2007+martin+y+rose%2c+ideation+construing+experience

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Working withDscourseMeaning beyond the clause-FJ. R. Martin and David Rose

K

?ro1,rlo -Fol J, c1t rolo+ tr.l .sont inuum


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ContentsContinuum'fhe Trwer tluilding 80 Maiclen [.anell York Road , Suire 704Lorr-lon, SEI 7NX New York, Y 10018IAcknowledgements {'l'hc autlurs arc grate[ul to the fol.,wing publis]rers fur rr:rrnissiorr to reprint exrracls:Long Walk to Freetlorn, by Nelsrfrutandel. r t99{ by Nelson Rolihlahla Mandela. Bypcr nrission


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IDEATION : construing experience

J.l333.43.5.J. O37

7476B690

100109113

t")r.r I lir r,.'Construing experienceTaxonomic relationsMore on taxonomic relationsNuclear relationsActivity sequencesMore on qramnratical metaphorSeeing participants from the field: kinds o1 enti,ies

III,IIIII)iI

ldeation is concerned with llow our experience is construed in cjiscourse. ltfocuses on sequences of activities, the peoplc and things involvecl in thenr, andtheir associated places and qualities, and on how these elements are built urrand related to each other as a tt,xt unfolds.Following an introduction, tiris chapter has three nrain sections. section 3 2describes chains of relations between Iexic.l elerrrents in a text, such asrepetition, synonymy and contrast. As tlrey build up a picture of people andthings as a text unfolds, these are known as taxonomic relations section 3.4describes lexical relations between processes, people, things, places arroqualities within each clause As they are more or less central in the clause, theseare known as nuclear relations. section 3.5 describes relatic,rns betweerractivities as a text unfolds. As they construe experienr-e as unfolding in series ofactivities, these relations are known as activity sequences.In section 3.2 a method rs introduced for analysing taxonornic relations in atext, that allows us to see relations between lexical elernents as a text unlolds,as well as the overall pictures of people and things that a text construes. Section3.4 includes methods for analysing nuclear relations in a text, that display howpeople and things participate n activities, and how lexical elements are relaled


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7 4 working with Discourseacross different parts of grammar. Secton 3.5 concludes with a method foranalysing activity sequences in a text that displays its phases of activities as wellds its patterns of participation by people and things.The final secton 3 6 discusses what happens when lexical meanings areexpressed by atypical wordings, such as realizi''g a process as a noun instead ofa verb ('nonrinalizatior'). [hrs rs known ar grammatical metaphor, and ametirod rs described for unpacking grarnnralical metaphors to help analyseactrvrly Sequencc'5.

', ,, 1.._,Ji ,l; t i t.tft ir. f, ": I li:]f ili iitj't'he nlodel of hunan experence at the hcart of ideational nreaning, in alilanguages, is of processes involving peoplc, things, places and qualities. Halliday(1994: l0) proposes that this construal of experience lies behind the grammar ofthe clausc:The cluse . . . embodrc.s a gcneral princrplc lor modelling experience - namey theprinciple that reality rs made up of eHortss[5. Our rrrost powerful impression ofexperiunce is that it consists of goings on - happerring, doing, sensing, rneaning, beingand becr:ming. All these goings on ae scrled out in the qrammar of the clarsc.

'fhe grammar of thc clausc organizes such 'goirrgs on' as configurations ofclements, such as a process, a person and a rlacc:ln lhis intcrpretatron of what is gc,ing on. there is doing, a rloer, anrl a locaton whcrethc doing takes place. This tripartite interpretation . . . is what lies behind thegrammatical dlstirrction of urord classes inlo verbs, nouns and the rest, a pattern that tnsorne form or olher is pro[rably universal (lr]ronr; human languages (iid.: 108)

Fronr a grammatical perspective, the clause is a structure of words and wordgroups, but frorn a discourse scmantic pcrspective the clause construes an activityinvolving peoplc arrtl tbings. The corc clenlents ofsuch a figure are the process andthe people and things that are directly involved in it, while other elenents such asrlaces and qu .ir. :s nray be more pcripheral. 'fhis nuclear nrodel of experience isdiagranrrned rn Frgure 3.1.'fhe'doer-cloing'nucleus is represented as a revolvingyin/yang complementarity, with 'place' and '


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7 6 Working with Discourserelations between people and things and the process they are involved in, and theplaces and qualities associated with the process, for example the configuration oftwo people and a process when Helena's romance starts: Helena * nrcet - youngntat. As they are more or less central to the unfolding ofthe Process' as in Figure3.1, these are known as nuclear relations.The third is the sequence of activities construed by clauses as a text unfolds.'['hcse are the relations. from one process to the next that imply a series of steps,srrch as meeting - beginning relationship - marriage. As they construe the field of atext as unfolding in series of activities, these relations are known as activitysequences. These three systems of rgrlrloH are summarised in Figure 3.2'

taxonomic relations between e/emenfs from clause to clausa(late teenage years - farm gid - eighteen'year'oldlnucf ear ref ation s configurations of elements within aach clausa(Helena - tneet - Young man)activity sequences from process to procoss in series ofclauses

( meet - begin relationshiq - marry)IDEATION

Figure 3.2 tDEArtoN systems

.,.. J ;i..:r.ili(irllit i'ill;iiil.'i ;',The first Incident of Helena's story principally concerns herself and her first love,who are seen from various perspectives as the events unfold. For example, sheclassifies her young self as a farm grl, and her lover as a young man and anF.nglshman,and contrasts this identity with tlre 'Boer' Afrikaners. Each mention ofthem is highlighted below in bold and bold italic.

