Martin (1992: 20-1, 29n):
An alternative projection (from Martin and Matthiessen 1991¹²) of these three strata, incorporating the additional axes of rank and metafunction is outlined in Fig. 1.13.
There, the strata are presented as concentric circles, which helps to capture the sense in which discourse semantics addresses patterns of lexicogrammatical patterns and lexicogrammar in turn addresses patterns of phonological ones.¹³ Within strata, description is further organised through layering (simultaneous metafunctions) and constituency (ranks). This projection also has the advantage of backgrounding the content/expression duality deriving from Hjelsmlev and underpinning Fig. 1.12. Somewhat more sympathetic then to Firth than to Hjelmslev, the model can be read as three meaning making levels, with the meanings made by smaller circles progressively recontextualised by larger ones.
¹² The concentric circle projection was initially designed by Halliday.
¹³ What Lemke (1984) generalises as the principle of metaredundancy.
Blogger Comments:
[1] To be clear, Figure 1.13 only illustrates rank and metafunction for the lexicogrammatical stratum, not the discourse semantic stratum, and, in any case, only the interpersonal system of Martin's discourse semantics involves rank. The other discourse semantic systems do not feature a rank scale, because they are Halliday & Hasan's lexicogrammatical systems of textual cohesion, misunderstood and rebranded as Martin's textual, logical and experiential systems.
Trivially, in SFL Theory, rank and metafunction are not axes, if only because axes — the paradigmatic and syntagmatic— are related in terms of realisation, which ranks and metafunctions are not. The rank scale is a constituent hierarchy, and the metafunctions are simultaneous dimensions of system and structure.
[2] Trivially, the circles are co-tangential, not concentric.
[3] To be clear, this again demonstrates that Martin does not understand strata as levels of symbolic abstraction. A stratum is not concerned with "addressing" patterns of patterns at a lower rank, if only because there are no "patterns" in a system of potential. A pattern at a given stratum presupposes an activation of the system, the process of instantiation, entailing patterns of feature selection. Such a pattern is thus located at the instance pole of the cline of instantiation, and a pattern of instantiation patterns is thus located at a point above the text on the cline, such as text type. In short, Martin has here confused stratification with instantiation.
[4] It is not clear why this backgrounding should be an advantage, given the important distinction that Martin has just made opposing the arbitrary relation between content and expression with the solidary relation between content strata. Reminder:
[5] The truth of this claim can be assessed by comparing Figure 1.13 with Firth's model of linguistic levels. Firth (1962: 30):
[6] This confuses semogenesis (meaning making) with stratification (levels of symbolic abstraction). The model of stratification, three co-tangential circles, does not construe three levels of meaning, but three levels of symbolic abstraction in meaning making: semantics (meaning), lexicogrammar (wording) and phonology (sounding).
Accordingly, this is not a matter of meanings made by lower strata recontextualised by meanings made by higher strata. Instead, lower strata realise higher strata. Sounding realises wording; wording realises meaning.
[7] This is potentially misleading. Lemke construes the relation between strata as one of redundancy, with metaredundancy meaning a redundancy on that redundancy; see See Halliday (2003 [1987]: 425-6). So, in terms of Martin's model, metaredundancy is
- the relation of discourse semantics to the redundancy of lexicogrammar and phonology, or
- the relation of the redundancy of discourse semantics and lexicogrammar to phonology.
Patterns of patterns, on the other hand, are a matter of instantiation, not stratification, as explained in [3] above.
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