Misunderstanding Mode

Martin (1992: 509-10):

Experientially mode mediates the semiotic space between action and reflection. Exemplifying again from [4:2], for the most part this text is constitutive of its field, which it generalises as an abstract procedure.  For this reason the processes are for the most part timeless (i.e. simple present tense in English) and the participants involve generic or generalised reference.  From [4:17tt] however, through to [4:17bbb], the text shifts its mode and becomes dependent on another text — the imaginary representation of the showing area on the coffee table to which the speaker refers exophorically: here, that way, like that, over there.  Correspondingly, the tense shifts as well, from simple present to present in present (is standing), as it has occasionally elsewhere in the text ([4:2e, h, j, z, gg]).  The text in other words becomes more dependent on its context — more a part, and less purely constitutive of what is going on.  Putting this in general terms, mode mediates contextual dependency — the extent to which a text constructs or accompanies its field.

17.	tt.		So, if your judge is standing here,
	uu.		we walk away from him that way.
18	vv.		That is [[so the judge can get the hind movement of your dog]].
19.	ww.		Then we usually walk sideways like that
	xx.		so as he can see [[the dog moving all over]]
	yy.		and then we walk back to the judge
	zz.		so as he can see the front movement.
20.	aaa.		After that he usually tells you
	bbb.		to wait over there.

Blogger Comments:

[1] The notion that mode "mediates" is mistaken and leads to multiple confusions, as shown in previous posts.  To be clear, one of the dimensions of mode is the cline from language in action to language in reflection (Halliday & Matthiessen 1999: 354).

[2] The text does not "generalise" its field as an abstract procedure.  In terms of mode (Martin's genre) the text is a recount of a (concrete) procedure.  In terms of field, the subject matter of the text is dog shows.

[3] A text does not 'shift its mode' when it is accompanied by gestures.  A spoken text ± gestures is a spoken text.

[4] The spoken text is not dependent on the gestures that accompany it.  The truth is the exact opposite: it is the gestures that are dependent on the spoken text for their interpretation.  The independence of the spoken text is demonstrated by the intelligibility of the written version — exophoric references notwithstanding.

[5] This claim is not supported by the data.  Of the three instances of exophoric reference, the tense changes only once: in the first.

[6] This misconstrues synonymy (part /constitutive) as antonymy (more a part /less constitutive).

Misconstruing A Dialogic Response As Monologue

Martin (1992: 509):

Interpersonally, mode mediates the semiotic space between between monologue and dialogue.  Text [4:2] for example begins as a conversation (What do you have to do… — Well…) but unfolds as a monologue [4:2c-hhh].  The interview genre in other words involves changes in mode — from dialogue to monologue and back to dialogue again. As is typical of textual meaning the changes manifest themselves as a kind of wave.  Putting this in general terms, mode mediates NEGOTIATION. 

[4:2]	Question:
	1.	a.		What do you have to do in the showing area,
		b.		with the dog on the lead?
	Response
	2.	c.		Well, you always walk
		d.		with the dog on the left-hand side,
		e.		the reason being is [[the judge is standing in the centre of the ring]].
	3.	f.		So, therefore, you need to get yourself between your dog and the judge.
	4.	g.		The dog (!) must be able to see the dog at all times.
	5.	h.		So, usually when a class is going into the ring,
		i.		the first thing he does is:
				…

Blogger Comments:

[1] Mode does not "mediate"; see previous critique.  Monologue and dialogue are opposing features in the system of mode, (textual metafunction, context stratum); negotiation is Martin's interpersonal system on the discourse semantics stratum.

[2] The claim here is that whenever an interviewer asks a question of an interviewee, the text is dialogic, but when the interviewee answers, the text is monologic.  This confuses responses in a dialogue — though not questions — with monologue.  A dialogue is a conversational exchange between two or more people, whereas a monologue is the text of a single speaker.

Misrepresenting Mode

Martin (1992: 509):

As with textual meaning in general, mode is concerned with symbolic reality — with texture. Since symbolic reality (i.e. text/process) has the function of constructing social reality, mode is oriented to both interpersonal and experiential meaning. It thus mediates the rôle played by language along two dimensions.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, it is the textual metafunction that is concerned with symbolic reality (Halliday & Matthiessen 1999: 7-8, 398, 512, 532).

