The Stratification Of Language

Halliday (1994: 15):

Systemic Theory: Meaning As Choice

Halliday (1994: xiv-xv):

IFG Is A Short Introduction Because Language Is Inexhaustible

Halliday (1994: xiii):

Folk And Scientific Models As Co-existing Varieties

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 573-4):

As we also noted above, we can interpret folk models and scientific ones as co-existing varieties of the same basic system within the ideation base. In the first instance, we will, of course, be aware of them as differing in particular domains — e.g. as operating with different lexical semantic organisations; but they also tend to construe experience differently in general terms — scientific models tend to rely on grammatical metaphor and thus embody a metaphorical construal of experience: see Figure 14-3.

Fig. 14-3: Folk and scientific models within the ideation base

Realisation vs Instantiation vs Delicacy

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 327):

It is important perhaps to make quite explicit the distinction among the three concepts of realisation, instantiation, and delicacy, since each of these is a distinct scale of abstraction. It is easiest to describe them in terms of metalanguage dynamics: what we are doing when we move along these different scales. 

(1) Realisation is the relation of one stratum to other strata (in any stratified system, with language as prototypical); when we shift attention from semantics 'upwards' into context or 'downwards' to lexicogrammar and phonology/ graphology, we are moving in realisation. We can do this at any degree of delicacy, from most general to most specific; and we can do it at any point along the instantiation scale, from system to text.  

(2) Instantiation is the relation between the system and the instance. When we shift attention along this scale, we are moving between the potential that is embodied in any stratum and the deployment of that potential in instances on the same stratum. Again, this move can be made at any degree of delicacy.  

(3) Delicacy is the relation between the most general features and the most specific. When we shift attention from, say, 'recreation' to 'hockey' at the level (stratum) of context, or from 'syllable' to long open nasal syllable' to /pã:/ in phonology, we are moving in delicacy. Again, we can do this at any point along the instantiation scale.

One Universal Property Of Language

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 299):

… one property of language which is universal is the stratal organisation of the content plane into semantics and lexicogrammar, with the lexicogrammatical stratum forming a continuum: at one pole are the most "grammatical" features, closed systems of just two or three terms, mutually defining along a single dimension and with very general meanings and contexts of use; at the other pole are the most lexical features, open sets of an indefinite number of items, taxonomically arranged along various dimensions and with highly specific meanings and contexts of use.

Lexical Metaphors Have Grammatical Implications

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 234):

As Whorf s examples illustrate, lexical metaphors have grammatical implications: they occur at a lexical degree of delicacy in the overall system, but precisely because grammar and lexis form a continuum related by delicacy, lexical domains are in fact more delicate elaborations of grammatical ones. 

So for example, if understanding is construed metaphorically as grasping, it follows that a high degree of understanding can be also construed according to the same material model: understand very well ==> grasp firmly, as in she grasped the principles firmly. 

Similarly, if intensity is construed metaphorically in terms of location or movement in abstract space, this lexical reconstrual also has grammatical consequences, e.g. in terms of circumstantial elements within metaphorical figures: prices fell sharply, prices rose to a new high, costs hit the ceiling, and so on.

Lexical And Grammatical Metaphor Differ in Delicacy

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 233):

Lexical and grammatical metaphor are not two different phenomena; they are both aspects of the same general metaphorical strategy by which we expand our semantic resources for construing experience. The main distinction between them is one of delicacy. Grammatical metaphor involves the reconstrual of one domain in terms of another domain, where both are of a very general kind; for example:

Lexical metaphor also involves the reconstrual of one domain in terms of another domain; but these domains are more delicate in the overall semantic system. For example:

 

The Principle Of Lexis As Most Delicate Grammar

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 198-9):

This resource, the construal of systematically related lexico-semantic sets, illustrates well the principle of "lexis as most delicate grammar" (Halliday, 1961; Hasan, 1987; Matthiessen, 1991b; Cross, 1993). We have discussed above the principle that categories in the experiential grammar are ordered in delicacy, so that starting from the very general types of process that are construed into figures, we can differentiate both processes and participants into finer and finer subcategories, until we reach the degree of differentiation that is associated with the choice of words (lexical items). Note that it is not (usually) the lexical items themselves that figure as terms of the systems in the network. Rather, the systems are systems of features, and the lexical items come in as the synthetic realisation of particular feature combinations. Thus lexis (vocabulary) is part of a unified lexicogrammar; there is no need to postulate a separate "lexicon" as a pre-existing entity on which the grammar is made to operate.

