On CONJUNCTION And The Relationship Between Genre, Register And The Linguistic System

Bateman (1998: 25-6):

For all its complexity, I have used chapters of the book with few problems with students of varying experience — including those new to linguistics; I have also used positions in the book as the starting point for further linguistic research (particularly in the area of CONJUNCTION: cf. Bateman and Rondhuis, 1996) and for the design of computational models of the generation of texts (particularly here the relationship between genre, register and the linguistic system: cf. Bateman and Teich, 1995). Each such investigation has drawn close attention to areas where the proposals of English Text may need to be extended, refined, and perhaps changed; but without the starting point provided by English Text that work would not have been possible.

Blogger Comments:

[1] As set out in great detail here, Martin's logical discourse semantic system of CONJUNCTION is a confusion of two of Halliday's lexicogrammatical systems:

• expansion manifested as cohesive conjunction (textual metafunction), and
• expansion manifested as relations between units in complexes (logical metafunction).

Moreover, Martin creates (non-metaphorical) mismatches between semantics and grammar by

• not organising his system on the basis of the three most general types of expansion, elaboration, extension and enhancement,
• misunderstanding and misapplying types of expansion, especially concession,
• misunderstanding the distinction between internal and external expansion relation, and
• omitting projection entirely from the logical potential of discourse semantics.

[2] As set out in great detail here, Martin misunderstands "the relationship between genre, register and the language system".  For example, Martin

• misunderstands varieties of language (register/genre) as culture instead of language,
• misunderstands cultural dimensions (field/tenor/mode) as register dimensions,
• misunderstands sub-systems (register/genre) as systems,
• misunderstands two perspectives on the same phenomenon (register/genre) as different levels of symbolic abstraction (strata),
• misunderstands genre as more abstract than the cultural dimensions (field/tenor/mode) realised by language, and
• misunderstands instances of context (situations) as instances of language (texts).

In SFL theory, register and genre (text type) are two perspectives on the one point of variation of linguistic content on the cline of instantiation, midway between system and instance:

On Subsequent Works Relating Genre To Grammar

Bateman (1998: 22):

Fortunately, some of the discussions of English Text and the work out of which English Text has grown have already started making their way into introductory text books in systemic functional linguistics, of which there have recently been a number of important publications. Eggins (1994), for example, assumes the English Text model as the basic starting point for her introduction, while notions of genre and its relation to grammar are explicitly introduced and summarised in both Gerot and Wignall (1994) and, in more detail, Butt, Fahey Spinks and Yallop (1995). This orientation gives students a clear additional reason and motivation for learning the intricacies of grammatical description, for only then is one in a good position to search out genre. They will also help substantially when beginning to comes to terms with English Text itself.

Blogger Comments:

This is potentially misleading.  Unlike Martin's students Eggins and Wignell, Butt et al. (1995) do not build on Martin's model of genre, but on that of Martin's source, Hasan, distinguishing, for example, between context (4, 7) on the one hand, and genre as text type on the other (8-14).

On Martin's Model And Critical Discourse Analysis

Bateman (1998: 21):

And, even if the reader is not yet ready to follow Martin’s proposal that English Text is to be read “(in part) in the context of projects oriented to de-naturalising hegemonic discourses and, ..., facilitating intervention in the political process’’[p2], one essential lesson that remains is that socially, culturally, and ideologically informed discussions should, and now can, be linguistically responsible. No critical discourse can really stand without such a model in place. It should in fact no longer be acceptable for such discussions to omit linguistic detail; any such omission compromises the exactitude of the discussion and raises the likelihood that what is being discussed is more opinion than empirical result. This should also have substantial pedagogical implications within discourse theory and critical discourse. Without proficiency in the tools necessary to become linguistically responsible, an analysis cannot aim at being so. Blunt tools yield rough analyses.

Blogger Comments:

To be clear, as demonstrated in great detail here, Martin's discourse semantics is largely Halliday & Hasan's lexicogrammatical cohesion, misunderstood, rebranded and relocated to his module of discourse semantics.  Martin's context consists of language varieties, register and genre — misunderstood as different levels of symbolic abstraction — and ideology misunderstood as Bernstein's coding orientations.  For these reasons, and more, the tools Martin provides for discourse analysis are  demonstrably "without proficiency" and "blunt".