My srory begins in my late teenage years as a farm girl rn the Bethlehem district ofEastern tree State.As an eighteenyearold, I met a young man in his tw'enties. He was working in a topsecurty structure. lt was the beginning of a beautiful relationship. We even spokeabout marriage. A bubbly, vivacious man who beamed out wild energy. Sharplyintelligent. Even if he was a', Englishman, he was popular with all lhc 'Boc'Aftikaners. And all my girlfriends envied me'

If we extract these instances we can see more clearly how Helena and he lover areclassified:

IDEATION : construing experienceher first love othersa young marr rrr his twentics ll the 'Brter' Alril.anersan Irrqilslrrnan

77Helenarny late teenage yOarsa farm girln erghteen-yer old

Helena describes herself in terms of lrer youth and her origins, ancl hc lover interms of his youth and English ethnicity, and she then cont asrs this with anotherethnic group he was popular with. As he is the lbcus of the stor)', her description ofhim is far nrore dcveloped, including nrany positive attribntes, srrch as Ituhbly,vivacious, beamed out v'ild energy, sharply intelligent, populnr. llowever, theseinscribed judgenrents are dealt with as appraisals in clrapter 2, and we will setthem aside in the discussion here, lirniting ourselves to rurely ideationalcategories.

Flelena constructs an unfolding picture of herself and her lover as rnembers ofmore general classes, such as age and ethnicit that are not stated but are assumedby their instances in the text. We will refer to the relation between one instrnce of aclass and thc next as a co-class relation. In 'lhble 3.1 we analyse each of thescrelationships as strings of lcxical relatiorrs as the events unfold.Table 3.1 Lexical strings of Helena and her first love

Helena's youthlate teenage yearsco-class{arm qirlco-classeightcen year old

her loveryoLil)g mdtlco classInglshrnanco class'Boer' Afrikant,s

underlying thesc instances in the texr arc g'ner, I social calegories, irrcludingage, gender, ethnicit canacity ard class (ser: (Jhapter 9, sectiorr 9..3). Figrrre 3.3shows some of their sub-categories, lhat are instantiatedr irr this phase of the story.Dotted lnes show how people are cross-classified by nrultiple categories, such as larm girl by hcr class, age and gender. (1'riple dots represent unstated other sub-categories. )Ifwe pull back the focus lronr lJelena and her first love, to the broader classes ofpeople running through the story as a whole, we carr nrakc explicit thc social worldthat she constructs in the storl in Figure 3.4.


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78 Working wittr Dis oun:socialcategoryclass


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78 Workino with Dis oun e

age

gender

sub-category instance in toxt,-/ '''ruralmiddle. -1 farm girl, j- eghteen-Year-oldteenage


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80 Working with Discourseln contrast to the classifying taxonomy in Figure 3.4 above, these parts o[ theman together make up a compositional taxonomy, consisting of wholes and theirparts and strb-parts, which we can express as a tree diagram in Figure 3'5'

his eyes his his theface hands throat bottom ofhis soulFigure 3.5 Parts of llelena's second loveTypes of taxonomic relationsRelations between classes and members, and between parts and wholes, make uptlvo types of taxonomies by which we construe fields of experience. People, thingsand places belong to rnore general classes of entities, and at the same time they areparts of larger wholes, and are composed of smaller parts. These are known asclassifying and compositional taxonomies respectively. Both hierarchies may havernany layers, particularly in technical fields, for example (classifying) kingdonr'phylum, closs, order, family, genus, species, sult-species and (composinE) ecosystem,foorl-chain, organism, organ s/stem, organ, tissue, cell, organelle, metaltolisn"t...Processes can also be viewed as instances of more general types, or as parts oflarger activities, but their taxonomies are not as multi-layered as for people' thingsand places. Qualities may fall into more general classes, but they are not composedof parts.Thcse taxoromies give rise lo several types of lexical relation in discorrrse,including class-member and co-class, rvhole-part and co-part. We can also includehere repetition, in which the same lexical item is repeated, sometimes in differentgrirrnrnatical forms, such as marry - nnrried - marrage. There is also synonymin which a similar experiential meaning is shared by a different lexical item, such^s marridge - wedding.Then of course there are contrasts between lexical items. The most familiar isperhaps antonymy, in which two lexical items have opposing meanngs, such asnutrriage - divorce. But another type of opposition is converse roles, such as wife -Itusbancl, porent - child, teacher - student, doctttr - patient, and so on. Althoughthese are oppositional relations, they are not strictly speaking antonyms.In addition to such oppositions, another type of contrast is series. These includescales such as hot - wann - tepid - cold, but also cycles such as days of the weekSunday - Monday - Tuesday - Wednesday and so on. This range of taxonomicrelations is set out in Figure 3.6.

the manTAXONOT 'llCRELATIONS

IDEATION:construingexperience 81repetition many - manied - marragesynonyms marrage - wedding

aO^tr"rt{ f scales ltot - warnt * tepid - coldsenes -)iL- cycles Sunday - Monday * Tuesday

whole-parl body- anns- handspart -iL- co-part face - hands - eyes --thro;;i * ltead -- brainFigure 3.6 Taxonomic relations systern

Each lexical itern in a text expects further lexical iterns to follow that are relatetlto it in one of these five general ways. A lexical itern initiates or expanrls on thefield of a text, and this field expccts a predict;rblc range oI rclatc


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82 Working with DiscourseTo provide or the irrvestigdton and the establishment of s complete a pcture asptrssible of the niturc, causes and extnl of gross violationf of human right . . . ;tlrtf granting of amnesty 10 personJ who rnake full discloure of all the relevant lactsalfording victims an oprortunity to relte the violations they suffered;tlre taking rf measures airned l the granting of reparation . . . ;reporting to the Nation about such violations and victims;the rnak ,g 'f recornmendtions ainred at the preventirn of the commssion of grossviolatiorrs or human rights;and f or the said purpose s to provide f c_r tfe estblishment of a Truth andReconciliation Commission, Committee on Human Rights Violations, aCommttee on Amnesty and a Committee on Reparation and Rehabilitation;nd to confer certain powers on, assiqn certain furrctions to and irnpose certain dutiesupon that Commision and those Commttes,arrd to provide lor matters connected therewith.

