lacks a system of PROJECTION. This creates the theoretical inconsistency of a lexicogrammatical system with no meaning to realise, which has the further consequence that any grammatical metaphor involving projection cannot be accounted for.

In setting up his experiential IDEATION, Martin confuses (textual) lexical cohesion with lexis as most delicate grammar (lexical sets), and misapplies logical relations to grammatical structures.

In later publications, Martin added two more systems to his discourse semantic stratum: PERIODICITY (textual) and APPRAISAL (interpersonal). In Martin (1992), what later became known as PERIODICITY was modelled as an interstratal interaction pattern, with strata misunderstood as modules, but in Martin & Rose (2007), for example, PERIODICITY is remodelled as a discourse semantic system. However, the theoretical validity of PERIODICITY is undermined by the fact that it is a rebranding of writing pedagogy, not linguistic theory:

• 'macro-Theme' is Martin's rebranding of the 'introductory paragraph' of traditional writing pedagogy,
• 'hyper-Theme' (a term taken from Daneš and misunderstood) is Martin's rebranding of the 'topic sentence' of traditional writing pedagogy,
• 'hyper-New' is Martin's rebranding of the 'paragraph summary' of traditional writing pedagogy,
• 'macro-New' is Martin's rebranding of the 'text summary' of traditional writing pedagogy.

Moreover, there are no macro- or hyper- Rhemes or Givens to contrast with these proposed elements and complete the proposed structures.

For the evidence on which the above assessments of Martin's discourse semantics systems are based, see the detailed review of Martin (1992) at English Text: System And Structure, the detailed review of John Bateman's review of Martin (1992) at Thoughts That Didn't Occur …, and the detailed review of Martin & Rose (2007) at Working With Discourse: Meaning Beyond The Clause.

 

The systems of APPRAISAL, however, differ from all the other discourse semantic systems in that they were developed through the collective efforts of Martin's colleagues and PhD students, with a first, early version of the key subsystem of ATTITUDE set out in 1994 by Iedema, Feez and White in their monograph, Media Literacy. Martin is possibly often regarded as the founder of the theory on the basis of references he made to APPRAISAL in a 1997 paper ("Analysing Genre: Functional Parameters") and/or his fuller treatment in his 2000 paper ""Beyond Exchange: Appraisal Systems in English". (The 1997 chapter presented an account of the sub-system of APPRECIATION, which was also developed through collaboration, most notably through Rothery's work on visual arts education.) However, key elements of what is now the widely referenced version of the framework were first presented in White's 1998 PhD thesis and then in White's 2002 paper, "The Language of Evaluation and Stance" (Handbook of Pragmatics.)". The version of the framework now most widely deployed in textual analysis was outlined in Martin and White's 2005 The Language of Evaluation: Appraisal in English. It includes accounts of the following sub-systems: AFFECT (drawing on earlier work by Martin), JUDGEMENT (collaboration by Martin, Iedema, Feez and White), APPRECIATION (collaboration by Martin and Rothery), ENGAGEMENT (from White's 1998 PhD thesis), GRADUATION (White and Martin collaboration).

Because of its distinct provenance, APPRAISAL, unlike other discourse semantic systems, is not merely Martin's rebranding of other people's work on semantics (NEGOTIATION), lexicogrammatical cohesion (IDENTIFICATION, CONNEXION and IDEATION) or writing pedagogy (PERIODICITY). In fact, Halliday (2008: 49) locates APPRAISAL within lexicogrammar, as representing more delicate options within the general region of evaluation, and characterises the system of ATTITUDE as 'a grammatical system that is realised by a selection of lexical items' where 'each such item is uniquely identified as a set of intersecting grammatical features' (ibid.: 179). Like all grammatical systems in SFL Theory, APPRAISAL realises the meaning of semantic systems, and in the absence of metaphor, is congruent with its semantics.

[3] To be clear, the process of instantiation is the selection of features and the activation of realisation statements in logogenesis, the unfolding of text. The cline of instantiation is the scale from potential to instance; that is, from system to register/text type to text.

Multiple coding, on the other hand, can refer either to indeterminacy in the instantiation of features in a text, or to accounting for indeterminacy in the analysis of instances. Indeterminacies include ambiguities, blends, overlaps, neutralisations, and complementarities.

To be clear, the 'inscribe/invoke' contrast is the distinction between explicit and implicit realisations of APPRAISAL system features, and to place these on a continuum is to model degrees of indeterminacy between the two options.

[4] To be clear, Martin has presented two models of a 'cline of individuation': one derived from the work of Bernstein and the other from the work of his PhD student, Knight. The Bernstein-derived model is a cline from 'reservoir' to 'repertoire', where 'reservoir' refers to the potential of the community and 'repertoire' refers to the potential of the individual. Bernstein (2000: 157):

I shall use the term repertoire to refer to the set of strategies and their analogic potential possessed by any one individual and the term reservoir to refer to the total of sets and its potential of the community as a whole.

