Misconstruing Heteroglossia And Dialogism As System And Process

Martin (1992: 574-5):

Like Firth, Bakhtin was interested in the heterogeneous nature of speech communities (for which he developed the notion of heteroglossia); and like Firth he saw this heterogeneity manifested in all texts (for which he developed the notion of dialogism*, using the metaphor of dialogue to capture the sense in which different voices converse as texture).

* Endnote #30 (p590):

The distinction between heteroglossia and dialogism in Bakhtin's writing is unclear; here heteroglossia is associated with system and dialogism with process.  Bakhtin himself however did not work with the Hjelmslevian notion of system and process, and was unlikely to have developed an opposition of this kind in light of his objections to Saussure's opposition of langue and parole.

Blogger Comments:

[1] This misrepresents Bakhtin and misunderstands his notion of heteroglossia.  According to the glossary in Bakhtin (1981: 428), 'heteroglossia' is the notion that the same wording has different meanings according to context:

The base condition governing the operation of meaning in any utterance. It is that which insures the primacy of context over text. At any given time, in any given place, there will be a set of conditions — social, historical, meteorological, physiological — that will insure that a word uttered in that place and at that time will have a meaning different than it would have under any other conditions; all utterances are heteroglot in that they are functions of a matrix of forces practically impossible to recoup, and therefore impossible to resolve. Heteroglossia is as close a conceptualisation as is possible of that locus where centripetal and centrifugal forces collide; as such, it is that which a systematic linguistics must always suppress.

[2] This misrepresents Bakhtin and misunderstands his notion of dialogism.  According to the glossary in Bakhtin (1981: 426), 'dialogism' is the notion that all utterances are made in the context of other utterances, with which they interact:

Dialogism is the characteristic epistemological mode of a world dominated by heteroglossia. Everything means, is understood, as a part of a greater whole — there is a constant interaction between meanings, all of which have the potential of conditioning others. Which will affect the other, how it will do so and in what degree is what is actually settled at the moment of utterance. This dialogic imperative, mandated by the pre-existence of the language world relative to any of its current inhabitants, insures that there can be no actual monologue. One may, like a primitive tribe that knows only its own limits, be deluded into thinking there is one language, or one may, as grammarians, certain political figures and normative framers of "literary languages" do, seek in a sophisticated way to achieve a unitary language. In both cases the unitariness is relative to the overpowering force of heteroglossia, and thus dialogism.

[3] To be clear, in SFL theory, texture is the property of being a text (Halliday & Hasan 1976: 2).

[4] The distinction between heteroglossia and dialogism in Bakhtin's writing is made clear by an appended glossary (Bakhtin (1981: 423-34).

[5] Here Martin maps his misunderstanding of heteroglossia onto the SFL notion of system, and his misunderstanding of dialogism onto the SFL notion of process.  Further complexity is added to these misunderstandings and inconsistencies when it is remembered that Martin has throughout misinterpreted the SFL notion of process — the instantiation of the system in the instance — as the axial realisation of system in structure, as demonstrated in previous posts.

[6] Bakhtin would not have associated heteroglossia with system and dialogism with process because such a mapping is wildly inconsistent with each pair of oppositions.

Misconstruing Barthes' 'Sequence' As Field

Martin (1992: 537):

Barthes's sequence, which is equivalent to the notion of activity sequence used here, is defined as follows (his nuclei are roughly equivalent to the clause rank nuclear structures proposed in Chapter 5):

A sequence is a logical succession of nuclei bound together by a relation of solidarity (in the Hjelmslevian sense of double implication: two terms presuppose one another): the sequence opens when one of its terms has no solidary antecedent and closes when another of its terms has no consequent.  To take another deliberately trivial example, the different functions order a drink, obtain it, drink it, pay for it, constitute an obviously closed sequence, it being impossible to put anything before the order or after the payment without moving out of the homogeneous group 'Having a drink' (Barthes 1977: 101).

Blogger Comments:

[1] In terms of SFL theory, Barthes' notion of 'sequence' corresponds to a sequence of figures that lack cohesion with the surrounding co-text.  However, Martin's notion of 'activity sequence' corresponds to a sequence of figures without regard to (non-conjunctive) cohesion.  Further, in Martin's model, such semantic sequences are misconstrued as context (culture-as-semiotic), which, in turn, is misconstrued as register (subpotential of language).  This does, however, raise the question as to whether Barthes' 'sequence' is the unacknowledged source of Martin's 'activity sequence'.

[2] In terms of SFL theory, Barthes' notion of 'nuclei' corresponds to semantic figures.  However, in Martin's model, such semantic figures are misconstrued as 'clause rank structures' (lexicogrammar), which, in turn, are construed as (discourse) semantics.  This does, however, raise the question as to whether Barthes' 'nuclei' are the unacknowledged source of Martin's 'nuclear structures'.

[3] It is worth pointing out that, as stated, Barthes' notion of 'sequence' does not survive close scrutiny.  For example, if it only requires one of its terms to have no antecedent or consequent, then the integrity of a sequence is "only as strong as its weakest link".  Further the claim that it is 'impossible to put anything before the order or after the payment without moving out of the homogeneous group Having a drink' is clearly false, since the sequence could be preceded by offering to buy for friends, and followed by thanking the bartender, to name just two possibilities.

Inconsistent Claims About Discourse Semantics, Register, Genre And Ideology

Martin (1992: 496):

In this projection [Fig. 7.3 Language and its semiotic environment] metaredundancy (Lemke 1984) is reflected through the metaphor of concentric [sic] circles, with larger circles recontextualising smaller ones; the size of the circles also reflects the fact that the analysis tends to focus on larger units as one moves from phonology to ideology.  Thus the tendency in phonology to focus on syllables and phonemes, at the level of lexicogrammar to focus on the clause, at the level of discourse semantics to focus on the exchange or "paragraph", at the level of register to focus on a stage in a transaction, at the level of genre to focus on whole texts and at the level of ideology to focus on discourses manifested across a range of texts.  More in the spirit of Firth than Hjelmslev, this projection lends itself to a reading whereby meaning is constructed on all levels …

Blogger Comments:

[1] In SFL, the tendency in phonology is to focus on the tone group, not on syllables and phonemes, and a tone group can be larger than a clause.

[2] To be clear, the lexicogrammar also affords the study of clause complex relations, and cohesive relations, some of which may obtain throughout an entire text.

[3] The units in Martin's model of discourse semantics (p325) are:

• exchange and move (interpersonal),
• participant (textual),
• message (logical), and
• message part (experiential)

The message is said (ibid.) to be realised in the lexicogrammar as 'Process (& transitivity rôles)', and the message part is said to be realised in the lexicogrammar as

• Event (element at group rank),
• Thing (element at group rank),
• circumstance (element at clause rank),
• Epithet (element at group rank) and
• Manner adverb (element at group rank in Martin, but at clause rank in SFL theory).

That is to say, the focus in discourse semantics is on units that are, for the most part, smaller than the clause, not larger.  On the other hand, Martin's macro-Theme (introductory paragraph) and macro-New (text summary) are construed as functions at the level of text — which is said to be the focus at the level of genre, rather than the focus at the level of discourse semantics.

[4] Leaving aside the facts that, in SFL theory, register is language and context is not, there is the inconvenient truth that not all registers involve staged transactions.

[5] On Martin's own model, this confuses context (genre) with language (text).  In terms of SFL theory, it confuses text type (genre) with the meanings of a text (semantics).

[6] This confuses stratification with instantiation.  In SFL theory, the study of "discourses manifested across a range of texts" is the concern of register (text type, genre).

[7] This continues the confusion between semogenesis (making meaning) and stratification.  The whole point of stratification is to parcel out the complexity of meaning making into different levels of symbolic abstraction, thereby relating meaning to both lower levels of abstraction (wording and sounding) and to higher levels of abstraction (context).

Confusing Material Setting And Context Of Situation [updated]

Martin (1992: 121):

These orientations [situation vs community] can be systematised as follows.  Adapting Malinowski's terms, a distinction can be drawn between context of culture and context of situation.  Context of situation refers here to relevant information that can be perceived (seen, heard, felt, tasted, smelled), including text; context of culture embraces relevant information which cannot be perceived, but which can be assumed because of shared knowledge among interlocutors deriving from their membership in some definable community.

Blogger Comment:

[1] The relation between 'situation' and 'community' — even on Martin's understanding of these terms — is not the same relation as that between 'context of situation' and 'context of culture', as will be demonstrated below.

[2] Here Martin fails to inform the reader that Malinowski's terms had already been introduced into SFL theory by Halliday; see, for example, Halliday & Hasan (1985/9: 5-7).  In doing so, Martin thus falsely presents the work of others as his own.

In SFL theory, 'context' is the culture modelled as a semiotic system, whose expression plane includes language — a connotative semiotic in Hjelmslev's (1961) terms.  Language realises context; context is a higher level of symbolic abstraction than language.

The relation between 'context of culture' and 'context of situation' is instantiation, with the former constituting the 'system pole' of the cline of instantiation, and the latter constituting the 'instance pole'.  In other words, a 'situation' is a instance of 'culture' as potential, where both are conceived of as semiotic, not material.

[3] The material phenomena that can be perceived by interlocutors are features of the material setting.  Any such phenomena only feature in the semiotic context of situation if they figure as an instance of the culture that is realised by the (instance of) language of the interlocutors.

[4] This blurs an important distinction.  To be clear, the 'surrounding' text is the co-text, and so is language that realises context, not context itself.  On the other hand, instances of culture realised in any ancillary texts, as in a teaching situation, can feature in the semiotic context of situation.

[5] To be clear, the 'context of culture' is the cultural potential that can be realised in the meaning potential that is language.

__________

Importantly, 374 pages later in this work, these inconsistencies are further compounded when Martin (p495) reinterprets context of situation as register and context of culture as genre.  The absurdity of substituting two perspectives on functional varieties of language (register and genre) for opposite poles of the instantiation cline for context (situation and culture) can be made clear by substituting the later terms for the terms introduced above, yielding:

Register refers here to relevant information that can be perceived (seen, heard, felt, tasted, smelled), including text; genre embraces relevant information which cannot be perceived, but which can be assumed because of shared knowledge among interlocutors deriving from their membership in some definable community.

The Inconsistency In Treating Genre As A Connotative Semiotic [Revised]

Martin (1992: 51):

The rank scale at the level of discourse proposed originally by Sinclair and Coulthard included three additional ranks, two above the exchange (lesson and transaction) and one below (move).  Considerations at the ranks of lesson and transaction will be handled under the heading of genre in this book and will be taken up again in Chapter 7, along with a discussion of why genre is treated as a[n] underlying connotative semiotic rather than a higher rank at the level of discourse semantics…

Blogger Comments:

Treating genre as a connotative semiotic is inconsistent with the meaning of both genre and connotative semiotic.  Because 'genre' is a variety of language, and language is a denotative semiotic, 'genre' is a variety of a denotative semiotic. And because a connotative semiotic is a semiotic system whose expression plane is language (Hjelmslev 1961), 'genre', as a variety of language, is located on the expression plane of a connotative semiotic, not on its content plane (context).

Confusing Stratification With Instantiation: Register And Genre [Revised]

Martin (1992: 26):

Finally, in Chapter 7, a model of context will be built up by sketching in the connotative semiotics of register, genre and ideology.

Blogger Comments:

To be clear, Martin (p493) claims to be following Hjelmslev in his use of the notion of a connotative semiotic. However, for Hjelmslev (1943), a connotative semiotic is a semiotic system whose expression plane is a denotative semiotic system. Martin's model of context misunderstands Hjelmslev in two crucial respects.

Firstly, as will be seen, Martin misinterprets Hjelmslev's connotative semiotic as merely its content plane, excluding its expression plane, the denotative semiotic.

Secondly, as will be seen, Martin misinterprets functional varieties of a denotative semiotic, registers and genres of language, as connotative semiotics.

These basic theoretical inconsistencies invalidate Martin's model of stratified context.

In SFL Theory, register and genre (text type), as functional varieties of language, are modelled as language, not as context. This means that, as varieties, they are located at the midpoint on the cline of instantiation of language. Register is text type (genre), viewed from the system pole of the cline, whereas text type (genre) is register, viewed from the instance pole.

However, as will be seen, Martin's model of genre adds further to the theoretical inconsistencies by also encompassing the SFL notions of MODE (e.g. recount, anecdote etc.) and semantic structure (e.g. Orientation^Record^Reorientation).

Confusing Levels Of Symbolic Abstraction [New]

Martin (1992: 15):

The solution, referred to by Hjelmslev (1961) as the essential genius of human language, involves combining sounds in sequence to distinguish meanings. This immediately provides a stratified model with two ranks in the phonology, phoneme (distinct sounds) and syllable (distinct combinations of sounds) and one in grammar, the word (distinct meanings). At this point a second language can be proposed, lexese, in which there is a one to one relation between meanings and words.

As far as we know, evolved systems on the model of lexese do not occur. Once again, their limitations are obvious. They would require humans to remember an inordinately large number of words; and they have the further important limitation that no-one could mean something they hadn't already heard. The logical way out of systems of this kind is once more a combinatorial one — adding on a grammar than organises sequences of words. This brings us to something more closely resembling human language, at least as it is modelled in Hjelmslevian terms — a two strata system, with a minimum of two ranks on each stratum and an non-biunique (and therefore in principle arbitrary) relation between sound and meaning. This kind of two strata system is outlined in Fig. 1.11.

 

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, Hjelmslev (1961) is concerned with expression and content; see [6] below.

[2] To be clear, the word, as grammatical form, is not meaning. The word realises meaning.

[3] This is a false conclusion to draw. To be clear, the one-to-one relation in this scenario is between wording and sounding, not between meaning and wording.

[4] To be clear, a language like lexese could not occur, because it requires grammatical form to emerge prior to the meaning it realises.

[5] To be clear, this does not resemble human language, because it is model in which words have no meanings.

[6] This is misleading, because it is not true. Hjelmslev's two levels are content and expression, whereas as Martin's are grammar and phonology. Where Hjelmslev's model includes meaning (in content), Martin's model does not.

On the one hand, this reflects Martin's misunderstanding of stratification, mistaking every stratum as a stratum of meaning; see later posts. On the other hand, it serves a rhetorical purpose, since Martin will later claim that he is filling a gap in SFL Theory by proposing a stratum of discourse semantics above the stratum of grammar, ignoring the fact that SFL Theory has always had a stratum of semantics above the stratum of grammar; see e.g. the primary source of Martin's model: Halliday & Hasan (1976: 5).

Misunderstanding Levels Of Symbolic Abstraction [New]

 Martin (1992: 14, 28n):

The strategy adopted here will be to review the arguments for distinguishing content and expression form, before pursuing the problem of stratifying the content plane.

To begin, consider a language called phonese, in which there is a one to one relation between sounds and meanings, such as that "spoken" by animals and young humans in the proto-language phase⁵ (Halliday 1975, Painter 1984). In such a language we have a very simple system of signs. Formulated systemically, it consists of a system with a list of features. The labelling of features in a system of this kind is a moot point; since content and expression are fused, either "semantic" or "phonetic" labels can be used.⁶ In Fig. 1.10 fused labels interfacing with both content and expression substance are employed; the language modelled there consists of six signs, with a bi-unique relation between meaning and sound.

 

⁵ Halliday, but not Painter, actually models the proto-language phase as a two strata system; Painter's mono-stratal characterisation is preferred here.

⁶ In traffic-light-ese this is the problem of labelling terms as [stop/speed up/go] or [red/yellow/green].

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, on the model of Saussure, and its development by Hjelmslev (1961: 58), a sign necessarily entails two levels of symbolic abstraction: signifier/expression and signified/content. In SFL terms, the signifier/expression (Token) realises the signified/content (Value).

[2] This is misleading. Such a system involves a system of content features, together with realisation statements that specify the expression of each content choice.

[3] This is a very serious misunderstanding. Content and expression are not semiotically "fused", since they are different levels of abstraction. If only content features are used, then their means of expression are not specified; if only expression features are used, then the meanings they expressed are not specified.

[4] In Figure 1.10, content and expression features are mistakenly juxtaposed, as if they were of the same level of symbolic abstraction. The problem is easily rectified, and made consistent with SFL Theory, by placing the phonetic symbols in realisation statements; e.g. ➘ [ba] etc. But the problem here is not the absence of a symbol in a representation; it is Martin's failure to understand the most fundamental notion of semiotic systems: different levels of symbolic abstraction, and as will be seen, this pervades Martin's work.

Confusing Realisation And Instantiation

Martin (1992: 4):

Following Hjelmslev (1961), paradigmatic relations are mapped onto potential and syntagmatic relations are mapped onto actual; thus system is described in terms of paradigmatic oppositions, process in terms of syntagmatic structure.  System and process are related through the important concept of realisation.

Blogger Comments:

[1] This confuses realisation and instantiation.  The relation between the axes, paradigmatic and syntagmatic, is one of realisation.  The relation between potential and actual is one of instantiation.

[2] This also confuses realisation and instantiation, but in a different way.  Here the instantiation process is confused with the realisation of paradigmatic options as syntagmatic structure.

[3] This confuses syntagmatic structure and the process of instantiation.  It isn't system and process that are related through realisation, but system and structure.