I'hese lcxical itcnrs re prcsented as lexical strings in Figurc 3.7. The order in whichtlic'y occur in the text is indicated by their position in the table.complete, pt(ture

IIsynonyfflIItull disclosure

5ynonymll |he relevnttcts

gross violattons ofltuntan riclhtsIIIropetrtt{-)n

vtolttorls tllcysuffcredrepetrtonvioltionsrepetrlronviolations


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84 Working with DiscourseFurther, retributive iustice - in which an impersonal state hands down punishmentwith little consideration for victims and hardly any for the perpetrator - s not theonly form of justice. I contend that there is another kind of iustice, restorativejustice, which is characteristic of traditional Afrcan jurisprudence. Here the centrlconcern rs not retribution or punishment but, in the spirit of ubuntu' the healing ofbreaches, the redressing of imbalances, the restoration of broken relationshipsThis kind of lulice seeks to rehabilitate both the victim and the perpetrator, whoshould be given the opportunity to be reintegrated into the community he or she hasinjured by his or her offence This is a far more personal approach, whrch sees theoffence as something that has happened to people and whose consequence is arupture in relationshiPs.Thus we would claim that justice, restorative lustice, is being served when effortsare being made to work for healing, for forgiveness and for reconciliation,

Tutu contrasts retributive justice wih rcstofative justice, completing his casethat justice is being done when amnesty is given. fle explicitly states thatrestorative jrtstice is part of African jurisprudence, so implying thal retributvejnstice is non-African (i.e. Western). Table 3.3 gives the lexical strings in this stage'Table 3.3 Kinds of iustice

Westem legal system African legal sYstem offencesan impersonal statepanretnbutive iusticeclasspunishment with Ittleconsideration for victims andhardly any for the PerPetrator

synonymretributionsynonympunishment

traditional African iurisprudencepanrestoratve justce

classthe spirit of ubuntuclasshealing of breaches

co-classredressing of imbalancesco-classrestoration of broken relationshpsco-classopportunty to be reintegrated intothe community (the perpetrator) hasinjured by his or her offenceclassa fdr more Penonal aPProachclassrestoratve iusticeparthealingco-partforgivenessco-Partrcconcliaton

the offenceclasssomethng that hashappened to Peoqlepanrupture in relationshiPs

IDEATION:construingexperience 85These relations construe two contrasting typrs of lcgal systenls. In one animpersonal sfr?fe hands drwn retributive justit:e; rhe other is traditionnl Africanjurisprudence, based on the pre-colonial spirit oJ- ubuntu, and aclvocated by -t'utufor contemporary restorative justice. Retributive justice includes the two attributesretributot ancl punishment vith little cotsideration .fr victirts nnd hurdly any .l'orthe perpetrato The three attributcs of the spirit o.f ubuntu are the healing ofbreaches, the redressing of imbalances and, the restoration of broken relationships.The four attributes of restorative justice are healing, forgiveness, recontiliation antlthe opportunity to be reintegrated into the comnunity. 'l'hese types of legal systemsand their attributes are set out in lrigure 3.9.

inrpersonal ,.,"stafe/\_- retnbutionjustice ---- punl.shmenf

tn,of/iusllce \, healing of breaches

redressng of imbalancesresloratiort o{ bnskenrelatonshpsoppounity to bo reintegratedinto the comtrrunilyhealingforgivenessreanciliation

Figure 3.9 Types of legal systems and their componentsBy means of this classification Tutu advocates an approach to justice that drawson implicitly positive evaluations, which he contrasts with implicitly negativeevaluations. As in the conlrasting attributes of Ilelena's lovers, before and aftertheir'opcrations', taxonomic relations interact with resources of aprraisal tocategorize the world and evaluale the categories we construe. Ilovever, in'l'ultr'sphilosophical argrnrent the catcgories are not people and their qualities, butinstitutional abstractions, including legal systems, principles oIjustice, and rroralbehaviours.

thespirit


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86 Working with Discourse) .3 l'fltirt: (Jft lciXr-trntiC fr.:l.rtitinSln our analyses above we have illustrated five types of taxonomic relations betweenelentents: retetitions, synonyms, contrasts, classes and, parts. This section providessorle nlore detail about then.SynonymsSynonynrs are diflrent lexical itens that share sinrilar experiential meanings. Forexample T'utu uses the synonyms public hearing and open session, which denote thesmc kind of event. Synonyrns arc often used by writers to avoid repetition. Therneanings ol syrronynrs also usually diffcr in some way, such as the contexts inwhichtheyaretypicallyused.t'-orexanrple publichearingnraybeusedinageneralcontext, and nrost of us will recognize the kind of event it denotes, whereas opensession may refcr to various kinrls of evcnts - not just court hearings. Furthermoresynonynrs rnay also differ in thc attitude they express. So public antl open areneutral in attituile, whercas other synonyrns f


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88 Working with Discoursearrnesty is only given to those who plead guilty, who accept resportsibility for whatthey have done. Amnesty is not given to innocent people or to those who claim to bennocent. lt was on preciseiy this point that amnesty was ref used to the police of f icerswho applied for it {or their part in the death of Steve Biko. They denied tltat they hadcommitted a crime, clarminq that they had assaulted him only in retliation for hisinexpficable conduct in attacking them

I{ere there is a double contrast inlplied, between the innocent and the guilt andbetween those who confess their guilt and those who falsely claim innocence, thuscompounding their crimes. Finally Tutu rests his case on the contrast betweenrctributive and restorative justice. Interestingly he argues that both tyPes treat theconverse roles of victim and perpetrator in some ways similarly. Retributive justicegivcs litrle consideration to either, whereas restorative justice classifies both as Peoplei

Further, retributive justice - in which an inlpersonal state hands down punishmentwith little consideration for victims and hardly any for the perpetfator - rs not theonly form of justice. I contend that there is another kind of lustice, restorative ustice,which is characteristic of traditional African jurisprudence Here the central concern isnot retrbuton or punishment but, in the spirit of ubuntu, the healing of breaches, theredressing of imbalances, the restoration of broken relatonshps. This kind of justiceseeks to rehabilitate both the victim and the perpetrator, who should be given theopportunity to be reintegrated into the community he or she has injured by his or herolfencc,. This is a far more personal approach, which sees the offence as somethingthat has happened to people and whose consequence is a rupture in relationships.