To be clear, it is the source of Martin's discourse semantics, Halliday's model of lexicogrammar, that provides the tools of "linguistically responsible" text analysis.  As Halliday (1985: xvi-xvii) argues:

The current preoccupation is with discourse analysis, or 'text linguistics'; and it has sometimes been assumed that this can be carried on without grammar — or even that it is somehow an alternative to grammar.  But this is an illusion.  A discourse analysis that is not based on grammar is not an analysis at all, but simply a running commentary on a text … the exercise remains a private one in which one explanation is as good or as bad as another.

A text is a semantic unit, not a grammatical one.  But meanings are realised through wordings; and without a theory of wordings — that is, a grammar — there is no way of making explicit one's interpretation of the meaning of a text.

On Required Extensions Of Genre Theory

Bateman (1998: 21):

Martin himself draws attention to some of the ways in which the theory will have to be extended, including the move from genre ‘agnation’ (i.e., organisation into system networks) to genre topology, and the tension between synoptic (language as product) and dynamic accounts.

Blogger Comments:

[1] On the one hand, this misunderstands genre agnation, since genre agnation is concerned with systemic relations between genres in a genre taxonomy, not with agnation in system networks that model genre as potential.  On the other hand, this is misleading, since Martin provides neither a taxonomy of genres nor a system network of genre potential to "move from" in extending the theory.

[2] To be clear, a genre topology would represent the degrees of relatedness between different genres.  In SFL theory, where genre means text type — that is: register viewed from the instance pole of the cline of instantiation — the degree of relatedness between text types is measured by the relative frequencies of shared semantic and lexicogrammatical features.

[3] As previously demonstrated, Martin misunderstands the synoptic vs dynamic distinction, with  his 'synoptic' corresponding to syntagmatic structure and his 'dynamic' to instantiation in logogenesis.  In relation to genre, this distinction arises in his application of metafunctional structure types — particle, prosody and wave — to genre (pp548-60), despite the fact that his genre, contrary to SFL theory, is not theorised on the basis of the three metafunctions.

Endorsing Martin's Model Of Context By Means Of A Logical Fallacy

Bateman (1998: 21):

The stratified model of context argued for by Martin in this chapter has now been extensively applied in a range of social contexts, ranging across the original areas of application in education to various institutionalised discourse situations. Some of the more recent work building on the approach is given in Christie and Martin (1997). This work shows that, although the formulation of accounts of genre may have now moved on in various directions, and the original model may have been subject to criticism from several perspectives, this does little to detract from the scope and perspective found in Chapter 7. It is only with the kind of explicit modelling and interrelationships posited in the chapter—no matter how the phenomena addressed come eventually to be modelled—that any attempt to understand the social functions of language can really be made.

Blogger Comments:

[1] As an argument for the validity of Martin's misunderstanding of context as varieties of language (register/genre) and coding orientations ("ideology"), Bateman here deploys the logical fallacy known as argumentum ad populum, which concludes that a proposition must be true because many or most people believe it.

[2] To be clear, these "social contexts" in which Martin's model has been used are, on Martin's model, those of ideology, genre and register.

[3] To be clear, criticisms from perspectives such as theoretical consistency and internal consistency do much "to detract from the scope and perspective found in Chapter 7".

[4] To be clear, in terms of explicitness, Martin provides no system networks for either genre or ideology, and none of his networks include realisation statements that specify structure at their own level, or preselected features at the stratum below.

In terms of interrelatedness, Martin misunderstands the principle of stratification (evidence here), and misunderstands the realisational relation between strata (evidence here).

On Bakhtin, Genre And Stratified Context

Bateman (1998: 21):

Explicit reference is made at the outset of the chapter [p494] to the very compatible work of Bakhtin (e.g,. 1986). However, combined with the previous chapters on discourse semantics and the presumption of an explicit and extensive lexicogrammar, the model of genre presented in this chapter certainly goes beyond any other account proposed previously in terms of its linguistic basis and ability both to draw linguistic consequences from the abstract descriptions of register, genre and ideology and, conversely, to use linguistic data to motivate such abstract descriptions.

