Crediting Halliday's Ideas To Martin

Bateman (1998: 4):

The answer that Martin sets out to develop in English Text is to ask how the larger-scale properties of text can be addressed in more detail. His starting point is to take Halliday and Hasan’s conception of ‘text’ as a semantic unit very seriously and to employ a stratal division, placing the linguistic stratum of grammar in an opposition with the linguistic stratum of semantics, rather than Cohesion in English’s opposition between structural and nonstructural linguistic resources. ‘Text’ is thus proposed as a semantic unit that is both larger than the units of grammar (e.g., clauses, nominal groups, prepositional phrases, words, etc.) and more abstract than grammatical units — i.e., placed at a higher stratum in the linguistic system.

Blogger Comments:

[1] This is very misleading. Here Bateman misrepresents Halliday's stratification of grammar and semantics as Martin's proposal.  The 'stratal division' is even explicitly stated in Cohesion in English (Halliday & Hasan 1976: 5).

[2] This is very misleading.  Bateman's use of the replacive conjunction rather than wrongly implies that the 'opposition between structural and non-structural linguistic resources' in Cohesion in English is not theorised on the basis of the stratification of grammar and semantics.  Moreover, the opposition is one within the textual metafunction only.  In shifting and rebranding the systems of cohesion, Martin has mistaken a metafunction (the textual) for a stratum (discourse semantics).

[3] This is very misleading. Bateman's use of the conjunctive Adjunct thus serves to misrepresent what is, in effect, Halliday's notion of 'text' as Martin's proposal.

Misrepresenting Halliday & Hasan (1976)

Bateman (1998: 4):

This is not an isolated example. The two fragments (e) and (f) show the same pattern, where (e) again exhibits a structural relation within the grammar and (f) a nonstructural cohesive tie (this time of causal conjunction: Halliday and Hasan, 1976:256).

(e) Because the poem was appalling, Trillian frowned.
(f) The poem was appalling. Consequently Trillian frowned.

Here two semantic ‘messages’ (the ‘appallingness’ of the poem and Trillian’s frowning) are placed in a semantic relation of consequence: this may be realised either entirely within a single grammatical unit (e), or across distinct grammatical units (f).  In both cases a text is made coherent partially by virtue of the discourse semantic relation of consequence that they realise. The traditional cohesion account does not, therefore, emphasise what pairs such as these share, even though they might stand as possible alternatives in particular texts.

Blogger Comments:

[1] Here Bateman again repeats Martin's theoretical misunderstanding in contrasting grammar with cohesion.

[2] In SFL theory, the logico-semantic relation in (e) is 'cause: reason', whereas the logico-semantic relation in (f) is 'cause: result'.

More importantly, having used the commonality of the structural (logical) and non-structural (textual) deployments of logico-semantic relations as a reason for setting up a discourse semantic stratum, Martin ignores the commonality and sets up discourse semantic systems that are inconsistent with those of the grammar, as well as with the meanings of the relations themselves, as demonstrated in great detail here.  For example, Martin abandons the fundamental distinction of elaboration vs extension vs enhancement that can be found at different locations and scales across the theory.

[3] The term 'coherent' has a precise meaning in SFL theory, and it relates to the textual metafunction, not the logical.  See Hasan in Halliday & Hasan (1989: 72ff).

[4] As demonstrated in the previous post, this misrepresents Halliday & Hasan (1976: 227-8), who took great pains to demonstrate "what pairs such as these share".  Here Bateman uncritically accepts Martin's misrepresentation without consulting the source publication for dis/confirmation.

On "The Continuity Between Structural And Non-Structural Resources" As Exemplifying "The Boundaries Of Grammatical Description"

Bateman (1998: 3-4):

For Halliday and Hasan, then, cohesive ties are present whenever one linguistic element is interpreted by reference to another, regardless of distance and structural relationship. But this, as Martin points out, “fails to bring out the continuity between the structural ... and non-structural ... resources.’’ [p19] Both (c) and (d), for example, appear to share that aspect of their textuality concerned with the temporal relation expressed.

(c) As soon as the Vogon began his poem, Ford yawned.

(d) The Vogon began his poem. Immediately Ford yawned.