[2] Symbolic reality is neither texture nor text/process.  Texture is the quality of being a text; text/process is the unfolding of the text at the instance pole of the cline of instantiation during logogenesis.

[3] Symbolic reality does not have the function of constructing social reality.  Moreover, the term 'social reality' blurs the distinction between the ideational and interpersonal metafunctions. The ideational metafunction construes a natural reality; the interpersonal metafunction enacts an intersubjective reality.  Symbolic reality is a second-order reality with regard to natural and intersubjective reality (Halliday & Matthiessen 1999: 398).

[4] Mode is not oriented to interpersonal and experiential meaning.  The textual metafunction is both enabling and second-order with regard to the interpersonal and ideational metafunctions.

[5] Mode does not mediate the rôle played by language along two dimensions (interpersonal and experiential).  The textual metafunction is both enabling and second-order with regard to the interpersonal and ideational metafunctions.

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 398):

The textual metafunction is second–order in the sense that it is concerned with semiotic reality: that is, reality in the form of meaning.  This dimension of reality is itself constructed by [the] other two metafunctions: the ideational, which construes a natural reality, and the interpersonal, which enacts an intersubjective reality. … The function of the textual metafunction is thus an enabling one with respect to the rest; it takes over the semiotic resources brought into being by the other two metafunctions and as it were operationalises them …

This second–order enabling nature of the textual metafunction is seen both at the level of context, where mode (the functions assigned to language in the situation) is second–order in relation to field and tenor (the ongoing social processes and interactant rôles), and the level of content — the semantics and the lexicogrammar, where the systems of THEME and INFORMATION, and the various types of cohesion, are second–order in relation to ideational and interpersonal systems of TRANSITIVITY, MOOD, and the rest.

Misidentifying Metafunctions

Martin (1992: 508):

Mode refers to the rôle language is playing in realising social action.  Within register, it is the projection of textual meaning, and so is realised primarily through the textual metafunction in language.  Mode thus puts major systems such as TONALITY and TONICITY in phonology, and THEME and INFORMATION (clause), DEIXIS (nominal group), TENSE (verbal group) and SUBSTITUTION and ELLIPSIS (clause and group) in the grammar at risk, and because of their textual orientation impacts on all systems at the level of discourse semantics (NEGOTIATION, IDENTIFICATION, CONJUNCTION and IDEATION).

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, Martin's 'register' is a misconstrual of culture (context) as a functional variety of language (register).  In SFL theory, mode is the "projection" of the textual metafunctional principle onto context, in modelling culture as a semiotic system, not the projection of textual meaning.

[2] Information is not a system of the clause.  It is a system of the information unit (Halliday & Matthiessen 2014: 115).

[3] Deixis is not a textual system of the nominal group.  It is an interpersonal system (Halliday & Matthiessen 2014: 387).  Deixis functions textually in the cohesive system of reference.

[4] Tense is not a textual system of the verbal group.  Tense is realised by the logical structure of the verbal group (Halliday & Matthiessen 2014: 398).

[5] Strictly speaking, substitution-&-ellipsis is not a system of the clause and group.  Rank systems are structural.  As a system of cohesion, it is non-structural.  The clause and the group are domains in which it operates.

The other cohesive systems — reference, conjunction and lexical cohesion — are also relevant here, but omitted because Martin has misconstrued them as discourse semantic systems of various metafunctions: identification (textual), conjunction (logical) and ideation (experiential), respectively.

[6] This exemplifies Martin's confusion between text as a semantic unit, and the textual metafunction as a dimension of semiosis.  See [5] above.

Two Problems With The Fifth Justification For A Genre Stratum

Martin (1992: 507):

(v) Finally, and critically, there is the question of genre agnation.  The argument here is that social processes are related in ways which complement the valeur determined by looking at them from the perspective of field, mode and tenor alone.  Combinations of field, mode and tenor choices in other words enter into relationships with each other which are more than the sum of their parts; to some extent, genres have a life of their own (see 7.3.2 below).  This argument can only be pursued by formulating networks for field, mode, tenor and genre and demonstrating that the genre network consists of different kinds of opposition to the field, mode and tenor ones.  Consequently, exemplification will be reserved until after the presentation of preliminary field, mode and tenor options below.

