Misrepresenting Expression Stratum Systems As A Semantic Stratum Network

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 95-6):

In terms of how they are construed in paralanguage, entities vary across two main dimensions – SPECIFICITY and DEPICTION, as represented in the system network in Figure 4.1. SPECIFICITY deals with how much meaning is committed in terms of shape and size, while DEPICTION addresses how the entity is visually formed.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, here the authors misrepresent systems of expression stratum features as a semantic stratum network. This confusion follows directly from their previous misunderstanding of linguistic entities that are realised by paralinguistic expressions as paralinguistic entities, thereby classifying content in terms of how it is realised on the expression plane. This is analogous to classifying these discourse semantic units as phonological entities, since this is how they are realised on the expression plane of language. Cf.:

In terms of how they are "construed" in phonology, entities vary across two main dimensions – PLACE and MANNER (of articulation).

This error invalidates the authors' network — a network being a theory of the system (Halliday). 

[2] To be clear, the relation between meaning and expression/form is realisation.

Why The Argument For Ideational Convergence (Concurrence) Is Invalid

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 94-5):

Here we draw on the concept of commitment ‘which refers to the amount of meaning instantiated as a text unfolds’ (Martin, 2011b: 255) as developed in Martinec (2008) and Martin (2010). 

Language and paralanguage can vary in terms of the amount of meaning that is specified by each semiotic mode. For instance, returning again to the example from the ‘Visit to the Dermatologist’ phase, and as noted in Chapter 1, some entities were committed in the language alone (e.g. the occurrence film in I didn’t film it) and not in the paralanguage. 

There can also be differences in how delicately meaning is committed in language and paralanguage. For example, the needle and the foot bump were more delicately committed in the paralanguage than in language, as far as qualities such as size and shape are concerned. 

So rather than separating gestures into a catalogue of types based on their purported resemblance to things in the world, the approach adopted in this chapter considers how gestures function as a resource which supports ideational meaning-making – focusing on how they concur with ideational discourse semantic selections.

Blogger Comments:

To be clear, this is the authors' argument for modelling paralanguage as convergent with ideational discourse semantics. It can be characterised as:

Premiss 1: Some meanings are made in language, but not in paralanguage.

Premiss 2: Paralanguage and language vary in the degree to which meanings are specified.

Conclusion: Paralanguage will be modelled as realising the ideational meaning of language.

There are two basic reasons why this argument is fallacious. The first is formal: the conclusion does not logically follow from the premisses, since the variation across modes is distinct from the question of whether one realises ("supports") the other. The second is informal: in the premisses and the conclusion, the authors misunderstand paralanguage as an expression-only semiotic system ('gestures'). See further below.

[1] As previously explained (here), Martin's notion of commitment is based on a fundamental misunderstanding of the system network, namely: that a speaker can choose the degree of delicacy to be instantiated during logogenesis. That is, it confuses systemic delicacy, in this case, with the degree to which a Thing (needle, bump) is expanded by Qualities (size, shape).

[2] As previously explained, it was not the needle that was gestured, but how a needle is held, and it was not simply the bump that was gestured, but the bubbling up of the bump (granuloma) after an injection.

[3] To be clear, both of these alternatives misunderstand paralanguage as an expression-only semiotic system ('gestures'), and the second preferred alternative proposes that this expression-only system realises ('supports') the ideational meanings of language.

The first rejected alternative, the only other possibility recognised by the authors, proposes that this expression-only system be categorised in terms of the material order phenomena that the gestures visually resemble.

In Cléirigh's model, the gestures of body language simply realise the meanings of body language, whether used paralinguistically or on their own.

Misunderstanding Paralanguage As An Expression-Only Semiotic System

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 94):

In our social semiotic model, rather than classifying gestures into types, we are concerned with degrees of convergence between gestures and discourse semantic entities, occurrences, qualities – that is, degrees of ideational concurrence.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, here once again, the authors remind the reader that Cléirigh's model is now their model. The plagiarism in this work is effected through myriad small steps.