Elaborating & Extending Figures As Alternative Modes Of Construal

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 146):

Elaboration and extension are agnate, one with the other; they offer alternative modes of construal, often with very little apparent difference. Thus we may find both

(1)Elaborating 'Man' is +male, + adult & + human ;

'Man' is a male, adult & human being

(2)Extending 'Man' consists of +male, + adult & + human :

'Man' has the features +male, +adult & +human

But if we technicalise these alternatives, they do constitute significantly different approaches to the interpretation of meaning. In this book and elsewhere in systemic-functional work, elaborating interpretations tend to be taken further than in many other approaches: this means emphasising realisation, delicacy, and identities across metafunctions to supplement the traditional emphasis on constituency and composition.

Elaborating Figures: Use

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 145):

Elaborating figures can thus be used to construe hyponymic taxonomies. In other words, they are, among other things, a theory of the systemic organisation of the meaning potential itself; and, by virtue of this fact, they can be used to elaborate it further. For example:

The fuels of the body are carbohydrates, fats and proteins. These are taken In the diet. They are found mainly In cereal grains, vegetable oils, meat, fish and dairy products. Carbohydrates are the principal source of energy in most diets. […] Fats make up the second largest source of energy in most diets. […]

Elaborating Figures Of Being & Having: Delicacy, Realisation And Instantiation

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 144-5):

One participant elaborates another one along the dimensions of delicacy, realisation, or instantiation. In other words, the elaboration sets up a relationship either of generality (delicacy), of abstraction (realisation), or of token to type (instantiation): see Table 4(4). There is another variable whereby elaboration involves either identity or membership along the dimension in question.

Sequences: Expansion Relations Between Figures

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 117):

Expansion is a highly generalised type of relation, whereby one figure is joined logico-semantically to another figure by a relator to form a sequence of the same order of reality. It will be easier to characterise expansion at the next step in delicacy, in terms of its immediate subtypes: elaborate (reiterate), extend (add), and enhance (qualify):

(i) elaboration is a (partial) identity relation between figures: one is identified with another with a difference in perspective (it matters a lot; it plays an important role) or one is included under another as an example (it plays an important role; e.g., it provides the infrastructure). These are clearly related to one another: identity is the limiting case of inclusion and inclusion is partial identity.

(ii) extension is an additive relation between figures: a sequence is made bigger by the addition of another figure. This may involve pure addition ('and': he is too young and he doesn't speak the language) or addition with an adversative feature ('and yet': he speaks the language but he is too young ). As a variant of addition, we also have alternation (he is too young or else he is just immature).

(iii) enhancement is a circumstantial or qualifying relation between figures: it is, in a sense, extension plus a circumstantial feature — 'and' + time ('and then', 'and at the same time', etc.), 'and' + manner ('and in the same way', 'and likewise'), 'and' + cause ('and therefore', etc.), etc.: it is autumn, so the leaves are turning brown.

Delicacy Of Categorisation (Hyponymy) vs Delicacy Of Focus (Meronymy)

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 92):

While the choice of 'level' in hyponymic elaboration is the choice in delicacy of categorisation, the choice of level in a meronymic taxonomy is the choice in delicacy of focus. The focus is typically on the whole (i.e., the most inclusive region within the meronymy) even if a specific part is particularly important (cf. Langacker, 1984).

Degrees Of Delicacy In The Lexical Zone

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 89, 90):

Within the lexical zone, we have already referred to the differentiation according to the degrees in delicacy; in particular, the 'basic' degree of delicacy stood out as most highly elaborated. There are also grammatical reactances indicating the taxonomic differentiation between the "basic" degree of delicacy and lower degrees of delicacy, at least in cases where the taxonomic relationship is of a particular kind. For example, the less delicate category may be construed by a mass noun whereas the more delicate, basic degree categories may be construed as count nouns: see Table 2(8).

Wierzbicka (1985: 321-2) identifies this phenomenon and shows that it is not arbitrary. Her explanation is in fact that the relationship between e.g. 'furniture' and 'chair, table' as super-category and subcategory is not the normal 'kind of relationship between e.g. 'bird' and 'swallow, magpie', but rather a grouping of different kinds according to similarity in use:

Thus, supercategones such as bird or tree are 'taxonomic', i.e. they belong to hierarchies of kinds (where each 'kind' is identified on the basis of similarity between its members); supercategories such as crockery, cutlery or kitchenware are not taxonomic — they include things of different kinds, grouped on the basis of contiguity and/ or similarity of function, not on the basis of similarity of form.