Applied to language, this is a model of the meaning potential of meaners (language users). The organising principle of the cline is elaboration and ascription (intensive attribution), since 'repertoire' is both a subtype of 'reservoir' (elaboration), and a member of the class 'reservoir' (ascription); cf. Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 145).

However, it is the Knight-derived model that is relevant to a discussion of 'bonds' and 'bondicons'. Martin et al (2013):

A second, complementary perspective on individuation looks at how personæ mobilise social semiotic resources to affiliate with one another — how users attitude and ideation couplings, in Knight's (2010) terms, to form bonds, and how these bonds then cluster as belongings of different orders (including relatively "local" familial, collegial, professional, and leisure/recreational affiliations and more "general" fellowships reflecting "master identities" including social class, gender, generation, ethnicity, and dis/ability).

Like the Bernstein-derived model, the organising principle is again elaborating ascription, since each point on the cline is a subtype and member of the points above as types, but unlike the Bernstein-derived model, the individuation here is not of the meaning potential of meaners but of the meaners themselves. This inconsistency leads to a more serious inconsistency: the conflation of two different types of hierarchy.

Affiliation differs from individuation in that its organising principle is extension, not elaboration, since it is concerned with composition and association (Halliday & Matthiessen 1999: 146). That is, where individuation is a hyponymic taxonomy (an elaboration of types), affiliation is a meronymic taxonomy (a composition of parts).

Because of this difference, affiliation can not be mapped onto the cline of individuation. For example, the bonding of meaners through shared evaluations does not affiliate them as a master identity such as gender or ethnicity. Gender and ethnicity are not created by people making the same interpersonal assessments, and the meaners (personæ) of the same gender or ethnicity can differ markedly in their interpersonal assessments.

[5] To be clear, Martin's concern here is to consolidate Appraisal as his discourse semantic system within SFL Theory. To the same end, he has previously claimed that Appraisal is not a theory, on the grounds that SFL is the theory, and here he echoes this claim by identifying Appraisal with description, rather than theory. However, a part of a theory is also a theory (e.g. transitivity theory), and in SFL Theory, every system network constitutes a theory. Moreover, in SFL, at least, the term 'description' refers to the application of the theory to individual languages (Halliday & Matthiessen 2014: xxiii, 55). That is, Appraisal Theory can be used to provide descriptions of appraisal in English, Chinese, etc.

But, in any case, Appraisal Theory can be used by linguists who are not acquainted with SFL Theory, as has been proved many times over. 

[6] To be clear, this is the challenge of dealing with applications and critiques of Appraisal Theory by those who do not acknowledge it as one of Jim Martin's discourse semantic systems in SFL. The intellectual way of dealing with this is to critically examine the work by reasoning on the basis of evidence, but this is also the way of dealing with applications and critiques of Appraisal Theory who do acknowledge it as one of Jim Martin's discourse semantic systems in SFL. In other words, whether or not Appraisal Theory is acknowledged as one of Jim Martin's discourse semantic systems in SFL is irrelevant to sound academic practice. Consequently, here Martin is merely concerned with maintaining the public perception that Appraisal Theory is one of his discourse semantic systems in SFL.

Hasan On The Bi-directionality Of Realisation

Realisation works somewhat differently in the two directions. In the encoding view, it is an activation of some possible choice at the next lower level: thus in the production of an utterance, context activates meaning, meaning activates wording. By contrast, in the reception of the utterance, realisation is construal of the relevant choice at the higher level: thus in decoding an utterance, the choice in wording construes meaning, the choice in meaning construes context. (Hasan, 2010: 12).

Blogger Comments:

If we turn SFL Theory back on itself, 'realisation' is an intensive identifying process that relates lower and higher levels of symbolic abstraction. Applied to the stratification hierarchy

• wording (Token) realises (Process) meaning (Value);
• meaning (Token) realises (Process) context (Value).

Identifying processes have two directions of coding: encoding and decoding:

• in encoding, the identity encodes the Value by reference to the Token;
• in decoding, the identity decodes the Token by reference to the Value.

Applied to the stratification hierarchy, in encoding

• the identity encodes meaning by reference to wording;
• the identity encodes context by reference to meaning.

Applied to the stratification hierarchy, in decoding

• the identity decodes wording by reference to meaning;
• the identity decodes meaning by reference to context.

However, Hasan interprets encoding as higher level (Value) activates lower level (Token)

• context activates meaning;
• meaning activates wording.

and interprets decoding as lower level (Token) construes higher level (Value)

• wording construes meaning;
• meaning construes context.