[2] Again, here the authors repeat their misunderstanding of paralanguage as an expression-only semiotic system that realises ("converges with") the content of language. This misunderstanding invalidates their model, since content and expression are the basic requirement of all semiotic systems, which includes paralanguage.

Confusing Content (Entity Types) With Expression (Gestures)

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 93, 94):

All of these linguistic entity types can be realised concurrently in paralanguage as gestures. Paralinguistic entities are often realised through a flat hand suggesting the boundaries of an object (e.g. parallel hands implying the sides of a box) or through a curved hand suggesting something being held or moulded (e.g. a cupped hand implying the weight or shape of an object). We introduced three entities from the ‘Visit to the Dermatologist’ phase in Chapter 1. In this phase the paralanguage concurred with two entities in the language (needle and bump) (Table 4.2).

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, here again the authors misunderstand paralanguage as an expression-only semiotic system that realises the content of an instance of language.

[2] To be clear, here the authors have misunderstood linguistic entities that are realised by paralinguistic body language as paralinguistic entities. That is, they have classified content in terms of how it is realised on the expression plane. This is analogous to classifying these discourse semantic units as phonological entities, since this is how they are realised on the expression plane of language.

It will be seen that this basic misunderstanding of stratification, which invalidates their model, leads the authors to present a semantic system network in which all the systems and features are of the expression plane (Figure 4.1).

[3] This is misleading because it is untrue. Neither of the first two hand shapes realises the entity 'needle'. The first mimes the manner of holding a needle, and the second mimes the dermatologist's manner of injecting with a needle. Similarly, the third hand shape does not realise the entity 'bump', but the 'bubbling up' of the granuloma after the injection of the steroid.

This, again, is recycled from Martin & Zappavigna (2019). Here are the comments from its review: Misinterpreting The Data.

Misunderstanding Realisation

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 93):

Entities are the ideational discourse semantic units construing items in a field of experience. The primary types of entity are thing entities (a person, place, or object), activity entities (an activity or sequence of activities) and semiotic entities (verbiage or ideas).

In the Chatty Vlog, the ‘National Night Out’, ‘Hair Dye’, ‘Caring for Children (A)’, ‘Dermatology’ and ‘Parking Lot’ episodes tend to realise concrete thing entities from the fields of domestic/daily life and medicine (e.g. people, neighbours, kids, feet, syringe). 

By way of contrast, the ‘Social Media’ phase at the end of the vlog, where the vlogger reflects on her own social media posting practices and goals, tends to realise fewer thing entities and more semiotic entities relating to her social media text production (e.g. vlog, text message, clips, videos, comments). 

Activity entities are not common (one example being vacation in the Intro) in the vlog. Examples from other studies include entities that realise activity sequences such as method, pipette calibration, study and experiment (in scientific discourse; Hao, 2015, 2020b; Hao and Hood, 2019).

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, in the discourse semantics of Martin (1992: 326), the only experiential unit proposed is the message part, which in the lexicogrammar 'is realised congruently as a lexical item'. The discourse semantic unit, entity, presented here, on the other hand, is that of Martin's former student, Hao, which, as will be seen, involves inconsistencies deriving from misunderstandings of the ideational semantics of Halliday & Matthiessen (1999).

[2] To be clear, this seriously misunderstands the notion of realisation in SFL Theory, since it presents a episode/phase of discourse realising a discourse semantic unit, entity. These are at the same level of symbolic abstraction, whereas realisation is the relation between different levels of symbolic abstraction.

[3] Again, this seriously misunderstands the notion of realisation in SFL Theory, though in a more convoluted way. In Martin (1992) activity sequences are misunderstood as context rather than semantics (evidence here). So here the authors use 'realise' in a way that consistent with the misunderstandings in Martin (1992), since a semantic entity is a lower level of symbolic abstraction than a contextual activity sequence. 

However, this consistency with the misunderstandings in Martin (1992) is inconsistent with Martin's later work, Martin & Rose (2007: 100ff) where 'activity sequence' is relocated to the discourse semantic stratum in the experiential system of IDEATION. That is, in terms of Martin's more recent work, there is no realisation relation between entity and activity sequence because both are positioned at the same level of symbolic abstraction.