Blogger Comments:

[1] What Bateman neglects to tell the reader here is that Martin misunderstands the work of Bakhtin; see, for example:

• Misunderstanding Bakhtin's 'Dialogic' And 'Heteroglossic'
• Misconstruing Heteroglossia And Dialogism As System And Process
• Misunderstanding Semantic Variation And Bakhtin

[2] To be clear, the significant previous work on genre is Martin's source, Hasan, who models genre in terms consistent with SFL theory.  Moreover, Martin misunderstands Hasan's (1989: 64) Generic Structure Potential, which models semantic structure of specific genres, as the structure realising a system of genre (misunderstood as culture instead of language).

[3] As previously explained, Martin's context — stratified as register, genre and ideology — is theorised on the basis of fundamental misunderstandings of SFL theory, and, as such, is riddled with internal inconsistencies.  See also, for example:

• Why The Argument For Register And Genre As Context Strata Is Invalid
• Why The Argument For A Stratum Of Ideology Is Invalid

On Modelling Context As Register And Genre

Bateman (1998: 20-1):

Finally, in Chapter 7 [pp493-590], Martin presents in detail the motivations for the proposal set out in, for example, Martin (1985) and Ventola (1988) that ‘context’ best be modelled as consisting of two distinct strata: register and genre. Both of these are then realised in the less abstract ‘plane’ of language consisting, as we have seen, of three strata: discourse semantics, lexicogrammar, and phonology. The chapter thus draws together results from many years of inquiry into the social situatedness of the linguistic system and the detail and examples given serve as a very useful introduction to the area and its points of debate.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, not just in SFL theory, 'register' refers to a functional variety of language, and 'genre' refers to a type of text.  In SFL, these are theorised as two views on the same phenomenon:

• language as register is language as genre (text type) viewed from the system pole of the cline of instantiation, whereas
• language as genre (text type) is language as register viewed from the instance pole of the cline of instantiation.

The place of register/genre (text type) in the architecture of SFL theory is identified in the following matrix:

Martin's proposal is to relocate register/genre (text type) from the content plane of language to cultural context and from subsystem/instance type to system.  In terms of SFL theory, this creates inconsistencies in terms of both stratification and instantiation.

In simple terms, Martin's proposal is that varieties/types of language are not language, but the culture that language realises.  This is analogous to proposing that varieties/types of birds are not birds, but something more abstract than birds.

To be clear, in Martin's model, texts cannot be instances of register or genre, since texts are instances of language, not context.

For some of the misunderstandings and inconsistencies in Martin's notion of register, see the 82 clarifying critiques here.
For some of the misunderstandings and inconsistencies in Martin's notion of genre, see the 67 clarifying critiques here.
For some of the misunderstandings and inconsistencies in Martin's notion of context, see the 172 clarifying critiques here.

The absurdities entailed by Martin's stratified context demonstrate that neither Martin nor Bateman  — nor anyone else who uses Martin's model — understands either stratification or instantiation.

[2] To be clear, as previously demonstrated, Martin's model misunderstands and rebrands Halliday & Hasan's non-structural textual lexicogrammar, the systems of cohesion, as structural discourse semantics:

• reference and ellipsis–&–substitution as IDENTIFICATION (textual),
• cohesive conjunction as CONJUNCTION (logical), and
• lexical cohesion as IDEATION (experiential).

[3] To be clear, Martin proposes that the linguistic system is socially situated in (varieties of) the linguistic system (register and genre).