We take delicacy to include both types of the relationship of supercategory to subcategory — both the "taxonomic" and the "non-taxonomic" ones. However, it would seem that with the relationship between 'furniture' and 'chair', 'table' &c. we are on the borderline between elaboration and extension.

The Construal Of Delicacy In Ideational Semantics

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 87, 88):

In general, then, we can say that the move in delicacy in the ideation base from 'most general' to 'most delicate' is construed lexicogrammatically as the move from 'grammar' to 'lexis': see Figure 2-15. 

This is of fundamental significance in the construal of semantic categories. The early part of the scale of delicacy is construed in the grammatical 'zone'. This zone provides the resources of grammatical schematisation for construing more delicate categories: those categories are realised lexically but construed according to the systemic parameters of the grammar. For example, the grammar of the nominal group provides a schema for construing various delicate categories of things, by classifying, describing, ordering and other such strategies.

Lexically- vs Grammatically-Construed Taxonomies

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 86):

So far, our discussion of taxonomic elaboration has focussed on those steps in delicacy that tend to be construed lexically in the lexicogrammar. But in the overall meaning base, lexically construed folk and scientific taxonomies do not start at the highest degree of generality in delicacy; they are ordered in delicacy after those systems that are construed grammatically. For example, while 'plant' is the "unique beginner" of a particular folk taxonomy, there are several steps in the construal of things that are more general than this — steps that are constructed in the grammar, in categories such as 'thing', 'conscious/ non-conscious thing', 'countable/ non-countable thing' and the like.

The Move From Folk To Scientific Taxonomies

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 85-6, 7):

The ideation base embodies not only folk taxonomies but also a range of taxonomic models such as those used by experts and by scientists. These are all variants within the overall ideational system. …

The move from folk taxonomies towards scientific ones involves both an increase in steps in delicacy and a change in the criteria used for classification. Wignell, Martin & Eggins (1990) give examples from the classification of roses and of birds of prey. … For birds of prey, they contrast a folk taxonomy with a "birdwatchers' vernacular taxonomy". We superimpose these to give a sense of the difference; see Figure 2-14. 

These examples show the difference in degree of delicacy quite clearly; an increase in delicacy reflects the move in the direction of scientific knowledge. At the same time, the criteria for categorisation also change, from overt criteria that are accessible to the naked eye to covert criteria available only through the application of scientific techniques. The change in taxonomic criteria is very clear from a review of the early taxonomic stage of science in Europe in the 16th and 17th centuries: see Slaughter (1986).

The Most Favoured Degree In Delicacy

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 84):

The most favoured 'band' in delicacy is that of the basic level: it is taxonomically most highly elaborated, it tends to be learnt first by children, and it construes categories with syndromes of usually salient functional and perceptual properties. … In addition, the "basic' degree in delicacy may have a special status in the instantiation of categories in text.In her study of lexicalisation in the pear stories, Downing (1980) found that the basic level was by far the most preferred one; these are the figures for concrete, nonhuman things (p. 106):

Such findings are interesting because they give some indication of what factors to consider in lexicalisation in text generation: a given phenomenon can, in principle, be construed at any point along the scale of delicacy. They are also interesting because they point to the relationship between the system and the instance: from the perspective of the system, we can observe that the basic degree of delicacy is most highly elaborated; from the perspective of the instance, we can observe that it is most frequent. However, we have to allow for considerable variation within a language — in particular, functional or registerial variation within the system according to the context of use, as in the variation between the spoken system of everyday life and the written system of science to which we turn next.

The Nature And Degree Of Taxonomic Elaboration

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 83, 85):

Delicacy is a uniform ordering from most general to most delicate; but along this scale, semantic systems differ both in the number of distinctions at any one degree of delicacy and in the overall delicacy that is achieved. There are specific differences associated with particular taxonomic regions. For instance, humans and higher animals are much more highly elaborated than lower animals. But there are also general differences in the nature and degree of taxonomic elaboration associated with different 'bands' in delicacy. Such general taxonomic principles are probably best known for folk-taxonomies in the domains of plants and animals, diseases, and the like (e.g., Berlin, Breedlove & Raven, 1973; Conklin, 1962; Frake, 1962; Slaughter, 1986); these fall within 'element: participant: thing' in the ideation base. The maximum steps in delicacy in a folk taxonomy are kingdom (unique beginner), life form, basic (generic) level, specific level, and varietal level. These steps are by no means always present in every particular taxonomy; and they have different characteristics, summarised in Table 2(6) (for taxonomic examples, see Leech, 1974).