The Contradictions Of 'Different Degrees Of Concurrence'

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 93):

Each phase involves figures and entities that have different degrees of concurrence between language and paralanguage: some are realised only in language, some co-realised in language and paralanguage and some are realised only in paralanguage (see the discussion of mime in Chapter 7). We begin by exploring how entities are multimodally realised in the vlog and then move on to consider figures.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, by 'concurrence' the authors mean the realisation of the ideational meaning of language in the expression-only system of paralinguistic body language.

[2] To be clear, if ideational meaning is only realised in the expression system of language, there is no concurrence and no paralanguage.

[3] To be clear, if meanings are realised only in body language, then the meanings are not those of the text as an instance of language, so there is no concurrence, since the meanings of the text are not realised in the expression-only system of paralinguistic body language. That is, here the authors incongruously propose a realisation relation between the content potential of language and an expression instance of paralinguistic body language.

[4] To be clear, the discussion of mime in Chapter 7 is recycled from Martin & Zappavigna (2019: 22-6) and discusses the miming of protolinguistic body language. See the comments from the review of Martin & Zappavigna (2019): Mime As Paralanguage.

Foreshadowing Misunderstandings In Chapter 4

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 91, 21):

Chapter 1 provided a brief overview of the ways in which paralanguage can converge semovergently with spoken language in terms of ideational meaning. The reader is reminded that we are not envisaging a one-to-one mapping of these discourse semantic systems to paralinguistic systems but are instead interested in degrees of concurrence between these systems (see Table 1.3).

Chapter 1 described how, in terms of articulation, ideational paralanguage is mimetic – meaning that it resembles a material thing or action (i.e. ‘draws’ a material reality). This chapter provides further details on the ways in which Figures and Elements are supported by paralanguage, and presents system networks modelling this meaning potential.

Blogger Comments:

[1] As previously demonstrated, the "convergence" and "mapping" here is the realisation relation between the content of language and the expression of body language used paralinguistically. Again, this demonstrates the authors' misunderstanding paralanguage as an expression-only semiotic system.

[2] To be clear, 'concurrence', 'resonance' and 'synchronicity' are three terms for the one idea, 'convergence', and this idea is a misunderstanding of the realisation relation between the language content and paralanguage expression, deriving from authors' misunderstanding paralanguage as an expression-only semiotic system. By 'degrees of concurrence', then, the authors mean the degree to which the content of language is realised in paralinguistic expression.

[3] Cf. Cléirigh's original notes (2009) on epilinguistic body language (body epilanguage):

These are body language systems which, like pictorial systems, are made possible by the transition into language, but which are not systematically related to the lexicogrammar of language.  When used in the absence of spoken language, this type of body language is called mime, and it is mimetic in this sense.

The kinological systems are analogous to the articulatory systems of phonology, though they realise meaning rather than wording, and include gestures that involve drawing in the air — ‘where drawing and gesturing merge’ (Matthiessen 2007: 8).

[4] To be clear, 'support' here means realisation. In this chapter, the authors plan to describe how the figures and elements in the semantics of language are realised in their expression-only system of paralanguage. This will lead them to present, as Figure 4.1,  a semantic system network, paralinguistic entity, in which all the systems and features are of the expression plane.

Misrepresenting Halliday & Matthiessen's Semantics As Martin And Hao's Discourse Semantics

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 91, 92):

This chapter explores how ideational meaning is realised in paralanguage. Ideational meaning is concerned with how experience is represented: ‘what kinds of activities are undertaken, and how participants undertaking these activities are described and classified’ (Martin and Rose, [2003] 2007: 17). The linguistic systems of ideation and connexion, described in Martin (1992) and developed by Hao (2015), model ideational meaning at the level of discourse semantics as sequences of figures made up of elements of different kinds: entities (objects), occurrences (happenings/motion) and qualities (attributes/manner) (Table 4.1). As discussed in Chapter 1, we set aside connexion, since, as in filmic discourse, there is no way of making it explicit in paralanguage alone and linking relations among gestures have to be abduced (Bateman, 2007, 2014).