However, (c) is an example of grammatical dependency (taxis within a single grammatical clause complex), whereas (d) illustrates a nonstructural, nongrammatical relationship between two sentences (a cohesive tie).

Blogger Comments:

[1] Here Bateman follows Martin in misrepresenting Halliday & Hasan, who are explicit about the "continuity" between these structural and non-structural resources. Halliday & Hasan (1976: 227):

There is a range of different structural guises in which the relations that we are here calling CONJUNCTIVE may appear. These relations constitute a highly generalised component within the semantic system, with reflexes spread throughout the language, taking various forms; and their cohesive potential derives from this source. Because they represent very general relations that may be associated with different threads of meaning at different places in the fabric of language, it follows that when they are expressed on their own, unaccompanied by other explicit connecting factors, they have a highly cohesive effect.

Halliday & Hasan (1976: 227-8) even use a temporal relation to exemplify this:

Let us take as an example the relation already mentioned above, that of succession in time. This appears in many different realisations, according to the other semantic patterns with which it is associated. It may first of all, be embodied in a predication, as in [5:1a]; here the verb follow means 'occur subsequently in time'. Note that the same relation can be expressed, still as a predication but with the terms reversed, by making the verb passive, or using a different verb precede. Secondly, the relation of succession in time can he expressed as a minor predication; that is, it may be realised prepositionally, as in [5:1b]. Again the relationship could be viewed from either direction, with before instead of after. 

Thirdly, time sequence may be expressed as a relationship between predications, with one clause being shown as dependent on another by means of a conjunction as in [5:1c]; sometimes, but not in all instances, the same words may occur both as conjunction and as preposition. Finally, in [5:1d], we have two separate sentences. Here there is no structural relationship at all; but the two parts are still linked by the same logical relations of succession in time.

[5:1]  a. A snowstorm followed the battle. (The battle was followed by a snowstorm.)

         b. After the battle. there was a snowstorm.

         c. After they had fought a battle, it snowed.

         d. They fought a battle. Afterwards, it snowed.

Contrast the following: 

[5:1) a'. A snowstorm preceded the battle.

        b'. Before the battle, there had been a snowstorm.

        c'. Before they fought a battle, it had snowed.

        d'. They fought a battle. Previously, it had snowed.

In (d) and (d'), the relation of sequence in time is expressed by an adverb, functioning as Adjunct, and occurring initially in the second sentence. Here the time relation is now the only explicit form of connection between the two events, which in the other examples are linked also by various structural relationships. The time sequence has now become a cohesive agent, and it is this, the semantic relation in its cohesive function, that we are referring to as CONJUNCTION.

Moreover, it will be seen later — as demonstrated elsewhere — that Martin misunderstands and misapplies expansion relations, both, in the analysis of textual cohesion (conjunction), and in the analysis of logical relations between clauses, and in doing so, creates "discontinuities" out of the "continuities" in the theorising of Halliday & Hasan.

[2] Here Bateman repeats Martin's misunderstanding in distinguishing cohesion from grammar.  In SFL theory, cohesion is the non-structural resource of the textual metafunction, and there are two broad types: grammatical and lexical.  The cohesion in (d) is grammatical (conjunction).

On Grammatical Metaphor As Exemplifying "The Boundaries Of Grammatical Description"

Bateman (1998: 3):

Similar arguments are brought with respect to Halliday’s notion of ‘grammatical metaphor’ (cf. IFG: Chapter 10) as well as Halliday and Hasan’s (1976) standard work Cohesion in English.

Blogger Comments:

There are three serious shortcomings in Martin's argument that Bateman does not address here (or elsewhere).

1. Halliday's model of grammatical metaphor presupposes two levels of symbolic abstraction on the content plane, and is the main reason Halliday gives for stratifying content into semantics (meaning) and lexicogrammar (wording); see Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 237).  That is, the argument is not Martin's, and it does not justify a specifically discourse semantics.
2. Martin's argument uses misunderstandings of grammatical metaphor; see Misrepresenting Grammatical Metaphor.
3. Having raised grammatical metaphor as a motivation for a discourse semantic stratum, Martin does not go on to provide the congruent relations between strata by which to distinguish metaphorical (incongruent) relations.