Fact As Participant

Halliday (1994: 272):

Agent, Beneficiary & Range As Both Participant-Like And Circumstance-Like

Halliday (1994: 167):

Ergative And Transitive Equivalents

Halliday (1994: 165, 166):

Difficulties In Identifying Circumstances: Prepositional Phrase As Participant

Halliday (1994: 159):

Participant Functions Realised By Prepositional Phrases

Halliday (1994: 158-9):

Direct vs Indirect Participants

 Halliday (1994: 150):

Process Types And Participant Rôles

Halliday (1994: 109):

Typical Clause Functions Of Group And Phrase Classes

Halliday (1994: 108-9):

The Frame Of Reference For Interpreting Experience

Halliday (1994: 107):

What A Natural Symbolic System Of Lexicogrammar Enables

Halliday (1994: xviii):

The Congruent As A Common Coding Of Experience

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 537):

"Congruent" is of course a contingent term. What it is saying is that, at the present moment in human history we can recognise forms of language which seem to represent a common coding of experience: this is the configuration that we referred to as "process + participant + circumstance" which is construed in grammars through some version of the trichotomy of verb, noun and the rest. If we relate this to English, it is the form of English that is learnt as a mother tongue, in which phenomena are interpreted clausally, in a kind of dynamic equilibrium of happenings and things. 

The prototypical thing is a concrete object which can be related by similarity to certain other objects, such that taken together they form a class, like engines. The prototypical happening is a change in the environment that is perceptible to the senses, or a change in the senser's own consciousness. A process is a happening involving one or two such objects, or one object and a conscious being. 

When children move from their own constructed protolanguage into the mother tongue, this provides a theory which they can use to give a plausible construction to their own individual experience.

The Significance Of The Distinction Between Direct And Indirect Participants

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 518-9):

The line between direct and indirect participants is a fuzzy one, and sometimes what seems to be the same role in the process can be construed in either way, for example pairs like:

where the winner, Hamlet, her bicycle and the farmers appear first as direct and then as indirect participants. Here the grammar is in fact using the structural resource of plus or minus preposition to construe a different kind of contrast, having to do with status in the message. 

But the distinction is significant because, as we saw above, such "circumstantial" elements tend also to function as qualifications not of the process but of some entity that is itself a participant: as well as the ice lies thinly on the water, with thinly and on the water as circumstantial elements of the clause, we have the thin ice (lying) on the water, where these have now become modifiers of ice — and then the thin layer of ice on the water. 

And since the prepositional phrase has a nominal group inside it, this opens up the possibility of further expansion, like the ice on the water in the pond by the oak trees in the corner of the wood. Thus incorporating the circumstantial element into the representation of a participant does not merely add one feature to the specification; it allows more or less indefinite scope, particularly in combination with the incorporation of an entire process. (We have already pointed out that the prepositional phrase is in fact a miniaturised clause; so the two really constitute a single resource, that of using a process to specify a particular class of entity.) This potential was crucial to the development of science and mathematics.

Participants

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 518):

The participants, on the other hand, which represent the prototype of entities persisting in time and space, are usually not subject to this kind of modification; but they are organised in fairly elaborate taxonomies. These may be construed as systematic relations among different lexical items: thus eyes, nose, mouth, chin are all different parts of face, and lamb, pork , mutton, beef are all different kinds of meat. Something of the same sort happens with verbs, but to a much lesser extent. 

The other resource for constructing taxonomies of things is the expansion of the nominal group, and here the picture is very different from that with verbs. Nouns are expanded lexically as well as grammatically, so that, while entities (like processes) are located deictically relative to the 'here-&- now', they are also (unlike processes) extensively classified and described. 

An example such as those two nice colourful picture postcards of Honolulu that Sandy sent us shows these resources at work: cards are classified as postcards rather than, say, playing cards; postcards as picture postcards not plain postcards; picture postcards are described as colourful, and also (signalling the speaker's attitude to them) as nice; they are quantified, as two, and specified deictically as those. Further than that, both a circumstantial feature (of Honolulu) and even an entire process (that Sandy sent us) can be brought in as characteristics which specify more exactly the particular cards in question.

Thus the grammar has the potential for construing a complex arrangement of classes and subclasses for any entity which participates in a process; or, on the other hand, of naming it as an individual, by using a "proper" noun instead of a common one. Proper nouns are already fully specific, and hence seldom expanded experientially (they are often expanded interpersonally!); but common nouns are almost indefinitely expandable, and it is this resource which organises our universe into its elaborate taxonomies of things.