Blogger Comments:

[1] The claim here is that text types (genres) are insufficiently identified by the contextual features of field, tenor and mode — which Martin misconstrues as register — and require further specification through systems of a stratum that is more abstract than the culture as semiotic system, but which specifies text structure, which in SFL theory, is located two levels below, at the level of semantics, within language, rather than context.

Further critical analysis "will be reserved" until the networks are presented that claim to demonstrate "that the genre network consists of different kinds of opposition to the field, mode and tenor ones".

[2] To be consistent with Martin's argument, this claim should have been that genres are more than the sum of combinations of field, tenor and mode.

Two Problems With The Fourth Justification For A Genre Stratum

Martin (1992: 506):

(iv) Distinguishing genre and register makes it easier to account for differences between the sequential unfolding of text as process and the notion of activity associated with field.  Depending on mode, texts may or may not unfold in the same sequence as the activities they accompany or discuss.  Live commentary on a football match has a different structure to newspaper accounts of the game; the commentary starts at the beginning of the match, the news story with its result.  The commentary and news story differ in staging, and therefore in genre; but they are alike in terms of field — they both reflect the sequence of activities which comprised the game.  Unhooking field from staging makes it possible to show how texts of these kinds are alike and different at the same time.

Blogger Comments:

[1] Martin's "distinguishing genre and register" translates into SFL theory as distinguishing text type and context (field tenor and mode), respectively.  Text type is a point of content plane variation on the cline of instantiation; it is register viewed from the instance pole.  Context is the culture as semiotic system, that is realised in language.  In Martin's model, therefore, a point of content plane variation on the cline of instantiation is construed as a stratum that is realised by the culture as semiotic system.  That is, language is realised by context — an inversion of the stratification hierarchy.

[2] This is already possible without "distinguishing genre and register".  In SFL theory, context (field, tenor and mode) is realised in semantics.  Similar fields are realised by similar ideational meanings; different modes are realised by different textual meanings, including different information flow patterns.

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.

Two Problems With The Second Justification For A Genre Stratum

Martin (1992: 506):

(ii) Setting up genre as a pattern of register patterns makes it possible to account for the fact that in a given culture, not all combinations of field, mode and tenor variables occur.  This is perhaps easiest to study from a cross-cultural perspective, noting the effect of western science and technology (new fields) or of media (new modes) for example on "developing" nations as social processes change dramatically in the face of imported medicine, industry, literacy, radio, television etc.  But all thriving cultures are continually elaborating their meaning potential by combining old variables in new ways and by making new distinctions to combine.  A distinct level of genre makes it possible to monitor this dialectic of constraints and possibilities.

Blogger Comments:

[1] No explanation is given as to how "genre as a pattern of register patterns" makes it possible to account for contextual configurations that do not occur in a culture; it is simply asserted without supporting evidence.

Moreover, this does not require "genre as a pattern of register patterns", since constraints — at any level — are theoretically modelled by the wiring of systems; in this case: by the wiring of field, tenor and mode systems at the level of context.  

[2] No explanation is given as to how "a distinct level of genre" makes it possible to "monitor this dialectic of constraints and possibilities"; it is simply asserted without supporting evidence.

Moreover, this does not require "a distinct level of genre", since the evolution of systems — at any level — is modelled in terms of phylogenesis; in this case: as the evolutionary change of field, tenor and mode systems at the level of context.

Seven Problems With The First Justification For A Genre Stratum

Martin (1992: 505-6):

(i) Establishing genre as a level of semiosis which is not itself metafunctionally organised means that texts can be classified in ways which cut across metafunctional components in language.  This strengthens Halliday's suggestion that field is strongly predictive of experiential choices, tenor of interpersonal choices and mode of textual ones without sacrificing the classification of texts into generic types such as narrative, exposition, procedure, report etc. … Generic labels such as narrative or exposition are impossible to tie satisfactorally [sic] to any one type of meaning; their realisation cuts across metafunctions.  For this reason, it is useful not to associate genre too closely with any one register variable (e.g. mode in Halliday's work or field in Hasan's).

Blogger Comments:

[1] Modelling 'genre as a level of semiosis' is inconsistent with the architecture of SFL theory and the meanings of the theoretical terms.  Strata represent levels of symbolic abstraction, but a type of text (genre) is not more abstract than the semantics and lexicogrammar of the text type. 