The key problem with Hasan's interpretation is that neither 'activate' nor 'construe' serves as an intensive identifying process, and so neither can serve as a 'direction' of the intensive identifying process 'realise'. 

'Activate' can be interpreted as either a material process or a qualitative attributive process ('make active'), and 'construe' here serves as a metaphorical mental process, with the lower level as Senser and the higher level as Phenomenon (which has the effect of assigning consciousness to the lower level in each case).

Importantly, while 'activate' is inconsistent with the principle on which the stratal hierarchy is founded, 'construe' is not, though it is not synonymous with 'realise'. With 'construe', the claim is the lower level 'intellectually constructs' the higher level. That is, meaning is intellectually constructed by wording, and context is intellectually constructed by meaning.

A further problem is the proposed one-to-one association of encoding with production and decoding with reception, since decoding and encoding are involved in both production and reception

• wording is decoded by reference to meaning (meaning identifies wording);
• meaning is encoded by reference to wording (wording identifies meaning).

Both the speaker and the listener are simultaneously decoding wordings by reference to meanings and encoding meanings by reference to wordings in a speech event.

Winning The Debate

The Verb 'Exist'

 Thompson (2014: 110-1):

It is useful to compare an existential process with a possible rewording using the verb ‘exist’:

Maybe some other darker pattern exists.

Although this is very close in meaning, the verb ‘exist’ itself is best analysed as a material process: the rewording reflects at least partly a choice to represent the entity (‘pattern’) as involved in a ‘going-on’ (which happens to be that of existing). The analyses of the two clauses are given in Figure 5.20 for comparison (‘Maybe’ is, of course, left unlabelled since it has no experiential meaning).

Blogger Comments:

To be clear, such clauses are existential, not material, on several criteria.

1. They satisfy the category meaning of existentials 'being (existence)', but not of materials 'doing (doing, happening, doing to/with)'.
2. There is no pro-verb, as there is for materials ('do, do to/with').
3. The unmarked present tense is the simple present ('exists') of existentials, not the present in present ('is existing') of materials.

See Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 354) for criteria distinguishing process types.

How To Lower Your Risk Of Offending Someone

Affliation

University Management

Performance Reviews

The Realisation Of Meaning In Wording

The Institutionalisation Of Affect As Judgement

Speaking Truth To Power

Interpersonal Skills

How To Deal With Criticism

How To Distinguish Theme From Subject In A Free Declarative Clause

Theme comprises everything in the clause up to the end of the first experiential unit.
Subject is what is picked up by a Mood Tag.

For example:

A little further on is the Rijksmuseum (isn't it?)

Theme: a little further on
Subject: the Rijksmuseum 

Sex Education In Schools

The Survival Value Of Ignorance

Consolations Of A Whistleblower

Verbal Group Structure Analysed For The More Common Secondary Tenses

Independent Assessment

Dealing With Whistleblowers

Mislabelling

Attacking The Messenger

The Place of 'Reading' In SFL's Architecture Of Language

Martin & Rose (2007: 310) place 'reading' on the cline of instantiation as more instantial than the text:

However, this is untenable for two reasons. Firstly, a reading of a text is at the same level of instantiation as the text it is a reading of. Secondly, a text is an instance of the system of the speaker/writer, whereas a reading is an interpretation of a text by a listener/reader.

As Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 384) explain:

If we look at logogenesis from the point of view of the system (rather than from the point of view of each instance), we can see that logogenesis builds up a version of the system that is particular to the text being generated: the speaker/writer uses this changing system as a resource in creating the text; and the listener/reader has to reconstruct something like that system in the process of interpreting the text — with the changing system as a resource for the process of interpretation. We can call this an instantial system.

On this basis, a reading is variant instantial system that is reconstructed by a listener/reader of the instantial system of a speaker/writer.

Metaredundancy Explained

Metaredundancy is not "the lexicogrammar construing the semantics construing the context" (Bartlett 2022). Metaredundancy, as the name implies, is a redundancy on a redundancy. Halliday uses the term for the three strata of language: semantics, lexicogrammar and phonology:

1. the redundancy of semantics and lexicogrammar is redundant with phonology, or
2. semantics is redundant with the redundancy of lexicogrammar and phonology.

One reason why Halliday took up Lemke's term was that it allowed him to explain that stratification is not a temporal (or causal) chain relation, as in 'semantics is realised in lexicogrammar, which is then realised in phonology'.

To be clear, the relation between strata is not enhancing (temporal or causal), but elaborating, and identifying, with the higher stratum of two as Value and the lower stratum as Token. Metaredundant relations in stratification can thus be expressed by either of the following:

For Halliday:

1. the realisation of semantics in lexicogrammar is realised in phonology, or
2. semantics is realised in the realisation of lexicogrammar in phonology.