On Martin's "Convincing" Use Of Ideation

Bateman (1998: 17):

He then turns to Sinclair’s (e.g, 1987) counter-position that collocation is in fact the better model to start from:

“collocation patterns may map more closely onto contextual ones than caution may have first led linguists to expect: ‘there is a great deal of overlap with semantics, and very little reason to posit an independent semantics for the purpose of text description’ (Sinclair, 1987:331).’’ [p277] 

Since the entire point of English Text is to provide an independent linguistic semantics that is primarily for the purposes of text description, Sinclair’s claim can be seen as something of a challenge — at least in the area of lexis and IDEATION. But, in direct answer to the challenge, Martin not only proposes a model of an independent discourse semantics for lexical relations but then provides several convincing examples of its use in text analysis, both alone in this chapter and, in the chapter following, in coordination with the other discourse semantic regions discussed.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, the source of "Martin's" model is Halliday & Hasan's (1976) lexical cohesion, a non-structural resource of the textual metafunction at the level of lexicogrammar.  Martin relocates this model to his own discourse semantic stratum, misunderstands it as experiential rather than textual, confuses it with 'lexis as most delicate grammar' (and with clause nuclearity), and rebrands the confusion as his own system of IDEATION, all of which is demonstrated in great detail here.

[2] For some of the problems with Martin's text analyses, unnoticed by the 'convinced' Bateman, see:

• Misconstruing Extension As Elaboration
• Misconstruing General Lexical Cohesion As Instantial
• Misconstruing Mode As Genre (1)
• Misrepresenting Processes As Subclasses Of Clause
• Misconstruing Enhancement (And Complementarity) As Extension
• Misconstruing Mode As Genre (2)

[3] For the cornucopia of theoretical misunderstandings in Martin's Chapter 6, see the evidence here.

On Martin's Misrepresentation Of Halliday & Hasan (1976)

Bateman (1998: 13):

Martin also attempts [p180] what he terms a “less materialist’’ and more semiotic interpretation of the internal/external division, drawing on the relationships between discourse semantics, register and genre that he sets out in Chapter 7; external relations then relate to ‘field’, the “institutional organisation of our culture’’, and internal relations relate to the ‘text genre’, the “organisation of text as it is formulated to construct our culture.’’ Conjunction is thus seen as the “most upward-looking’’ system in the discourse semantics and, as such, is suggested as a particularly useful place to start whenever the structure of a whole text is to be considered [p269].

Blogger Comments:

[1] Martin's misrepresentation of the source of his ideas — Halliday & Hasan's distinction between internal and external conjunctive relations — as "materialist" derives from his own misunderstanding of their distinction.  Martin (1992: 180):

Internal relations in other words structure semiosis; external ones code the structure of the world.

As Halliday & Hasan (1976: 241) point out, it is both types of cohesive conjunction that create text, not merely internal conjunctive relations.  This is hardly surprising, given the fact that conjunction is a resource of the textual metafunction, rather than of the logical metafunction, and given the fact that the textual metafunction is concerned with 'semiotic reality' — 'reality in the form of meaning' — rather than with 'natural reality' (ideational metafunction) or 'intersubjective reality' (interpersonal metafunction); see Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 398).

[2] To be clear, Martin's reinterpretation of Halliday's context, the culture as a semiotic system, confuses culture with varieties of language, register and genre; see the clarifications and critiques of Martin's Chapter 7 here.  In SFL theory, language lies on the expression plane of context.

Significantly, it is Martin (1992: 33, 39-40, 122) who, in earlier chapters, adopts a "materialist perspective", confusing semiotic context with material setting.

[3] To be clear, Martin's proposal is to relate one type of conjunctive relation to the lower level of his model of context, and the other type of conjunctive relation the higher level of his model of context, skipping the lower level,

• where strata are misunderstood as interacting modules (p390), rather than levels of symbolic abstraction, and
• where the strata are varieties of language misunderstood as cultural context.

Moreover, Halliday's system of conjunction, a resource of the textual metafunction, is misunderstood by Martin as a logical system, and relocated from lexicogrammar to discourse semantics.

[4] This quoted glossing of 'field' is inconsistent with both SFL theory and Martin's own use of the term. In SFL theory, 'field' refers to the ideational dimension of the culture as semiotic system, whereas 'institution' refers to a point of variation on the cline of instantiation, namely sub-potentials of the culture as semiotic system (which are realised by sub-potentials of language: registers). In Martin's usage, on the other hand, 'field' usually refers, in SFL terms, to the ideational dimension of semantics: the domain that realises a contextual field. For Martin's misunderstandings and inconsistencies with regard to field, see the clarifications and critiques here.

[5] This quoted glossing of 'genre' is inconsistent with both SFL theory and Martin's own use of the term. In SFL theory, 'genre' is Hasan's (1985/9: 64) term for text type, which is, in turn, register viewed from the instance pole of the cline of instantiation. In Martin's usage, 'genre' refers to context, whereas the organisation of text is the organisation of an instance of language, not context.

One possible source of Martin's confusion could be his misunderstanding of Hasan's (1985/9: 64) model of 'Generic Structure Potential', which is concerned with the potential semantic structure of texts according to type (genre).

[6] This quote from Martin, exemplifies his misunderstanding of strata as interacting modules, instead of as levels of symbolic abstraction. The relation between strata is an intensive identifying relation, with the lower stratum as Token and the higher stratum as Value; a Token does not "look up to" a Value — a Token realises a Value at a lower level of abstraction.

[7] To be clear, the original source of Martin's model, Halliday & Hasan's (1976) cohesive conjunction, is a non-structural resource of the textual metafunction at the level of lexicogrammar. There are two significant reasons, then, from the perspective of SFL theory, why conjunction is not a model of text (semantic) structure:

• conjunction is not structural, and 
• conjunction is not semantic.

On Chapters 6 & 7 Of Martin's 'English Text'

Bateman (1998: 2):

Then, the final part, consisting of chapters 6 and 7, considers some significant and highly suggestive issues that arise when relating distinct levels of description.  Chapter 6 shows some of the ways in which options selected from phonology, lexicogrammar and discourse semantics are woven together systematically to create and enhance a text’s texture and Chapter 7 closes the book with an extended consideration of the placement of the entire linguistic system discussed in the previous six chapters within its social context and situation of use. This latter chapter raises important issues concerning the definition and interconnections of text types, genres, registerial selections and ideology.

Blogger Comments:

The positive appreciation here (significant, important) is entirely unjustified by the quality of the theorising under review.

[1] In SFL theory, the relation between levels of description is one of realisation, which is an intensive identifying relation between two levels of symbolic abstraction.  Chapters 6 and 7 of Martin (1992) are inconsistent with this stratal model because Martin mistakes the strata along this dimension for "interacting modules" (p390).  This fundamental misunderstanding invalidates the basis of the theorisation in chapters 6 and 7, and leads to deep and widespread theoretical inconsistencies, as demonstrated here (chapter 6) and here (chapter 7).

[2] Chapter 6 of Martin (1992) takes cohesive harmony (Hasan 1985), modal responsibility (Halliday 1985) and method of development and point (Fries 1981), misunderstands each — see cohesive harmony, modal responsibility, method of development, point — and reconstrues them as "interaction patterns" (p393) between strata (misconceived as modules).  Much of the chapter confuses writing pedagogy with linguistic theory, rebranding the terms 'introductory paragraph', 'topic sentence', 'paragraph summary' and 'text summary' as 'macro-Theme', 'hyper-Theme', 'hyper-New' and 'macro-New', respectively.  This also involves misunderstanding the original notion of hyper-Theme (Daneš 1974).

[3] Martin (1992: 384, 393) misconstrues the lexicogrammatical system of information (content plane) as phonology (expression plane).  For Martin's misunderstandings and false claims about phonology, see the critiques here.

[4] In SFL theory, the term 'texture' refers to the quality of being a text (Halliday & Hasan 1976: 2), which is achieved through the textual metafunction, not through interaction patterns between stratal modules across various metafunctions — each of the latter also misconceived by Martin as a module.

[5] Martin's model of social context is misconstrued as language varieties, misconstrued as modules; see [6] below.  In SFL theory, context is construed as the culture as a semiotic system.

[6] Chapter 7 of Martin (1992) takes register (Halliday) and genre (Hasan) and misconstrues them as strata of context (each misconstrued as a module) as opposed to language.  That is, it takes functional varieties of language, and models them as more abstract than language.  This is analogous to claiming that lorikeets are not varieties of bird — and so, not even birds — but are more symbolically abstract than birds.

In SFL theory, register and genre are two views of the same phenomenon, located as a midway point on the cline of instantiation, with register the view from the system pole, and genre the view from the instance pole.