[2] This is inconsistent with one of the most fundamental postulates of SFL theory.  Halliday and Matthiessen (2004: 60):

In fact, the threefold pattern of meaning is not simply characteristic of the clause; these three kinds of meaning run throughout the whole of language, and in a fundamental respect they determine the way language has evolved.  They are referred to in systemic accounts of grammar as metafunctions, and the concept of 'metafunction' is one of the basic concepts around which the theory is constructed.

[3] In SFL theory, texts can be identified according to features of the three metafunctional dimensions — field, tenor and mode — of the context of situation that they realise.  To classify texts in ways which "cut across metafunctional components" is to classify texts in a less principled way, and according to fewer and less elaborated features.  Theoretically, it is a step backwards.

[4] This is manifestly untrue.  Classifying texts without regard to metafunction has no bearing on metafunctional predictions across strata.

[5] No such sacrifice is required.  To the extent that such classifications refer to the rôle played by a text type in a situation type, they are either features of the system of mode, or else the synthetic outputs of mode systems.

[6] This confuses context with language.  Generic labels are features of context, whereas their realisation is in language.  Moreover, "generic labels" can be modelled in terms of the textual metafunction (see [5]), and their realisation in language involves all three metafunctions (see [2]).

[7] Given the falsity of the reason, the conclusion does not follow.

Problems With 'Genre As A Pattern Of Register Patterns'

Martin (1992: 505):

The advantage of formulating genre as a pattern of register patterns will now be briefly reviewed:

Blogger Comment:

This needs unpacking from several angles.  (The 'pattern of patterns' formula is stratal realisation stated in terms of redundancy.)

From the perspective of SFL theory, genre is text type: it is register viewed from the instance pole of the cline of instantiation, just as register is text type viewed from the system pole of the cline of instantiation.  From this perspective, Martin's formulation relates the same phenomenon viewed from different poles of the cline of instantiation as different levels of symbolic abstraction (strata).

However, from the perspective of SFL theory, Martin's 'register' corresponds to context.  From this perspective, Martin's formulation relates text type and context as different levels of symbolic abstraction, such that text type is realised by context.  That is, on this model, a type of language is realised by the culture as a semiotic system.  On the SFL model, context is realised by language — the reverse of Martin's formulation.

A broader inconsistency here is the modelling of types (genre and register) as strata.  In SFL theory, strata — context, semantics, lexicogrammar, phonology — are not types.  Types are modelled in terms of instantiation, not stratification.

Confusing Context (And Semantics) With Text Type

Martin (1992: 505):

Where the models do differ substantively is with respect to Martin's suggestion that there is a network of relationships underlying register which relates text types to each other in ways they cannot be inter-related considered from the perspective of any one register variable.

Blogger Comment:

This misunderstands the SFL model with which Hasan's model is consistent, and with which Martin's model is not consistent.

In SFL theory, registers are text types (genres) viewed from the system pole of the cline of instantiation.  Text types realise situation types, whose metafunctional dimensions are field tenor and mode.  Text types differ in terms of the contextual features (field tenor and mode) they realise.

In Martin's model, a system of mode is relocated from context (misconstrued as register) to a new higher stratum (misconstrued as genre), with this higher system said to "underlie" the lower stratum.

Moreover, schematic structure — text structure — is located on the higher stratum of "context" (genre), instead of on the stratum of semantics.

Misunderstanding Stratification And Realisation

Martin (1992: 505):

The common ground between the two models lies in the correlation proposed between schematic structure and field, mode and tenor options; for both Martin and Hasan staging redounds with social context.  Keeping in mind that realisation is not theoretically directional in systemic models, there is nothing substantive in the fact that whereas for Hasan, choices in field, mode and tenor are realised by schematic structure, for Martin schematic structure is realised through these same components of register.

Blogger Comment:

This seriously misunderstands stratification and realisation.  Strata are relative levels of symbolic abstraction, with higher levels realised by lower levels.  Contra Martin, higher levels do not realise lower levels; e.g. lexicogrammar does not realise phonology.

In Hasan's model, context is realised by semantics —configurations of field, tenor and mode features are realised in text structure.

