Presenting Halliday & Hasan's Ideas As Martin's Ideas [2]

Martin (1992: 117):

The feature [semblance] could be further subclassified, into [identity] and [similarity].  This makes it possible to note the ways in which the features [presenting] and [presuming] condition its realisation; such occurs only in the context of presenting reference, same only in the context of presuming reference.

	PRESENTING	PRESUMING
SIMILARITY	a similar frog; such a frog	the similar frog;
IDENTITY	an identical frog; an equal amount	the identical frog; the equal amount; the same frog/amount

Blogger Comments:

[1] Here again Martin presents a distinction in Halliday & Hasan (1976: 76) as his own work, rebranding his misunderstanding of their grammatical distinction as his discourse semantic distinction.

plagiarism (noun) 

the practice of taking someone else's work or ideas and passing them off as one's own. 

synonyms: copying, infringement of copyright, piracy, theft, stealing, poaching, appropriation;

See also Jim Martin "Honouring" The Late Ruqaiya Hasan where Martin falsely accused the late Ruqaiya Hasan of plagiarism at a symposium organised to honour her.

[2] To be clear, Martin's distinction between presenting and presuming reference is his rebranding of Halliday & Hasan's grammatical distinction between non-specific and specific deixis, misunderstood as reference and relocated to his discourse semantic stratum; see previous posts.

[3] As these constructed examples demonstrate, reference is here misunderstood as feature of nominal group structure.  No attempt is made to provide, in a constructed co-text, a frame of reference by which something is 'the same or different, like or unlike, equal or unequal, more or less' (Halliday & Matthiessen 2014: 632).

Presenting Halliday & Hasan's Ideas As Martin's Ideas [3]

Martin (1992: 117):

The distinction between [similarity] and [identity] also accounts for the difference between so and that where they realise comparison in Attributes.  Both are colloquial in register.  So realises similarity and points to the non-verbal context, often to an iconic measuring gesture:

[3:40]  The frog was about so big.

That realises [identity] and depends on information recoverable from either the verbal or non-verbal context; it is exclamatory in intensity:

[3:41]  You mean he was that stupid!

 Blogger Comments:

[1] This is very misleading.  Having falsely presented this distinction in Halliday & Hasan (1976: 76) as his own work — see the two previous posts — Martin reinforces this falsehood by purporting to argue for the value of "his" distinction.

plagiarism (noun) 

the practice of taking someone else's work or ideas and passing them off as one's own. 

synonyms: copying, infringement of copyright, piracy, theft, stealing, poaching, appropriation;

See also Jim Martin "Honouring" The Late Ruqaiya Hasan where Martin falsely accused the late Ruqaiya Hasan of plagiarism at a symposium organised to honour her.

[2] This confuses the nominal group structure that realises Attributes (experiential metafunction) with comparative reference (non-structural textual metafunction).  Comparative reference involves a cohesive relation between a reference item and some reference point by which a comparison is made (Halliday & Matthiessen 2014: 632-3).  (Martin's system of IDENTIFICATION purports to theorise the semantics of reference.)

[3] Any referential function of so in this constructed instance is demonstrative, not comparative, since it serves the same function as this in The frog was about this big.  The item is exophoric to a gesture that indicates the size of the frog.

[4] Any referential function of that in this constructed instance is demonstrative, not comparative, since it serves the same function as that in You mean he was stupid to that extent.

That is, Martin has used two instances of demonstrative reference ([3] and [4]) to illustrate a distinction in comparative reference that he has falsely presented as his own work.

[5] Trivially, this misconstrues speech function (exclamatory) as intensity.

Presenting Halliday & Hasan's Ideas As Martin's Ideas [1]

Martin (1992: 116-7):

As far as the nature of the comparison itself is concerned, this may be on the basis of similarity or difference.  With general comparison this is the contrast between such, same, equal, similar, identical realising [semblance] and other, different, else realising [difference].  Where the comparison is experientialised, [difference] is realised either through the comparative morpheme -er or through submodification of a two or more syllable adjective with more or less; [semblance] is always realised through submodification in this context:

so/as/such/equally/similarly/identically + adjective.

The following paradigm exemplifies this crossclassification.

	QUANTITY	QUALITY
DIFFERENCE	fewer frogs	bigger frogs
SEMBLANCE	as many frogs	such big frogs
	β    α	β      α

Blogger Comments:

[1] The similarity vs difference opposition is not the basis of all comparative reference, merely the general (vs particular) type.  More importantly, Martin misleadingly presents these ideas as if they are his own; see Halliday & Hasan (1976: 76).

[2] This is a rebranding of the grammatical distinctions in Halliday & Hasan's (1976: 76) ' general comparison' as discourse semantics, with Martin's 'semblance' subsuming the original features 'identity' and 'similarity'.

[3] Martin's "experientialised" comparison is a rebranding of Halliday & Hasan's (1976: 76) 'particular (non-deictic)' comparison, and Martin's 'quantity' vs 'quality' opposition is a rebranding of their 'numerative' vs 'epithet' opposition, with these grammatical distinctions rebranded as discourse semantics.  Most importantly, Martin misleadingly presents these ideas as if they are his own.

plagiarism (noun)

the practice of taking someone else's work or ideas and passing them off as one's own. 

synonyms: copying, infringement of copyright, piracy, theft, stealing, poaching, appropriation;

See also Jim Martin "Honouring" The Late Ruqaiya Hasan where Martin falsely accused the late Ruqaiya Hasan of plagiarism at a symposium organised to honour her.