Many such antonyms are construed in the principles motivating the ReconciliationAct, with the contrast etnphasized by negative polarity nof' and the contrastiveconjunction bur:srNcr the Constitution states that there is a need lor underttanding but not forvengeance, a need for reparaton but not for retaliaton, a need for ubuntu btt notfor victimization;

tn other genres, series are an important resource for interpreting things and events'Newspaper stories for example jump, around in time, so that readers must be ableto recover relations between times in order to construe the sequence of events' Thefollorving extract recounts the events. surrounding the 2001 rescue of shipwreckedrefugees trying to reach Australia by the Norwegian freighter Tampa, and theAustralian government's shameful refusal to help them:ORIFT|NG 22km off Christmas lsland and with food and supplies running low, CaptainArne Rinnan was last nirht trying to mantain order on his besieged ship after beingturned away by Australia and warned off by Indonesia. The Norwegian captain of the

IDEATION:construingexperience 89MS Tanrpa last night told Tlre Daily Telegraph by satellile phone rnany of tho ,138 rnen,wornen and children orr his ship were ill after their 11th day at sea ..But Prinre Minister John lloward s.rid after a cbinet mce:tinq yesterday afternoontlrat thc ship would not trt-. allowed to entor Australian watcrs ... Hotrs later. thclndonesian Government responded by sayinq the boal peo-rle - who arc: helieved to befrom Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan and lrrdonesia - could not return to Indoncsia.Capt Rinnan told lhc Daily Telegraph lre lrad not yot irrforrned tire boat peopltr lastnight that Austrlia had refused tlrcrn perrnission to land at Christnras lsland. Asked ifhe was alraid ol violence, he said: 'Not at the moment, but we were and wc will be ifthey are turned away They are starting to qet frustrated.'When he picked up the distress call 24 hours earlier, he believed he would becarrying out a rescue operation, de[vering the bo.,t pe,]ple to the nearest Indotresianport. After reaching thp stricken 20m wooden vessel, KM Palapa 1, the crew helpedthe boat people on bcard. With the strong south easterly winds which buffet the reaat this tirne of year, it took thc Tampa crew three hours to get thern all on board . .Capt Rinnan said thc boat people had become distressed when told they ntight haveto return to Indonesia earlier in the day, wtth some threatentnq to lump overbo.rrd. 'lsaid we are heading towards Indonesia and they saicl "l'.1o, you mtlst head toAustralia".'Capt Rinnan said they were'just hanqng arourrd'late yesterday, waitingfor Australian officials to (om orr foard (Isavdaridis 2001 . 1)

The potential complexity of tracking the events through the story is eviclent in thefollowing list of times as they appear in the text:last nighttheir 'l 1th day at seayesterday afternoorlhours laterlast nightat the moment24 hours earlierthree hoursearlier in the daylate yesterdy

As ese times are out of sequence in such genres, timc cyclcs are art essentiallexical resource fur recognizing a sequence of events.Class to memberRelalions of class to rnember are given various natnes in F,nglish, deperrding on tlrcfield, e.g. a clas:of words, a nake of car, a breed of dogs. Comnon examples includeclass, kind, tlpe, category, sort, variety, genre, style, form, make, hreed, species,order, family, Brade, brand, cdsfe. These can be used cohesively between messages,e.g. Like my new car? Yes, what make s it? Technicall class-member relations areknown as hyponymy (hypo- from Greek 'under').


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90 Working with DiscourseWholes to partsLikewise relationships of wholes to parts are also given various names in English,dcpending on the field, e;. lart, content, ingredient, constituenl, stratum, rankoplane, element, factor, fitt.rrg, r ternber, component, faction, excerpt, extract, episole,chupter, selection, pece, segment, sectiotr, porton, measure. ln addition, facetsname parts that are locations of wholes, e.g. the bottom of his soul, top, nside,outside, skle, edge, middle, perirneter, environs, start, finish, beginning, rest.Measures na[re sorne portion of the whole, e.g. a cup of coffee, glass, bottle, jugcan, burrel, louf, nrcuthful, spoonful, ounce, pound, kilo, metre, acre. Again part-whole relations can be used cohesively betwcen messages:

pr tsfacetsmeaSure5

flte chair's broken - Wh U ?Was t a good marriaqe? - Only atHow much is petrol today? - More

introducti


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92 Workino with DiscourseThe Commission may granlAgentamnestyMedium

Processrs not grantedProcess

amnestyMediumby the CommrssronAgentamneslyMedium

to those who pleadguiltyBeneficiaryto innocent peopleBeneficiaryby the CommissionAgentthe oolice olficers were refusedBeneficiary Process

The Medium may be alfected by the process, but the Agent is left implicit, as in I'ngoing to be haunted, amnesty was refused. As Agent and Beneficiary may be left outof the clause, they are relatively marginal in terms of nuclear relations.How do these grammatical functions interact with the lexical elements thatinstantiate them in particular texts? ln the grounds that Tutu gives for his secondArgrrnrent, he names its field as the granting of amnesty. This field is expanded inthe following clauses as processes of 'giving', 'not giving', 'refusing' and 'applyingfbr'2 (in italics below), of which amnesty is the Medium (in bold), with variousy',gents and Bcneficiaries (underlined):