In Martin's model, semantics is realised by context — i.e. schematic (text) structure is realised by field, tenor and mode — with the complications that semantics is misconstrued as genre, and context is misconstrued as register.

It is manifestly untrue that this represents "common ground between the two models".

Inverting The Stratification Hierarchy

Martin (1992: 505):

Martin's alternative proposal is that text structure is generated at the level of genre, as in Ventola's systemic formulation of Mitchell's work above.  Genre networks would thus be formulated on the basis of similarities and differences between text structures which thereby define text types.  As part of the realisation process, generic choices would preselect field, mode and tenor options associated with particular elements of text structure.  Text structure is referred to as schematic structure in Martin's model, with genre defined as a staged, goal-oriented social process realised through register (see Martin 1984b, 1985a, 1985b, Martin, et al. n.d., Ventola 1987: 63-66).

Blogger Comments:

[1] From the perspective of SFL theory, Martin's proposal confuses semantics (text structure) with text type (genre) and misconstrues text type as context.

[2] From the perspective of SFL theory, this inverts the stratification hierarchy, since choices of text structure (semantics) are realised by field, tenor and mode options (context).  Martin misconstrues this semantic structure as genre, and context as register.

[3] In SFL theory, the term 'schematic structure' comes from Hasan (e.g. 1984: 79), where it means an instance of generic structure potential; that is, the semantic structure of an actual text.  Martin makes no acknowledgement of this source.

[4] From the perspective of SFL theory, genre (text type) and register are the same phenomenon viewed from different poles of the cline of instantiation.  Stratifying genre and register misconstrues them as different levels of symbolic abstraction.  Stratifying them as context, confuses (types) of language with context (the culture as a semiotic system).

Misrepresenting Hasan On Text Structure

Martin (1992: 504-5):

For Hasan, text structure is the realisation of choices made from among the options constituting a culture's field, mode and tenor (each permissable [sic] combination of choices is referred to by Hasan as a contextual configuration).  In practice, obligatory elements of structure appear to derive from field, with variations in generic structure controlled by tenor and mode.  This means that there is a strong association between field, text structure and genre.  As Hasan (1985/1989: 61) puts it:

by implication, the obligatory elements define the genre to which a text belongs; and the appearance of all these elements in a specific order corresponds to our perception of whether the text is complete or incomplete.

Blogger Comments:

[1] This misrepresents Hasan (1985: 59-63) in a way that encourages a misreading of the provided quote, and in a way that suits Martin's proposed model of text structure. In describing a particular service encounter, Hasan (1985: 60) writes of the first obligatory element, SALES REQUEST: 'Its occurrence is predicted mainly because of field values' and of the second, SALES COMPLIANCE: 'The motivation for SC is to be found in field and tenor values'.  Hasan associates none of the other three obligatory elements (SALE, PURCHASE and PURCHASE CLOSURE) with a specific contextual value.

[2] This also misrepresents Hasan (1985: 59-63) in a way that encourages a misreading of the provided quote, and in a way that suits Martin's proposed model of text structure.  Hasan (1985: 60) relates optional elements to contextual configurations (field, tenor and mode), not merely to tenor and mode:

So, while optional elements do not occur randomly, their optionality arises from the fact that their occurrence is predicted by some attribute of a CC that is non-defining for the CC and to the text type embedded in that CC.

[3] Given the false representations of Hasan above, the singling out of field here is misleading.  On Hasan's model, the structure of a text of a particular type (genre), realises the field, tenor, and mode values that make up a contextual configuration.

Misrepresenting Previous Work On Text Structure And Context

Martin (1992: 504):

Given the strong teleological orientation of systemic work on text structure alongside the uncertainty about how to deal with rhetorical purpose in models of context, it is not surprising that staging is dealt by systemicists in different ways.

Blogger Comment:

This misrepresents the earlier work of systemic linguists in a way that lends unwarranted weight to Martin's own work.  On the one hand, the "strong teleological orientation" is Martin's alone; it is not the orientation of the other theorists he has cited.  On the other hand, "rhetorical purpose" is Martin's invention alone; it is not a term that covers the various approaches to context by the other theorists he has cited.  Only Fawcett uses the concept of purpose, though his notions are 'relationship purpose' and 'pragmatic purpose', not 'rhetorical purpose'.