Using Embedding To Argue About Hypotaxis

Martin (1992: 486):

Subjects in embedded clauses are not however modally responsible, as can be seen from the fact that embedded clauses cannot be  tagged or queried.  Both the tag and the response in [6:51] for example refer unambiguously to the test, not the drug.

[6:51]	(embedding)
	The test proved [[the drug killed her]], didn’t it?
	— Yes it did.

With hypotaxis, the situation is more equivocal; the tag and response in [6:52] may refer either to the test or the drug, although the tag is much more likely to refer to the alpha clause than the beta:

[6:52]	(hypotaxis)
	The test suggested that the drug may have killed her, didn’t it?
	— It did.

So while hypotactically dependent clauses are still negotiable, the Mood element is less likely to be replayed than that of the alpha clause, and their Subject can accordingly be considered less at risk than those of ranking a [alpha?] clauses.

Blogger Comments:

[1] Text [6:52], like text [6:51], involves embedding, not hypotaxis.  It is the Subject of this clause simplex that is picked up by the pronoun in the Mood Tag.

the test	suggested		[[that the drug may have killed her]]	didn’t	it
Token/Identified	Process: identifying		Value/Identifier
Subject	Finite	Predicator	Complement	Finite	Subject
Mood		Residue		Mood Tag

Cf. the receptive agnate: That the drug may have killed her was suggested by the test, wasn't it?

[[that the drug may have killed her]]	was	suggested	by the test	wasn’t	it
Value/Identifier	Process: identifying		Token/Identified
Subject	Finite	Predicator	Adjunct	Finite	Subject
Mood		Residue		Mood Tag

See, for example, Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 269, 277, 285).

[2] Here the meaning of Subject, modal responsibility, is misconstrued as meaning "at risk".  In SFL theory, the Subject 'is the element the speaker makes responsible for the validity of what he is saying' (Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 83).