Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 149-50):
So far we have explored figures in terms of how they categorise experience into particular types or domains, showing how this typology extends in delicacy. The next step is to specify what modes of participant interaction the semantic system of figures engenders. There are two models of participation-in-process embodied in the semantic system of English —(i) One is particularistic: it diversifies our experience of participant interaction into four domains — doing, sensing, saying and being.(ii) The other is generalised it unifies our experience of participant interaction across the different domains.The system thus strikes a balance in the construal of figures between unity and diversity — between differentiating one aspect of experience from another and generalising over the whole. These constitute distinct but complementary perspectives: see Figure 4-7.
