Ideational vs Interpersonal Manifestations Of Projection

Halliday And Matthiessen (2014: 676-8):

When the need arises in discourse to attribute information to some source, this can be done logically by means of clause nexus of projection; but it can also be done experientially by means of a circumstance of Angle. …

Projection can also be manifested interpersonally in the form of a modal Adjunct … Unlike the logical and experiential manifestations, the interpersonal manifestation does not represent the Sayer or Senser; rather it enacts the speaker’s opinion – an enactment of his or her degree of commitment to the proposition: the proposition is assessed as being projected by somebody other than the speaker. This type of assessment is known as ‘evidentiality’: the modal Adjunct is used to indicate the evidential status of the proposition. The nearest logical equivalent would be ‘people say/they say that ...’, or ‘I hear that’: evidentiality is related to ‘verbal’ clauses and ‘mental’ clauses of perception.

In Chapter 4, we called this kind of modal assessment presumption; the comment Adjunct is realised by adverbial groups with adverbs as Head such as evidently, supposedly, reportedly, allegedly; arguably; presumably and they may have cognate verbs such as report, allege, argue serving as Process in a ‘verbal’ clause or suppose, presume serving as Process in a ‘mental’ clause. …

Projection is thus manifested interpersonally as modal assessment of the presumption type; but it extends beyond presumption to cover quite a few other types of modal assessment as well.

Propositions & Proposals

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 113-4):

Information is either given or demanded; in either case it is encoded as a proposition. Similarly, goods and services are either given or demanded, but the linguistic act is a mediating one, specifying the (typically non-linguistic) action that embodies the exchange, as an offer to do or a demand that something should be done. This is a proposal for a deed, one that commits either the speaker (giving) or the addressee (demanding); together with a third type, which is a combination of these two, viz. suggestion: Let’s do the laundry.

Interpersonal Manifestations Of Projection: Modal Assessment

Halliday & Matthiessen (2004: 604-5):

Projection can also be manifested interpersonally in the form of a modal Adjunct. … Unlike the logical and experiential manifestations, the interpersonal manifestation does not represent the Sayer or Senser; rather it enacts the speaker’s opinion — an enactment of his or her degree of commitment to the proposition: the proposition is assessed as being projected by someone other than the speaker. This type of assessment is known as ‘evidentiality’: the modal Adjunct is used to indicate the evidential status of the proposition. … evidentiality is related to ‘verbal’ clauses and ‘mental’ clauses of perception.