It is also not true that TtlE GRANTING OF AMNEsry encouraqes impunrty . . .because amnesty is only given to those who plead qulty . . .Amnerty is not gven to innocent people or to those who clam to be innocent.It w.ls on precisely this point tlrat amnesty ws ref used to the police off icerswho applied for [a6651y] lor their part n the death of Steve Biko.Arnnesty is construed here as a commodity that is given or refused to variousrecipients, by an implicit giver (the Commission), and is also demanded bypotential rccipients (police officers). The central elements in this construal are theprocesses ofexchanging (given, not given, refused, applied for), the nuclear elementis the commodity exchange


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94 Working with Discounebetwcen these activities and nore marginal elements are only predictable withinthe particular field of the Truth and Reconciliarion commission (e,g. who theCommission can and ca)not grant amnesty to).Other nuclear relatonsA proccss nray also be instigated by the Medium and cxtended to aparticipant that is not alfected by the process, known as a Range. The firstRangc is an entity that the process extcnds tr:

secondtype of

Range are a gualil.y or a possession of the Mediunr, In thisof'being' or 'having', that relates the quality or a possession

all nry girlfrieruJIthey Merlium I

Anothr,r r*o ki,,d, oJcase the proccss is oneto tlic lvlediurn:

envredcan't explarnwould nutte'r" ro\?s5

fl)Lrthe pain and btternessthe fercri wcrdRange

quality lleIlrc'Iperpetrat(]rsHelenMedlum

waswa5becarnem gotnqlravehadProcess

populartorn to piecesvery quietmadno excusea new loverRange

an Irrglishrnanreal policemerr nowrnc'mbers of death scluadsonly one desirethe gutsRange

ln additi


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96 Working with Discoune

marginal

I1

r ProcesScentral ? Tprocess danceaiigL Range -)-.- class be an EnglishmanL- part have the guts Medium grant amnestyInuclear -) L- Range *)f- quality going madL- oossession had another lover

Figure 3.13 Nuclear relations in the clauseNuclear relations below the clauseIlelow the clause, processes, participants and circumstances are themselves madeup of groups of words, including lexical items. In Halliday's 1994/2004 model,clause, group and word are different ranks in the grammar; a clause is realized by aconfiguration of word groups, each ofwhich is realized by a configuration of words.As with the clause, nuclear relations also pertain between lexical words in groups.To describe these relations, we need to distinguish two kinds of word groups -nominal groups that realize things and people, and verbal groups that realizeprocesses.Lexicall we are concerned with five functional elements of nominal groups.First, in Halliday's model, the central function o[ a nominal group is called theThing. The lexical noun that realizes a Thing is a class ofperson or thing, such asgirl, man, window, berl. Second, the Thing may be sub-classified by an itemfunctioning as Classifier. Classifier and Thing together form a unfied lexicalelement:

oeriorrerar{

a farma top securitythe specialthe 'Boer'reStorattveClassifier

Agent granted by the CommissionBeneficiary gnnt to those who confessCircumstance (inner) see with our own eyesCircumstance (oulerl moving to a special unit

grnstructureforcesAfrikanersjusticeThing

Third, people and things may also be described with qualities, that function in thenominal group as an Epithet:

myclan

lteyoungextrcmely shortEpithet

T'he Epithet is less central in a nonrinal group; struclurally it is lrther fronr the'Ihing than the Classifier. Ilpithcts may be intensified verylltle ext:ernely short, butClassifiers may not (\very teennge).Fourth, peoplc and tlrings ntay also be qualified, by circunrsfances or clauses thatfollow the'l'hing. These elcments are known as Qualifiers. 1'hey are phrases or clausesthat are'downranked' and embedded as elenrcnls in the nontinal group. In terms ofnuclear relations, they are more peripheral still than Classifiers and Epithets:

IDEATION:construingexperience 97Ieenaqe years

mnmar r iarJeClassifier Thing

a youngan extremely shortbloorj curdlingthe Epthet

rldn ir lris twentiesmarriaqe to scmeone elseshrieks of fear and pairr fronr thctottom of lris soulpolice officers who applied for amncstyClassifier Thing QualifierFinally, we must also account for various'of'structrrres in nonrinal groups.1'hescinclude facets (tfie side ol the house), measures (n g/ns,s of heer), types (a mnke olcar), and so on. For simplicity we will label all these here as Focus. Like ClassifierThing structures, Focus'l'hing structures also cornprise a single lexical elenrent:

tfre bottonr of hrs soulthe early hours of the morninglhn only form ol juslrccFocus ThingIn verbal groups, we are concerned witlr just thrre rnctional clements. Filst, thelexical process in a verbal group is known as the Event, for exampler was working,won't see, was to learn, can't explan. A verbal group ntay inclrrde more thn oneEvent, comprising separate lexical processes:clairnlrydieEvent

to beto resisttryingEventSecond, Events nray be described with Qualities (manner adverbs in traditionalgrammar), that are more peripheral:


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98 Working with Discn,-,.seSnak evr5rtrnulter5rt5Event

benrIooklookscreamEvent

More central on the other hand are particles in prepositional verbs, whichcomprise a single lexical itcn:

uncontrollablyf e9urarryabruptlymotronlessQuality

outoutupdtParticle

'l'lrese can often be paraphrased with a sinrple verb, e.g. radiale, beware, research,abuse' So at thc rank of word group, the centre is occupied by the l'hing and(llassifier or Event and Particle, the nucleus by the Epithet or second Event, anct theperiphery by the Qualifier or Qualit schenratized in Figrrre 3.14. These options innuclcarity in groups are then set out in Figure 3.15.

Figure 3,14 Nuclearity in nominal and verbal qroupsClassifier Thing polco force

the bottom of his soulbeant out

- nomlnalnrrclear --2 L- verbal Epithet Thing young manEvent Event keep shakingThing Quafifier youry man in his twtsnliesEverrtQuality shakeuncontrotlably

Figure 3.15l{uclear relations belor,v the clauseAs we saw lor granting dmnesty, the predictability of nuclear relations in clausesarttl grottPs rnay correlate with the degree ol' nuclearity. Relations between centralelenrents are often prcdictable across ficlds (grantint=reJitsing, polite=force), relations

r utasstnef In norninal -l| - Focus Thingcentral -? - verbal Event Particle

f nomtnal- penpheral-lL verbal

IDEATION: corrtruing experience 99wi nuclear elements may be predictable wiin general fields (grant+amnestl,young+man), while marginaUperipheral elements may only be predictable wiinspecific sub-fields (amnesty x those who plead guilty, shake x uncontrollably\.Nuclear relations and taxonomic relationsNuclear relations are particulafly useful to inform analyses ofactivity sequences intexts, as we will show in e following section. On the other hand, for texts and textphases that are focused on entities rather than activities, nuclear relations can helpto inform analyses of taxonomic relations between things and qualities. This isillustrated with the following descriptive rePort fron school biolog describing theAustralian class of reptiles known as goannasi

Australia is home to 25 ol the world's 30 monitor lizard species. In Australia, ntonitorlizards are called goannasGoannas have flattish bodies, long tails and strong jaws. They are the orrly lizardswith forked tongues, like a snake. Their necks are long and may have loose folds of skirrbeneath them. Therr legs are long arrd strong, with sharp claws on thelr feet Manygoannas have stripes, spols and other markings that help to cantouflage them. Thclargest species can grow to more than two metres in length.All goannas are daytime hunters. They run, cfimb and swim well. Goannas huntsmall mammals, brrds and other reptiles They also eat dead animals. Smaller goannaseat nsects, spiders and worms. Male goannas fight wrth each other in the breedtngseason. Females lay between two and twelve eggs. (Silkstone 1994)

The appearance phase ofthe report describes each part ofthe goanna in turn, withrhe sequence expected by the field of its anatomy, beginning with the body, tail andjaws, followed by the tongue, the neck, the legs, skin markings, and finally size.flowever the parts and their qualities are dispersed across various gramnratcalcategories at clause and group rank. For example the part-whole relation isexpressed as a process (have llattish bodies), or a prePosition (with forkedtongues), or a possessive (their necks). A nuclear relations analysis allows us togroup these relations according to discourse semantic criteria.In the analysis in Figure 3.16, there is one lexical string for goannas and otherreptiles, and another string for their parts. Ir nuclear terms, classes and ;arts ofthings are central, qualities of things are nucledr, and locations are periPheral. S(\ inaddition to labelling taxonomic relations (vertically), we will label thesc nuclearrelations (horizontally), using'='for central,'+'for nuclear, and'x'for nrarginal/peripheral.Including nuclear relations with the taxonomic relations analysis allows us toconsistently track the relatiors of qualities and locations to each elenrent in thelexical strings, despite their structural dispersal across various gramnraticalcategories. A particularly complex example is the senlence They are the ttnly lizards


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100 Working with Discounegoan

portbodies + flattishco-porttails + longco -portjaws + strong

IIIco -porttongues + forkedco-'port

necks + long, ___-__ portI skin + loose folds x beneath necksco-portlegs + long and strongPortfeetportclaws + sharpclossmany goannasIIco-closslargest species .-.--.- po"tlength + more than two metres

Figure 3.16 Taxonomic and nuclear relations in an entity focused textwith forked tongues, like a snake, which simultaneously classifies goannas asIizards, implicitly includes both lizards and snakes in a higher class (i.e. reptiles),assigns forked tongues as a part of both goannas and snakes, and excludes otherlizards from having forked tongues. This configuration of relations is brought outvery simply in the combined taxonomic and nuclear relations analysis, highlightedin Figure 3.I6.r. _; Jrl f iuii.y setur:rictsWe have shown how elds of experience are construed in discourse, from oneperspective as taxonomies of people, things, processes, places and qualities, andfrom anoer perspective as configurations of these elements in clauses. Our third

\ .----.-.-...--

\closslizardsco-closssnake =

--- porTstripes, spots and other markings

IDEATION: construing experience 1 01perspective on fields construed in texts is on sequences of such configurations. Afield of human experience is composecl of recurrent sequences of activities.Because they are recurrent, any seqlrence is to some extent predictable within afield, so that variations from such sequences are countercxpectant.In other words, aclivity sequences are series of events that are expected by afield, as in meeting - relatonship - marriage. 'Ihe unmarked relation betweenevents in such an expectant sequence is 'and', sinrply adding each event to theothers in the series. So in oral personal recounts each clause comnronly begins with'and', illustrated in the following extract from testinrony to the Australiar Nationallnquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanler Children fromTher Families:

The circumstances of nry being taken, as I recollect, were thatI went off to school in the morningand l^was sitting in the classroomand there was only one room where all the children were assenlbledand there was a knock at thc'door, which the schoolmaster answered.After^a conversation he had with somebody at the door,ne carne to get me.He tnk me by the handand took rne to the door.I was^physically grabbed by a male person at lfre door,I was.t.rken to a rnotor bkeand held by the office'and drivcn to llre airstnpand flown off the lsland (HRFOC 1997 99)

ln this case the activity sequcnce is cxpected by the two fields of 'sclrool in themorning'and'abduction of Aboriginal children by the sr,rte'. Within each field theexpectant activity sequence is constructed with simple addition, but thecountrexpectant shift from one field to the next is signalled by the rnarked timeTheme After a conversaton he had with sonrebody at the door... (see Chapter 6).


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142 Working with DiscourseIr science fields, by contrast, the unmarked relation between events in a

seqrence is typically assumed to be cause and effect, so that each succeeding effectis iniplied by the preceding cause. For this reason such event series are known asinrplication sequences. An example is the following explanation of cycles ofbushfires and regeneration in the Australian Mullee woodland. The irnplicationsequcrlce is predicted by the opening scntence, and each step of cause and effectunfolds withou, -'ny explicit markcrs:

Regeneration of the Mallee depends on periodic fires.Old mallee produces a build-up of very dry litter and the branches themselves are oftenfestooned with slreamers of bark rnviting a flarne up to the canopy of leves loaded,,vith volatile eucalyptus oilA drv elcrtrrcl stornr in srlrlrrler is all tht is needed to strt a blaze,,rlrrr.tr, wrth a vcry hot northerly wind belrind it,,vrll race unchccked tltrouclh the bushllre;rext lins will bring an explosiorr of qround fiora;the lurnrner grasses ;nd forbs rrrrt able lo compete under a rrrallee carropy, will breakout ill a riot of cok;irrl.lew 5hoots of mallee will sprinq from the Iignotrrbernd another cycle of succession will begin rr,orrigan 1991 . 100)

Irew texts consist of crntinuous series of events, rather these are typicallyinterspersed wilh phases o[ dcscription, such as Helena's description of her firstIove, or by comrnents, reflcctions or reactions to the events. B,ven where a text isprimarily crncerned rvitl serics of events, these are typically organized intodistinct phascs. l'his is cvident in the personal recount abtve, in which the secondphase of events is counterexpcctant to thc first phas". It is also illustrated in thescicrce explanation, in r nic.'one phase is concernerl with fire and the next withregurreration, and the swrtcli in field is signalled by the Theme The next rains...Irol thesc reasons we neecl to analyse sequences in relation to the phases of atcxt. lypes of phases are predicted by the text's gcnre, as activities within eaclplrase :rre predicted by its fleld. Iror exirrnplc, we world exrect stories to includerhases such as settings, episutles, dcscriptions, problenrs, reactions and so on,rvhile phases in explanatiorrs nray include causal stcps, rnultiple factors, or multipleconsequcnccs (see Martin and Rose 2007b, Rose 2007 for more discussion).Within each pha.$e wc would expect activities to be related, as nrenrbers of awider set of activities, or as sub-parts ol larger activities. For example, the activities

IDEATION: construing experience 103meeting, relationship, marriage belong to a wider set of social interactions, andactivities such as marriage can be broken down into smaller components, such asproposal, engagement, wedding, honeymoon and so on. And wedding in turn can beboken down into smaller component activities.Nuclear relatons and activity sequencesEarlier we showed how nuclear relations can inform an analysis of taxonomicrelations in an entity focused text. Here we combine analysis of activity sequenceswith nuclear relations, together with taxonomic relations between processes.Nuclear relations can showus the roles of people and things in activity sequences;taxonomic relations show how processes expect each other in an activity sequence,and how expectancy shifts from one phase to the next. Analysis ofnuclear relationsand activity sequences is illustrated here with a simple personal recount, a victim'sstatement from the Truth and Reconciliation Commission:

On arriving back at Sandton Police Station, at what they call the Security Branch, thewhole situation changed.I was^screarned at, verbally dbused,I was.slapped around,I was"punched,I was^told to shut up,sit in chair,then I was questioned.When I answered the questronsI was^told that I was lying.I was^smacked again.And this carried on to an exlent where I actLrally jumped up off the chairand started fighting back.Four,^maybe frve policemen viciously knocked nre down,arrd thcy put me back on the ch,lir


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106 Working with Dis


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108 Working with Dirourse'operations', 'consequences', consisl of slnaller phases that are generic to all stories'settings, descriptions, reactions, problems. Inscribed attitudes are included here, tobring the appraisal into the ideational picture, distinguished from ideational lexisin italics.Table 3.6 Nuclear relations and activity sequences: Helena's storynuclear central nuclear peripheral phases

in my late 'meeting'teenage years settlng

in a top securtystructu re

description

my sloryHelena

young manHelena +young mantl

I

begins

met r),/was worKlngco-partbegan relatingbeautitullv\.'lspoKe ./co-Partmarrying

as a farm girlas an eighteen-lear-olda young man in histwenties

young manllilt' was an Englishmanrl wasHelena's enviedgirlf riends

bubbly, vivacouswildly energettcsharply intelligentPoPular . . .Helena

Helena +young man

one day 'oPerations'on a 'trip' Problemyoung manllHelena *young man

sadgongco-partwon't see again... maybenever ever againtorn to peces reacton IHelena +young man

married extremely someone elsebrieflyfepetitionmarried to forgetreaction2Helena

Helenall

metco-partlearn

my first lovethrough a goodlriendfor the first timeagain 'consequellces'more than a settingyear ago

young rnantl

Helenalll

operaung. -)gornq to ask -'co partnot be punishedcan't explairr

co-cl assleelsco- classsaw

hurt and bitterwhat was left olthat beautiful, big,strong person

IDEATION: construingexperience 109overseaS

for fris crimesreactron

young man wantedco-classtt wanted to tel,co-class" didn't care notto be punislredco-clas5" only wnted to tell

only one thinqtruth

descrirtion

truth

Relations between activities are as follows. First meeting, beginning to relcte anrlmarrying are parts of a'romance'field that expect one lnother in a sequence. Inthe description phasc, each of the yotrng rnan's qualities is expecte


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1 10 working with Discounesuch lexical metaphors in Ilelena's story. For example she describes herself andherfist love as torn to pieces, comparing the pain of separation with disnrenrberment,During her husband's 'trips' something deadful was shoved down his throat,comparing the actions he s .s lb ced into with force-feeding. And as a consequencehe and his collcagues acte'J likc 'vultures', meaning that thcy treated people likeprey or carrion. Lexical metaphors


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112 Working with Discourse

Things and people as parts of activities-as-thingswhen processes are reconstrued as things, the people that participate in theprocesses are often left out, which is one reason that abstract written discoursesometimes seems to be so alien to our everyday experience of things going onarotrncl us. However participants can be included when processes are reconstruedas things, by presenting them as parts of activities-as-things as possessions:Helena got iscl- Helena's marriagevrctrms werecontpensaled

-)victims' compensation ----> compensation for victims

In the following example tl're processes of 'exposing'and'humiliating'becomethirrgs that qualify the penalty, and are themselves qualified by their participant theperPetr.ltor:

quality of process-- >quality of thngoperatrng overseasrelate beautifullyrnarry very brieflyviolate qrosslyexpose publiclylorture regularly-

overseas operattonsa beautiful relationshipan extremely short malriagea gross violationpublic exposureregular torturers

by publicly exposinq and humiliating himlinker Process 2 Mediumhe perpetrator is PenalizedMedium Process 1/'x'the penaltyThing of oublic exoosure and humiliation for the perpetratolQualifier Qualilierlcleational metaphor tends to reconslrue our experience of reality as if it consistedof relations betrveen institutional t stractions. These strategies have evolved toenable writers to generalize about social processes, and to describe, classify andevaluate them, one cost is that it ntay be hard to recover who is doing what towhorn; another is that this type 0f discourse can be very hard to read andunderstand. Unpacking ideational rnetaphors as we have shown here can help toreveal how they construe reality and is one key strategy for teaching languagelearners how they work.

IDEATION: construinq experience 1 13'f '";-j '1;::;r.1: ii:, ',: ,::. : .,.I .,:f i ,.1:,,, | ".,.'As we have illustratecl rlrroughout this chapter, things and people are tiremselvesclasses of entities. Nlost gcnerally wc have distinguisht'd between concrete enlities,such as man, girlfrientls, t'ace, honds, andglgg (,nriries, ,,,.h n, -r,,rr,7, offence,applicatiorts, r'iolation.'I'his distinction between concrete and abstract ways ofmeaning reflects a flndamental division in fields of activity in moclern cultures -between the everyday activities of fanrily ancl communiry, and the 'uncomnron-sense' fields of technical professions and social institutions such as law, medicineor education. Everyday fields are organized prinrarily by personal relationsbetween interacting speakers, while uncommonsense fields are organized as llluchby written records.we can distinguish kinds of entities in terms of more specific fiekls wirhin thcbroad categories of concrete or abstracr. To begin with there are nrany concretetypes of things that belong less in everyday activities rhan in specializedoccupations, including names for tools and nrachinery (e.g. mattock, Iuthe,gearbox). Although they are specialized, the nreaning of these terms can be learnt,like everyday things, by poinring to thcm and using rhcrn. Ry contrasr, rhemeanings of technical terms in professional occupations, such as econolnic.s,linguistics or biology (e.g. inJlation, metaftnction, gene), refer not to concreteobjects but to abstract concepts, and can only be learnt through a Lrng series ofexplanations in secondary and tertiary cducation. Although technical entities ljkegenes, atoms or galaxies can potcntially be pointed to and named thrcuihinstruments, the only way to fully understand them is by gc rin, involvecl inscientiflc explanations, typically in writing.other kinds of abstract things include thosc that are specializ-ed to socialinstitutions such as the law, many of which we find in Tutu's exposition (offence,hearing, applications, t'iolation, arnnesty). These arc examples of aclrninistrativetechnicality. A third type includes abstractions that refer to senliotic cntities -feattres of language (e.g. question, issue, Ietter, extract). semiotic entities can bereferred to in any field, but become rnore common irr written discourses, anct ofcourse proliferate in fields like linguistics. A fourlh type of abstraction narnesdimensiorrs of meaning, such as the terms for classes and parts that we discussedunder taxonomic relations above (e.g. kind, class, part, cttlour, time, manner, way,cause),we can refer to these as'generic entities'; they featrrre in all knds olfields,but specialized and technical fields tend to have their own sets of generic ternrs,such as the linguistics categories word class, structure, functon, genre and manymore.ln addition there is a third class of entities that are derived from ideational


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114 Working with Discoursemetaphor, including two general types of metaphoric entities - those derived fromprocesses (e.g. relationship, marriage, exposure, humiliution), and those derivedfrom qualities (e.g. justice, truth, integrity, biilerness, security\. Kinds of concrete,abstract and metaphoric entities are sunlmarized in Table 3.7.Table 3.7 Knds ol entitiesrruJefinite pronorns sor ttc /a r t,' no lh t | ry ibudy /a nc

concrete cvcryday rnan, gtrlfriend, face, hands, apple, house, hillspecialrzed nattock, lathe, gearboxabstract technicl tnflation, metfunctrcn, geneinstitutional offence,hearing,appl;:ations,wolation,amnestysemiotrc question, ssue, letter, extractgeneric colour, time, manner, way, knd, class, part, causemetphoric process relatonshp, marriage, exposure, humiliationquality justice, truth, integrity, bitterness, security

l,Je rle :1 The term 'instantiated' rcfcrs to instances of a semiotic systent in a text.2 We are treatirg 'applying for' here as a phrasal verb realizing an effcctivenraterial process.3 'I'he process likely to lead to a nsctrriuge ttf justice is intcrpreled as 'cause a

nriscar riage'.

2007+martin+y+rose%2c+ideation+construing+experience

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