Participant Ambivalence In Mental Processes

 Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 517):

When it comes to mental processes (and here is one of the contradictions referred to above), the grammar is uncertain whether the participant other than the Senser is doing duty as agent or not; if I'm doubtful about something, for example, I may say your story doesn't convince me, which makes your story look like an agent, or I may say I don't believe your story, which makes the role of your story very different — not exactly a goal, but like an expression of scope. Many languages display some such ambivalence about mental processes, which do not match up neatly with material processes in our experience in any obvious way.

Inherent Participants

 Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 517):

At the same time, all processes are interpreted as having something in common, in that typically there is one participant that is inherently associated with the process — without which the process could not take place at all, like birds in birds are flying. That may be the only one, in which case that participant is held accountable (even if involuntarily!) and the process is said to stop there. Alternatively, another participant may be involved; either as an external agent, like children in children are flying kites, or as a goal, like a letter in I'm writing a letter.

Favourite Configurations Of Participants

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 516-7):

With each type of process, the grammar associates one or two favourite configurations of participants. These usually vary considerably from one process type to another, in English, there is a strong link between the role of "Senser" (the one who knows, thinks &c.) in a mental process and the personal pronouns he and she, such that putting it in this role (it didn't believe me, for example) creates an anomaly — we wonder what this "it" could be?

The Ideational Function Of English Prepositional Phrases

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 513):

The classes of word may be distinguished by their internal form, or by the way they are able to enter into larger constructions (or both). Typically the most complex is the class of circumstantial elements, because these are themselves often formed as complex constructions; there may be simple words (a class of adverbs), but there may also be constructs like English prepositional phrases, the function of which is to bring in other potential participants but to bring them in indirectly, like the sea in across the sea. The theory behind this is that there are two ways in which an entity can be involved: either directly as a participant in the process, or indirectly in a circumstantial role, such as the place where the process happens. This indirect participant is often construed as participating in a kind of secondary process tangential to the main one (grammatically, a prepositional phrase is a reduced variant of a clause).

Construing Classes Of Phenomena Through Classes Of Word

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 513, 515):

The significant step that took place in human grammars in this context was, obviously, the evolution of common nouns — or rather, of common words, since verbs are also "common" in this sense: that is, words denoting classes rather than individuals. It is usually assumed that these evolved out of "proper" words, prototypically the names of individual persons; the ontogenetic evidence suggests that this is one source but not the only one, another source being rather in the interpersonal function. Be that as it may, construing processes in this way clearly depends on generalising whole classes of phenomena; the grammar sets up classes of process, of participant and of circumstance. There are various ways of doing this; one that is familiar in many languages is by means of a taxonomy of different kinds of word, as in Figure 13-1. The classes of word may be distinguished by their internal form, or by the way they are able to enter into larger constructions (or both). 

The Secondary Motif Of Grammatical Metaphor

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 268):

The "secondary motif" is that whereby a 'thing' (congruently construed as a noun functioning as Thing in a nominal group) is metaphorised on the model of some quality — qualifying, possessive or classifying. This represents a shift one step 'backwards' along the logical–experiential scale. It is thus contrary to the prevailing general tendency, since something that is congruently a participant on its own terms is now treated as existing only by virtue of some other participant.

This type of shift occurs only in syndromes, where the process is reconstrued as a participant; and as a corollary, the participants in that process become its 'qualities'. For example, Griffith's energy balance approach to strength and fracture, where the participants strength and fracture and energy balance have become 'qualities' expanding the metaphoric 'thing' approach — compare the more congruent Griffith approached strength and fracture in terms of (the concept of) energy balance.

Why Metaphoric Shift Is Towards Thing

Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 265):

Participants are realised by nominal groups, which allow more or less indefinite expansion (through the univariate structure of modification). This expansion is the grammar's way of constructing taxonomies of things: grouping them into classes, assigning properties to them, quantifying them and then uniquely identifying any individual thing, or any number, set or class of things, in relation to the 'here-&-now' of the speech event. 

The expansion involves open sets of things and qualities, realised by lexical items; but it can also capture a circumstance, realised by a prepositional phrase, or an entire figure, realised by a clause, and put it to use as a quality in describing or identifying such a thing or set of things, e.g. this unique 20-piece handprinted china dinner service with optional accessories never before offered for sale at such a bargain price.

Qualities are attached to things, and so contribute to this overall expansion. They also have possibilities of expansion of their own, by submodification (at least for intensity, but sometimes along other lines as well: very long, longest; dark blue, red hot). … 

This grammatical potential for taxonomising is complemented by the lexical potential of the nominal group for construing feature networks. So by construing any phenomenon of experience as a thing, we give it the maximum potential for semantic elaboration.