On the other hand, the notion of lexicogrammar construing semantics is the notion that semantics is intellectually constructed by lexicogrammar, and the notion of semantics construing context is the notion that context is intellectually constructed by semantics.

Yægan Doran Undervaluing Michæl Halliday

Yaegan Doran wrote to SYSFLING on 27 Oct 2022, at 17:02:

The M.A.K. Halliday Prize is an international book prize awarded biennially for the most significant scholarly monograph recently published in Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL). It is named in memory of M.A.K. Halliday, who was the leading figure in the development of SFL theory.

Blogger Comments:

To be clear, this seriously undervalues the rôle of M.A.K. Halliday in the development of SFL theory. It is analogous to reducing Albert Einstein to the leading figure in the development of the General Theory of Relativity. SFL Theory is the creation of M.A.K. Halliday. Everyone else merely works in the theory that Halliday created. Without Halliday, there would not be any SFL Theory; without everyone else, there would.

For the motivation, see The Purpose Of Martin & Doran (eds).

Negotiating Tenor: Enacting Affiliation In Dialogue And Monologue (Yaegan Doran)

Negotiating tenor: Enacting affiliation in dialogue and monologue

Yaegan Doran

Australian Catholic University

Growing work in SFL has illustrated a wide range of strategies that people use to affiliate with each other and build community. To this point, however, these strategies have yet to be systematised into an integrated model. 

This talk presents one component of a model that aims to bring together these strategies into one system, as an evolving model of tenor (developed with Michele Zappavigna and J. R. Martin). 

Much work on affiliation, building on Knight (2010), has highlighted the regular use of both dialogue and evaluation in establishing and negotiating bonds: what we can analyse discourse semantically through NEGOTIATION and ATTITUDE (e.g. Zappavigna 2018). 

Similarly, descriptive work on interpersonal grammar across languages has highlighted the nuanced interactions that often occur between NEGOTIATION and the positioning of voices through ENGAGEMENT (e.g. Zhang 2020, Muntigl 2009, Martin et al. 2021). And work by White (2020), among others, has emphasised the crucial role of alignment in monologic discourse, highlighting the parallels between dialogic resources of NEGOTIATION and monologic resources of ENGAGEMENT. 

This talk aims to synthesise these interactions and parallels into a systemic model of tenor (being prepared as Doran, Martin and Zappavigna in prep.). The model developed views tenor as a set of resources for enacting social relations. 

The talk first explores the unfolding of dialogue, in terms of how people tender meanings to be reacted to, as well as how they can render these meanings in terms of support or reject. 

From this starting point, it then builds a more fleshed out description, that allows for the nuancing of meanings in terms of who has control or purview, the means by which propositions and proposals can be negotiated and ways in which each of these resources can be organised in both dialogue and monologue. 

Together, these sets of choices offer nuanced possibilities for negotiating people’s social relations in ways that complement a perspective on social relations in terms of status and contact.

Blogger Comments:

To be clear, this work simply confuses social relations (context plane) with the means of enacting social relations (language plane). That is, it misconstrues interpersonal language as interpersonal context (tenor). (And this is true even in terms of Martin's stratification, since although tenor is misunderstood as register, it is nevertheless understood as context.)

Halliday (1989: 12) describes tenor as follows:

TENOR — the role structure: 'who is taking part'

refers to who is taking part, to the nature of the participants, their statuses and roles: what kinds of role relationship obtain among the participants, including permanent and temporary relationships of one kind or another, both the types of speech role that they are taking on in the dialogue and the whole cluster of socially significant relationships in which they are involved.

The 'strategies that people use to enact social relations', on the other hand, are the interpersonal systems of language (and other parallel semiotic systems). 

In a previous seminar on tenor, Doran similarly presented systems of exchange structure (interpersonal semantics) as systems of tenor (interpersonal context).

This basic confusion between different levels of symbolic abstraction invalidates the proposed model of tenor.

Positive Discourse Analysis

He who praises everybody praises nobody.

 — Samuel Johnson

The most positive men are the most credulous.

 — Alexander Pope

Her Attitude

The Dialectical Method

The Lies That Bind

How To Identify The Thing (And Head) Of A Nominal Group

Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 394):

… while the Thing … is the entity that is functioning as participant in the transitivity structure of the clause … It is the Head that determines the value of the entity in the mood system, and therefore as a potential Subject.

To demonstrate: 

Here it is clearly the word picture that serves as Thing, since it was the picture that was eaten by the llama, not Dorian Grey.

For Matthiessen (1995: 656-7), on the other hand, it is Dorian Grey that serves as Thing in such nominal groups: