Affirming The Metastability Of Evolving Dynamic Open Systems

Martin (1992: 585):

Martin 1986 introduces the term contratextuality for texts which directly oppose each other from different positions and this idea has been extended in delicacy by Lemke (1988: 48).  Contratextuality is critically related to semogenesis in ways that are only beginning to be investigated (for a revealing study of the semiotic subversion of genre fiction by feminist writers see Cranny-Francis 1990) and it is probable that work in this area will be among the first to shed light on the vexing question of how text renovates system as dynamic open systems evolve, thereby affirming their metastability.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, the semogenesis to which contratextuality is related involves three related processes:

• logogenesis, the instantiation of the system in the text;
• ontogenesis, the development of the system in the individual; and
• phylogenesis, the evolution of the system in the species.

[2]  To be clear, on the SFL model, the relation between text and system is instantiation.  In this view, language is a probabilistic system and it is differences in probabilities that define register variation (Halliday & Matthiessen 1999: 552-6).  Probabilities in the system are manifested as frequencies in the text, and the frequencies in each text minutely nudge the probabilities in the system up or down.

Addressing "The Central Problem In Marxist Theory" By Adding A More Abstract Level

Martin (1992: 575, 576):

In their interpretations of language, register and genre as semiotic systems, systemicists have generally attempted to model cultures as a whole — to generalise meaning potential across all imaginable texts… .  The problems with this are:

1. as noted above, this meaning potential is not evenly distributed across participants in a culture; and 

2. for a culture to survive, this meaning potential has to evolve.

These two problems are in fact closely related; it is the tensions produced by the unequal distribution of meaning potential that forces a culture to change.  This brings social semiotic theory face to face with the central problem in marxist [sic] theory: what is the nature of the dialectic between base and superstructure that facilitates and at the same time frustrates social change?  Even more to the point, from the perspective of a theory of linguistics as social action, how is it possible to intervene in a dialectic of this kind?  These are the questions that the communicative plane of ideology has been articulated to address.

Blogger Comments:

[1] This is misleading.  Theory–competent Systemicists do not distinguish register and genre from language and do not model them as systems.

[2] This confuses culture (context potential) with the language that realises it.  The confusion is thus along the dimension of stratification.

[3] Neither of these are problems for proposing a system of language potential.  On the one hand, the social distribution of language system variants is a further dimension to be added to the model, and on the other, the evolution of the language system is modelled in SFL theory (Halliday & Matthiessen 1999: 18) by phylogenesis in relation to the other two semogenic processes:

• logogenesis provides the material for ontogenesis which provides the material for phylogenesis, while
• phylogenesis provides the environment for ontogenesis which provides the environment for logogenesis.

[4] The claim here is that:

• it is the tensions produced by the unequal distribution of meaning potential that forces a culture to change

Leaving aside the possibility that there may be other factors that "force a culture to change", the implication here is that an equal distribution of meaning potential would reduce tensions, but by doing so, put an end to cultural change.

[5] On the basis of [4], the academic revolutionary is faced with the choice of either working for social inequity or working for cultural stagnation.

[6] The claim here is that adding another level of symbolic abstraction to Martin's stratification hierarchy will address two questions:

1. what is the nature of the dialectic between base and superstructure that facilitates and at the same time frustrates social change?
2. how is it possible to intervene in a dialectic of this kind?

It might be remembered that the following has also been promised (p546):

Discourses of generation, gender, ethnicity and class channel subjects in very different ways according to the coding orientations they enjoy. It is the responsibility of the plane of ideology to make the nature of this channeling clear, deconstructing the momentum and inherent contradictions which allow it to evolve.

Misrepresenting Martin (1992) On Register & Genre

Martin (1992: 575):

The register and genre theory reviewed and developed above represents systemic theory's attempts to model heteroglossia and dialogism; it does this by formulating register and genre as social semiotic systems realised through text, thereby providing an account not simply of how one text relates to another (cohesion across products) but in addition of how one text relates to all the texts that might have been (product in relation to system). …

The interpretation does however need to be qualified in two important respects — namely heterogeneity and semogensis [sic] (i.e. semiotic change). 

Blogger Comments:

[1] This is doubly misleading.  Firstly, 'the register and genre theory reviewed and developed above' does not represent systemic theory's attempts.  On the contrary, it is inconsistent with SFL theory, and represents Martin's attempts only.  Secondly, 'the register and genre theory reviewed and developed above' does not model heteroglossia and dialogism.  On the contrary, what is claimed bears little or no relation to heteroglossia and dialogism; see further below.

[2] This is inconsistent, both with Martin's model and with SFL theory.

In terms of Martin's stratification model, register and genre systems are realised by the systems of language, not by text.  In this, Martin confuses the system and instance poles of the cline of instantiation.

In terms of SFL theory, it involves two confusions.  Firstly, the notion of register and genre systems confuses a midway point of variation on the cline of instantiation (register/genre/text type) with the system pole of the cline.  Secondly, it misconstrues the relation between system and text as realisation instead of instantiation.  (This in addition to the inconsistencies entailed by modelling varieties of language as context rather than language.)

[3] This is misleading in terms of both register and genre.  In terms of register, any chance of providing an account how one text relates to another is undermined by Martin's numerous misinterpretations of field, tenor and mode systems, as demonstrated in many previous posts.  In terms of genre, Martin merely provides two simple taxonomies of factual and story genres (text types).  Martin nowhere presents any account of how his formulation of register and genre relates one individual text to another.

[4] To be clear, in SFL theory, cohesion is not a relation between 'products' (texts).

[5] This is the opposite of what is true.  This is precisely what Martin's model does not do.  In SFL theory, the relation of texts to text potential — of instances to system — is modelled as the cline of instantiation.  Martin's model is inconsistent with the cline of instantiation, due to the fact that it misconstrues the midway point on the cline (register/genre), not as language, but as systems of context, and as such, as higher levels of symbolic abstraction than language.  This follows from not understanding either stratification or instantiation, as demonstrated many times in previous posts.

[6] To be clear, Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 18) identify three types of semogenic processes:

• logogenesis, the instantiation of the system in the text;
• ontogenesis, the development of the system in the individual; and
• phylogenesis, the evolution of the system in the species.

Misrepresenting Martin (1992)

Martin (1992: 574):

The first point that needs to be made is that the interpretation of language and context here is indeed multi-structural and polysystemic.  System/structure theory has been re-involved in the description on a number of different levels — rank, stratum and plane — most of which involve metafunctional diversity and so can be analysed simultaneously as particle, wave and prosody; in addition, synoptic and dynamic perspectives on text as system and text as process have been introduced.

Blogger Comments:

[1] As previously explained, context is interpreted here as types of language, rather than as context, with the result that, being context, these types of language are not considered language.

[2] This is misleading, in that it overstates what has actually been done.  Almost none of the systems that Martin has provided specifies structural realisations.  This is partially disguised by the fact that some networks do include realisation statements; however, these merely provide textual instances of the feature.

• Of Martin's 49 discourse semantic system networks, across four metafunctions, only 4 specify structural realisations, and all are confined to the interpersonal metafunction.
• Of Martin's 11 register system networks, not one specifies any structural realisations; that is, no register structures are specified by register systems.
• Martin provides 0 genre systems — only taxonomies of types (factual and story genres); that is, no genre structures are specified by genre systems.

[3] This is misleading, in that it overstates what has actually been done.  Martin has not provided a rank scale for his planes of register and genre, and in the case of the stratum of discourse semantics, only one of the four metafunctional systems, the interpersonal, includes a rank scale: exchange and move.  The ranks discussed in the experiential dimension of discourse semantics — the clause and group — are ranks of a different stratum: lexicogrammar. 

[4] The level that does not involve metafunctional diversity is genre.  Metafunction is thus another dimension in which the model is inconsistent with the architecture of SFL theory, which follows from the misinterpretation of genre as context.

[5] To be clear, these are the favoured modes of structural realisation only, varying according to metafunction.  Significantly, these were introduced in the section on genre, the plane without metafunctional diversity. 

[6] This confuses text with language.  Text is only the instance pole of the cline of instantiation.  Language is the entire cline, from systemic potential to actual instance, with every point on the cline providing a different perspective.

'Text as system', therefore, is the instantial system; i.e. the system of an actual text, not the system of the language as a whole.  It is the instance viewed from the system pole.  Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 384): 

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 call this an instantial system.

'Text as process', on the other hand, is the process of instantiation that occurs at the instance pole of the cline of instantiation during logogenesis.  As previously explained, Martin misconstrues 'process' as structure, the syntagmatic axis, "viewed dynamically".  That is, he confuses the instantiation of the system as instance with the axial realisation of the system as structure.

Asserting The Opposite Of What Is True

Martin (1992: 573):

The general point here is that single plane models of context tend to introduce additional complexity to handle the contextual variables distributed among field, tenor, mode and genre by English Text.  So the cost of recognising two connotative semiotics instead of one is not as high as it might initially appear.

Blogger Comments:

This is the conclusion of Martin's "argument" for the theoretical superiority of his stratification hierarchy over Halliday's original model, and it is clearly the opposite of what is true.

[1] As the previous six posts have demonstrated, Martin's model is more complex, not less complex than Halliday's model, but more importantly, its complexity arises from misunderstandings of the theoretical architecture of SFL, principally stratification and instantiation.  This has resulted in a model that is inconsistent both with the theoretical architecture and also with itself.

Furthermore, in the course of his argument, Martin has been prepared to misrepresent the work of both Halliday and Hasan in order to invent non-existent problems, which he purports to solve with his model.  As the previous posts demonstrate, each of Martin's "solutions" involves the creation of additional theoretical consistencies.

[2] The principal defect in Martin's bi-stratal model of context is, of course, that it is not a model of context.  Register and genre refer to language, not to context, and in SFL theory, they are complementary perspectives on diatypic variation.

With respect to register, Martin's misunderstanding arises from mistaking the contextual systems that identify registers — field, tenor and mode — for systems of registers themselves.  This in turn arises from Martin not understanding the principle of stratification: as levels of symbolic abstraction related by realisation (as demonstrated many times in previous critiques).

With respect to genre, Martin's misunderstanding arises from mistaking Hasan's generic structure potentials for potentials 'at the level of genre'.  For Hasan, they are structural potentials at the level of semantics which vary according to genre (text type/register).

In conclusion, because Martin confuses semogenesis (all strata make meaning) with stratification, his strata of register and genre are — ignoring internal inconsistencies — both focused on linguistic meaning; that is, both strata are theoretical relocations and rebrandings of semantics.

Misrepresenting Hasan On Generic Structure Potential

Martin (1992: 551-3):

In the same paper, Martin (1985) cautions against another bias inherited by genre theory from grammarians — namely that towards a synoptic as opposed to dynamic form of representation and interpretation.  The basic problem here is that in order to attain generality, grammarians have tended in various ways to abstract away from linear progression (to divorce in other words functional order from sequence).  Structure potentials such as those used by Hasan, and to an even greater extent the system/structure realisation cycle suggested by Martin, separate order from sequence in such a way that choices leading to a particular text structure bear no direct temporal relation to the unfolding of that text in real time.  To the extent that aspects of the unfolding of text are conditioned by linear progression, this perspective breaks down.

Blogger Comments:

[1] In Systemic Functional Grammatics, sequence during instantiation is specified by realisation statements of features, such as declarative Subject ^ Finite.

[2] This misunderstands the relation between order and sequence.  Sequence is one type of order; that is, sequence is a hyponym of order.  To speak of separating a hyponym from its superordinate category is a nonsense — cf separating lorikeet from bird.

[3] This is manifestly untrue with respect to Hasan's generic structure structure potentials.  Hasan (1985/9: 61) specifies the order of obligatory elements in the sense of 'sequence':

So the obligatory elements of text 4.1 are SR, SC, S, P and PC in that order.  This can be displayed as SR ^ SC ^ S ^ P ^ PC, with the sign ^ showing the order of elements.

[4] This continues the earlier confusion of syntagmatic structure with logogenesis (the unfolding of text at the instance pole of the cline of instantiation).

Blurring The Distinction Between Realisation, Logogenesis And Instantiation

Martin (1992: 536-7):

Field is the contextual projection of experiential meaning and so alongside IDEATION puts at risk the clause rank systems TRANSITIVITY, CIRCUMSTANTIATION and AGENCY, as well as systems generating Numerative, Epithet, Classifier, Thing and Qualifier in nominal group structure and various other group/phrase systems, all of which need to be interpreted as embracing lexis as most delicate grammar; in addition, research into collocation patterns provides an important perspective on field's realisation (see Benson & Greaves 1981, 1992, forthcoming).

Blogger Comments:

[1] This is misleading.  Field is not the contextual projection of experiential meaning.  Field is the ideational dimension of context.  That is, it is application of the theoretical notion of the ideational metafunction to the culture as a semiotic system.

[2] As previously demonstrated, Martin's system of ideation, purported to be a model of experiential meaning on the discourse semantic stratum, is actually a confusion of lexical cohesion (textual metafunction at the level of grammar), lexis as most delicate grammar (lexicogrammatical delicacy), and logical relations between figure elements.

Martin here omits systems of the logical metfunction.  This would have required the inclusion of the discourse semantic system of conjunction, which, as previously demonstrated, is a confusion of clause complex relations (logical metafunction) and cohesive conjunction (textual metafunction), both of which are grammatical systems.

[3] Unhappily, the risk that semiotic systems face is never identified.

[4] To be clear, the clause rank system of transitivity includes the systems of agency and circumstantiation.  Circumstantiation refers to 'circumstantial transitivity' (Halliday & Matthiessen 2014: 758).

[5] 'Systems generating structure' blurs the distinction between axial realisation, logogenesis and instantiation.  The relation between paradigmatic system and syntagmatic structure is realisation.  Structure realises system.  That is, they are in a relation of symbolic identity, with system as Value and structure as Token.

On the other hand, 'generating', in this sense, is modelled in SFL theory as logogenesis, the unfolding of text at the instance pole of cline of instantiation, as features are selected and realisation statements activated (the process of instantiation).

[6] This demonstrates a lack of understanding of the notion of lexis as most delicate grammar — as also demonstrated by its inclusion in Martin's model of experiential discourse semantics.  Lexis as most delicate grammar means that if grammatical networks were to be elaborated to sufficient delicacy, bundles of the most delicate features would specify individual lexical items — just as bundles of articulatory features specify individual phonemes.

[7] To be clear, collocation is a resource of lexical cohesion, and so represents a resource of the textual, not ideational metafunction.

Misconstruing The Realisation Of Tenor

Martin (1992: 528):

As with register systems in general, tenor systems put certain types of meaning at risk and for the most part it is a pattern of interpersonal choices across a text which is meaningful, not the individual choices themselves.  Indeed, the notion of reciprocity implies that a number of choices have to be examined from the perspective of different participants for tenor to be realised at all.

Blogger Comments:

[1] This confuses functional varieties of language (registers/text types) with the culture as a semiotic system that is realised in language (and other semiotic systems).  The confusion is thus along two semiotic dimensions simultaneously: stratification (context vs language) and instantiation (system vs instance type).

[2] The "risks" that meaning is exposed to are never actually specified.  To be clear, risk is the potential of gaining or losing something of value.

[3] All interpersonal choices are meaningful, whether as meanings realised in wordings, or as wordings realising meanings.  Each selection is an instantiation of the system during logogenesis; patterns of selections are termed logogenetic patterns (Halliday & Matthiessen 2004: 524-31; Halliday & Matthiessen 2014: 593-603).

[4] The realisation of tenor in language does not depend on what linguists examine, let alone on the perspectives taken.

Eight Problems With The Third Justification For A Genre Stratum

Martin (1992: 506):

(iii) Making genre rather than register variables responsible for generating schematic structure makes it easier to handle changes in experiential, interpersonal and textual meaning from one stage to another in a text.  There are many text types where this occurs: a teacher may shift fields to explain a point by analogy; a salesperson will manipulate tenor in order to close a sale; sports commentators shift rhythmically from play to play description to critique and evaluation.  Underlying register, genre can be used to predict these changes, stage by stage, while at the same time accounting for a text's overall coherence.  Halliday and Hasan's (1976: 23) observation about coherent texts being "consistent in register" cannot in other words be interpreted literally as "the same register throughout"; rather the text must be motivated by its register, changes in which can in turn be motivated by genre.

Blogger Comments:

[1] The use of 'generating' here confuses semogenesis with the realisation relation between the paradigmatic and syntagmatic axes.  The relation of system to structure on a given stratum is one of realisation; system is a higher level of symbolic abstraction than structure.  Generation, on the other hand, is the unfolding of text, logogenesis, at the instance pole of the cline of instantiation.  This is a departure from previous confusions of semogenesis and realisation, which involve the realisation relation between strata, rather than axes.

[2] To be clear, by 'register variables' Martin means the metafunctional systems of context: field, tenor and mode.

[3] The claim here is that contextual changes of field, tenor and mode during the logogenesis of texts are easier to "handle" if the text structure of text types (genres) is modelled as a higher level of symbolic abstraction than the culture as semiotic system. The problems with this model include:

• one aspect of semantics, text structure, is removed from semantics and relocated to a level even more abstract than context (the culture as a semiotic);
• the stratification model is reversed: semantics (text structure) is realised by context (field, tenor and mode);
• cultural context (field, tenor, and mode — misconstrued as register) is modelled as the interface between two levels of language, in Martin's model: between genre and discourse semantics.

[4] Martin's claim that his higher stratum (genre) underlies his lower stratum (register) betrays his misunderstanding of stratification.

[5] This again reverses the relation between strata.  Contextual changes of field, tenor and mode during the logogenesis are realised in changes in text structure at the level of semantics.

[6] The coherence of a text is not accounted for by an incoherent model.

[7] This is misleading in a way that suits Martin's argument.  The interpretation is not Halliday and Hasan's, though Martin's use of quotation marks invites this attribution.

[8] In addition to all the above-mentioned inconsistencies, this presents the relation between strata as one of motivation rather than realisation.  That is, it misconstrues an intensive (elaborating) identifying relation as a circumstantial (enhancing: cause) identifying relation.

Misrepresenting Purpose And Intention

Martin (1992: 503):

It should be stressed here that bringing telos into contextual theory at this point in no way implies that text is being interpreted as the realisation of speakers' intentions; genres are social processes, and their purpose is being interpreted here in social, not psychological terms. Nor does the model imply that the cultures as a whole are goal-directed, with some over-riding purpose governing the interaction of social processes. Social processes negotiate with each other and evolve, as noted above in the motivation for a level of ideology superordinate to genre and register. The metaphor of intentionality, in other words, is just as inappropriate for explaining why a culture has the social processes it does as for explaining why an individual speaker produces certain kinds of text. With these qualifications in mind, the notion of telos is a useful one for glossing systemic relations between combinations of field, mode and tenor choices at the level of genre.

Blogger Comments:

[1] It is useful here to consider the congruent construals of 'purpose' and 'intention' in the lexicogrammar of English.  Purpose is an enhancing expanding relation between processes (because intention Q so action P), in which a desiderative mental process of intention is the reason for another process.  That is, intention and purpose congruently involve mental processes.  Speakers undergo mental processes, genres do not.  The purposes of genres are the purposes of their speakers, whether viewed linguistically, socially or psychologically.

The functions of genres, on the other hand, are modelled in SFL theory by the contextual features (field, tenor and mode) of the situation type that the particular text type realises.

[2] This confuses orders of experience.  Genres, as processes, are types of semogenic processes; types of logogenesis.  Social processes are of the material order of experience, semogenic processes are of the semiotic order of experience.

[3] Social processes do not "negotiate" with each other.  Speakers negotiate through the interpersonal metafunction of language.  The metaphor is a misleading one.

[4] This continues the misunderstanding of stratal relations as hyponymic.

[5] This is manifestly untrue.  Intentionality — metaphorical or otherwise — can indeed explain 'why an individual produces certain kinds of text'.  For example, the intention of speaker A to learn something from speaker B about grammar explains why speaker A produces texts involving questions about grammar.

[6] The utility of the notion of telos has not been demonstrated. It has merely been asserted without supporting argument.

Misrepresenting Halliday On Formal And Contextual Meaning

Martin (1992: 497-8):

Halliday (1961) similarly includes context as a level of language concerned with the relationship between form and extra-textual features of the situation.  This is glossed as semantics in Fig. 7.4 (from Halliday, McIntosh and Strevens 1964: 18), although it is important to keep in mind that Halliday (1961) recognises both formal and contextual meaning, with contextual meaning "an extension of the popular — an traditional linguistic — notion of meaning" (1961: 245).  As Halliday clarifies in Thibault (1987: 614), 

"the whole system is meaning creating.  Meaning is the product of the interrelations among the parts";

 it is a mistake in other words to make

"too close a tie-up between 'meaning' and the notion of a specifically 'semantic' level."

Blogger Comments:

[1] See the clarification in the preceding post.

[2] This is very misleading, especially when juxtaposed with this co-text. In this very early paper by Halliday, 'formal meaning' is the "information" of information theory, and 'contextual meaning' Halliday equates with 'semantics', as stated in Halliday et al. (1964). The following quote from Halliday (1961) clarifies the matter:

Language has formal meaning and contextual meaning. Formal meaning is the "information" of information theory, though (i) it can be stated without being quantified and was in fact formulated in linguistics independently of the development of information theory as a means of quantifying it, and (ii) formal meaning in lexis cannot be quantified until a method is found for measuring the information of non-finite ("open") sets. The formal meaning of an item is its operation in the network of formal relations. 

Contextual meaning, which is an extension of the popular — and traditional linguistic — notion of meaning, is quite distinct from formal meaning and has nothing whatsoever to do with 'information'. The contextual meaning of an item is its relation to extratextual features; but this is not a direct relation of the item as such, but of the item in its place in linguistic form: contextual meaning is therefore logically dependent on formal meaning.

[3] This continues the confusion between stratification and semogenesis. To be clear, this quote from Halliday refers to semogenesis — 'meaning creating' — not to stratification.

[4] The notion of meaning as a semantic level is meaning as a stratum in the stratification hierarchy, which is a means of parcelling out the complexity of the meaning making process into levels of symbolic abstraction.  Halliday (2008: 14) clarifies this narrower use of the word 'meaning':

Realisation is the relationship among strata… wordings realise patterns of meaning, which we refer to as the stratum of semantics. (Note that “meaning” is here being used in its narrower, more specific sense, to refer just to patterns in semantics.)

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).

Why The Argument For A Stratum Of Ideology Is Invalid

Martin (1992: 495-6):

Any configuration of this kind then needs to be qualified with respect to cultural diversity (cf. dialogism and heteroglossia in Bakhtin 1981).  Clearly, meaning potential is not evenly distributed across a culture (any more than material resources are).  Access to genre, register and language as semiotic resources is mediated through discourses of ethnicity, class, gender and generation, which discourses are in a continual process of negotiation with each other.  Not only is this process of negotiation manifest in all text, but it functions as well as the source of semogenesis, both contextual and linguistic.  It is for this reason that a fourth communicative plane, ideology, will be articulated here, with genre, and hence register and language as its expression form.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, genres/registers are types of language, not distinct semiotic modes.

[2] This is manifestly untrue.  The negotiation between "discourses of ethnicity, class, gender and generation" that "mediates access" to semiotic resources is a feature of only some registers of language.  Consider, for example, texts like the following:

There once was a young lady named Bright
Whose speed was much faster than light
She set out one day
In a relative way
And returned on the previous night.

[3] The claim here is that the negotiation between "discourses of ethnicity, class, gender and generation" that "mediates access" to semiotic resources is a source of semogenesis.  This misunderstands semogenesis.  In SFL theory, the logogenesis of all texts 'provides material for' ontogenesis, which 'provides material for' phylogenesis (Halliday & Matthiessen 1999: 18).

[4] The claim here is that, because the negotiation between "discourses of ethnicity, class, gender and generation" that "mediates access" to semiotic resources is a source of semogenesis, it motivates a more abstract level of context, above genre, termed ideology.  That is:

• because logogenesis 'provides material for' ontogenesis (and ontogenesis for phylogenesis),
• ideology can be modelled as a level of symbolic abstraction within context.

In logic, this is known as a non sequitur.  Semogenetic relations are distinct from — and so do not motivate — higher levels of symbolic abstraction.  This continues the confusion of semogenesis with stratification and the misconstrual of strata as modules.

In SFL theory, the ideologies of a culture are simply modelled within context, whereas the language that realises ideologies is, in the first instance, the concern of semantics.

Rhapsodising On Point

Martin (1992: 489):

Point is the discourse complement of method of development.  Where Theme ties the text down, point elaborates it, developing it as news.  A much greater range of meanings with be realised in New than Theme, though not a random set.  A text's principle [sic] strings and chains will still be there, constrained by cohesive harmony; but there will be lesser [sic] strings and chains and odds and ends as well.  A text is never hermetically sealed; a text, like the system behind it, is a dynamic open process — and point is a source of openness: a resistance to the closure predicated on cohesive harmony and method of development.

Blogger Comments:

[1] Again, it is instructive to compare these metaphors with Martin's model.  Martin's point is, again, a mixture of writing pedagogy and linguistic theory.  Martin supplies the writing pedagogy, rebranding paragraph summary as hyper-New, and text summary as macro-New, whereas Halliday supplies the linguistic theory: New as information deemed unrecoverable to the listener (textual metafunction).

Martin's point is the accumulation of experiential meaning that is highlighted as New information and included in a paragraph summary and text summary.  Importantly, interpersonal and textual meanings are also highlighted as New information — e.g. modal adjuncts such as allegedly and conjunctive adjuncts such as nevertheless, respectively — but these are ignored in this focus on experiential meaning.

Martin's deployment of the linguistic theory is internally inconsistent, given that New information is located on the phonological stratum, and yet construed as an element of the clause (lexicogrammar), rather than the information unit.

[2] Theme, as the point of departure of a message, does not "tie a text down" — anymore than airports, as points of departure during a holiday, "tie a holiday down".

[3] Point does not "develop the text as news".  New is information that is presented as unrecoverable to the listener; hyper-New is a paragraph summary of what has already been written; and macro-New is a text summary of what has already been written.

[4] Cohesive harmony does not constrain a text.  Hasan's cohesive harmony describes the synergy of the non-structural resources of the textual metafunction, cohesion, and the meanings of the experiential metafunction (and potentially the interpersonal metafunction).

[5] To be clear, system and text are related by the vector of instantiation.  In SFL theory, 'system' is short for 'system–&–process' (Halliday & Matthiessen 1999: 507), and text is an instance of the 'system–&–process'.  The unfolding of the text at the instance pole of the cline of instantiation is the process of logogenesis.

[7] By definition, New information may be "a source of openness", but summaries of what has already been written (hyper-New and macro-New) are not.  They are repetitions of meanings internal to the text.

[8] This is manifestly untrue.  See [2] and [4] above.

Misconstruing Modal Responsibility As Social Responsibility

Martin (1992: 461):

Halliday (1984/1988: 43-45; 1985: 76-78) stresses the fact that Subject is a meaning making function in the English clause, alongside the textual functions Theme and New or experiential functions such as Actor and Goal.  The meaning of Subject is glossed in terms of modal responsibility.  This meaning is most transparent in proposals, where regardless of voice, the Subject is the constituent responsible for seeing that goods are exchanged or a service performed.

Blogger Comments:

[1] Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 148n):

… in our systemic-functional account of English, Subject is interpreted metafunctionally as an interpersonal grammatically [sic] category; but like other such categories, e.g. Theme and Actor, Subject is both grammatical and semantic at the same time – the notion of ‘modal responsibility’.

[2] This confuses semogenesis (making meaning) with stratification (wording realising meaning).

[3] New is a functional element of the information unit, not of the clause.

[4] Modal responsibility is the view of Subject 'from above' — from semantics. Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 149):

From above, [the Subject] is that which carries the modal responsibility: that is, responsibility for the validity of what is being predicated (stated, questioned, commanded or offered) in the clause.

[5] The Subject is not "the constituent responsible for seeing that goods are exchanged or a service performed".  This social responsibility between interlocutors is not (semiotic) modal responsibility.  Modal responsibility is responsibility for the validity of the proposal or proposition.  The validity of a proposal is commanded or offered with respect to the Subject; the validity of a proposition is stated or questioned with respect to the Subject; see for example Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 242).

Confusing Writing Pedagogy With Linguistic Theory

Martin (1992: 444):

The interaction patterns considered to this point have focussed on written text; the compositional scaffolding discussed depends for its development on a degree of consciousness not associated with spontaneous spoken monologue… — although professional public speakers do make use of scaffolding of a not unrelated kind.  Spontaneous spoken text however unfolds dynamically; it is not configured as a thing, with an elaborated part/whole structure.

Blogger Comments:

[1] This is misleading.  Text [6:35] was falsely presented as a text in written mode, despite the fact that it was actually a written transcript of an interview (spoken mode).  See the evidence at Falsifying Data: Misrepresenting An Interview Transcript As A Writing Exercise.

[2] As the term 'scaffolding' makes clear, this model of method of development — using macro-Theme (Introductory Paragraph) and hyper-Theme (Topic Sentence) — is actually a model of writing pedagogy.

[3] The "degree of consciousness" not associated with spoken monologue — or indeed spoken dialogue — is the possibility, afforded by written mode, of planning and editing a text, with the further option of using a model of writing pedagogy.

[4] Professional public speakers who write their speeches beforehand can also make use of the scaffolding offered by writing pedagogy.

[5] All texts unfold dynamically — since unfolding is a process, it would be hard to unfold any other way.  In SFL theory, this semogenic (meaning-making) process is modelled as logogenesis: the unfolding of the text at the instance pole of the cline of instantiation.

[6] To claim that a written text is 'configured as a thing' is to confuse the text as material object (e.g. ink on paper, etc.) with the text as semiotic object (an instance of a linguistic content).

[7] On the contrary, even spontaneous spoken text is highly structured.  As Halliday (1985: 79) explains:

The spoken language is, in fact, no less structured and highly organised than the written. It could not be otherwise, since both are manifestations of the same system.

Misrepresenting Hasan's Work On Coherence As Formalist

Martin (1992: 433):

As a final caveat the reasons for developing a measure of textual coherence need to be cautiously examined.  One might argue from the perspective of formal linguistics that just as the goal of a grammarian is to account for speakers [sic] intuitions about which sentences are grammatical, so the goal of the textlinguist is to account for intuitions about which texts are coherent.  But just as a functional grammarian would reject this delimitation of the goals of grammatical theory, so a functional discourse analyst might view accounting for a speaker's intuitions about coherent text with some suspicion.  Alternatively, one might pose questions about the effectiveness of a text in achieving it's [sic] interlocutors' social purpose.  This rhetorical perspective is likely to prove more appropriate as far as functional linguistics is concerned.  Or one might ask questions about a text's role in sustaining culture as a dynamic open system.  These points will be taken up again in Chapter 7 below.

Blogger Comments:

[1] The reason for raising formal linguistics here is to present Hasan's work as proceeding from Formalist (Cartesian, Chomskyan) principles and/or assumptions.  Martin introduced the word intuition in the previous paragraph and uses it three times in this paragraph in order to establish the collocation with Formal linguistics.  It is misleading in a number of ways.  To begin with, here is what Hasan (1985: 72, 86, 88) actually wrote:

The property of texture is related to the listener's perception of coherence.  Thus in common parlance, Example 5.1 would be described as possessing coherence while example 5.2 would be seen as lacking in coherence. …

Whenever I have presented these two texts to informants, they have unanimously agreed that text 5.2 is less coherent than 5.1… .  An explanation of what this judgement correlates with in patterns of texture is difficult to find, so long as grammatical and lexical cohesion are examined separately. …

…can the listener's perception of varying degrees of coherence between Texts 5.1 and 5.2 be correlated with differences in texture…?

A cautious examination of Hasan's work reveals that the purpose of the work on texture is to determine the linguistic correlates of the listeners' perception of coherence.  In Hasan's work, the data are instances of language (texts).  This is very distinct from the concerns of Formal semantics. In Formal semantics, it is intuitions about language that constitute the data.  As Martin Stokhof (2011 Intuitions And Competence In Formal Semantics) explains:

In formal semantics intuition plays a key role, in two ways. Intuitions about semantic properties of expressions are the primary data, and intuitions of the semanticists are the main access to these data.

[2] The implication here is that Hasan's work is not framed within the rhetorical perspective.  This is also misleading.  Here is what Hasan (1985: 96) actually wrote:

The infra-structure of all assumptions about co-operative acts of doing and saying is, in the last resort, social. The assumption of coherence can be sustained so well because human language has the resource for indicating coherence, while the nature of language as a resource has developed in a particular way because it has had to serve the needs of the community.  Our task is to understand the specific nature of these resources — not simply to hide behind the mind and the intention of particular speakers and listeners.

By way of clarification, Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 415-6) characterise the two linguistic traditions in the following way:

We can identify two main traditions in Western thinking about meaning (see Halliday 1977):

(i) one oriented towards logic and philosophy, with language seen as a system of rules;

(ii) one oriented towards rhetoric and ethnography, with language seen as resource.

… Our own work here falls mainly within the second tradition — but we have taken account of the first tradition, and the general intellectual environment in which versions of our meaning base are being used also derives primarily from the first tradition. Indeed the two traditions can in many respects be seen as complementary, as contributing different aspects to the overall picture. Our own foundation, however, is functional.

[3] Incidentally, Martin provides no reasoned argument for or against the two linguistic perspectives, he merely expresses negative attitude (reject, suspicion) towards the Formalist tradition, and positive attitude (appropriate) towards the rhetorical tradition.

[4] In SFL theory, this is modelled by realisation, instantiation and semogenesis.  A text realising a context of situation (an instance of culture) unfolds at the instance pole of cline of instantiation during logogenesis, each text nudging the probabilities of its register and the overall linguistic potential, and each context of situation nudging the probabilities of the situation type and the overall culture as potential.  And, as Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 18) put it, logogenesis provides material for ontogenesis, which provides material for phylogenesis (with phylogenesis providing the environment for ontogenesis, and this for logogenesis).

Conclusion:

This extract from Martin (1992) is intended as the third and final part of a critique of Hasan's cohesive harmony, as a prelude to introducing his own version. As can be seen from the clarifications above, it is merely a misunderstanding and misrepresentation of Hasan (1985).

Misrepresenting Interstratal Relations

Martin (1992: 379):

The interaction of discourse semantic and lexicogrammatical structures will be taken up in Chapter 6 below in an attempt to underline the way in which the two strata contribute independently, dependently and interdependently to the process whereby meanings are made as text.

Blogger Comments:

[1] In SFL theory, the "interaction" between these two levels of symbolic abstraction, these two perspectives on the content plane, is realisation: either congruent or metaphorical.

[2] The logical relation of interdependency is irrelevant to interstratal relations; the only logical relation between strata is elaboration (the intensive relation of identity).  The notion of semantics and lexicogrammar being independent aligns with the Chomskyan view of 'autonomous syntax', which contradicts the previously espoused view of a natural relation between content strata.

[3] To clarify, the process whereby meaning potential becomes actualised as the meanings of a text is termed instantiation — the selection of features and the activation of their realisation statements — as occurs during the semogenic process of logogenesis, the unfolding of the text.  Logogenesis occurs at the instance pole of the cline of instantiation.

Misconstruing 'A Realises B' As 'A Reconstitutes B'

Martin (1992: 338):

It [this chapter] has also attempted to renovate (point (iii) above) linguists' interpretation of grammar and meaning by configuring the grammar as Agent in a material process with meaning as the Medium produced: grammar makes meaning (cf. learning how to mean, making meaning, meaning making resource etc.).

Blogger Comments:

[1] Here a statement about how the theorist has gone about modelling language is presented as an example of a relation in the model itself (i.e. realisation).

[2] In 'point (iii) above', A realises B is interpreted as A reconstitutes B, which is, in turn, glossed as A continually renovates B.  In such an interpretation, the intensive identifying process of A realises B:

A	realises	B
Token	Process: relational: intensive: symbol	Value

is misconstrued as an assigned attributive relational process:

A	continually	renovates (‘makes new’)		B
Agent/Attributor	Manner: quality	Process: relational: attributive: intensive	Range/Attribute	Medium/Carrier

In SFL theory, instead of characterising realisation, this is more a statement about the relation between the instance and the system: the notion that in logogenesis, through instantiation, each instance alters system probabilities.  Halliday (2008: 119):

Each instance minutely perturbs the probabilities of the system. Any part of the system may remain stable over long periods of time; but the system as a whole is metastable: it persists by continually evolving within its overall eco-social environment.

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 555) 

Historical change in language is typically a quantitative process, in which probabilities in systems at every level are gradually nudged in one direction or another, now and again becoming categorical so that some systemic upheaval takes place. Each instantiation of a tense form, say, whenever someone is speaking or writing in English, minutely perturbs the probabilities of the system …

[3] This continues the confusion of semogenesis (making meaning) with stratification (realising meaning) — a confusion which makes Martins' model of stratification theoretically untenable.

stratification: intensive identifying relational process

grammar	realises	meaning
Token	Process: relational: intensive: symbol	Value

semogenesis: creative abstract material process

grammar	makes	meaning
Agent	Process:	Medium
Actor	material: creative	Goal

Note that this material process does not exemplify the relational process of 'point (iii) above'.