 

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, by this, the authors do not mean 'how the ideational meaning of paralinguistic body language is realised by its expression systems', but 'how the ideational meaning of language is realised by paralinguistic body language expression systems. As previously explained, this is because the authors misunderstand paralanguage as an expression-only semiotic system.

[2] This is very misleading indeed. The terms 'sequence', 'figure' and 'element', and their congruent realisations in lexicogrammar, derive from the ideational semantics of Halliday & Matthiessen (1999), not from the discourse semantics of Martin (1992). Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 49):

In stark contrast, Martin (1992: 325) proposes only the 'message' and message part' for his ideational discourse semantic systems:

and relates his discourse semantic logical unit to clause functions (except circumstances) and his discourse semantic experiential unit to group and phrase rank functions and clause-rank circumstances (ibid.):

Hao was Martin's PhD student and she accordingly adopted his practice of rebranding the work of others as Martin's model. In Figure 4.1, based on Hao (2015), she cherry-picks from Halliday & Matthiessen's (1999) system of elements, rebranding their 'process' as her 'occurrence', and reinterpreting subtypes of participant, 'quality' and 'thing' as least delicate types, with the latter rebranded as her 'entity'. Cf. Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 67):

Note also that Table 4.1 also confuses form (clause complex, clause) with function (participant, process, circumstance), these latter being the functions of groups and phrases.

[3] This is misleading, because it is untrue. The enhancement relation of 'before', for example, can be realised by directed gestures that use a dimension of the gesturing space as the time dimension. 

[4] This is another misunderstanding that arises because the authors misunderstand paralanguage as an expression-only semiotic system. The logical relations do not obtain between gestures on the expression plane; they obtain on the content plane, and gestures are a means of realising them on the expression plane.

Misunderstanding Phonological Systems As Interacting With The Sonovergent Systems Of Paralanguage

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 67, 68, 70):

Our main aim in this chapter is to provide a description of those phonological systems of language that interact with the sonovergent systems of paralanguage presented elsewhere in this book. …

Our approach to the functions of vocal semiotic systems, in their interactions with bodily semiotic systems, is developed from the perspective of the discourse semantics described in Martin and Rose ([2003] 2007) …

Our work takes a discourse semantic view on the semiotic functions of speech.

 

Blogger Comments:

[1] This is misleading because phonological systems do not "interact" with the sonovergent systems of paralanguage — the authors' rebranding of Cléirigh's 'linguistic' body language. This is because the sonovergent systems of paralanguage are not paralanguage, but language. They are principally the grammatical systems of INFORMATION and KEY realised by body parts other than (divergent from) the vocal tract.

[2] This is misleading, because, in this chapter, the authors' approach to the functions of vocal semiotic systems is not developed from the perspective of the discourse semantics. Moreover, in later chapters, the authors do not use the discourse semantic system of IDEATION in Martin & Rose (2003, 2007) but a version of the ideational semantics in Halliday & Matthiessen (1999). See here for a detailed review of Martin & Rose (2007).

Why The Authors' Argument Against Protolinguistic Body Language Is Invalid

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 63):

In sum, given that

there is no formal way to discriminate the proposed adult ‘protolinguistic’ body language from the semovergent category, 

no evidence that the proposed instances operate as protolinguistic signs and 

a common recognition that the meanings in question belong within the interpersonal domain, 

they are subsumed in this book within the semovergent category. Our position will be that

paralanguage, like verbal language, is organised metafunctionally and that

different metafunctional strands of both language and paralanguage can be instantiated simultaneously.

Blogger Comments:

[1] This is misleading because it is untrue. Throughout this chapter, the authors have failed to grasp the basic criteria of Cléirigh's model. Protolinguistic body language is distinguished from epilinguistic body language ("semovergent paralanguage") in not requiring the prior evolutionary or developmental emergence of language, which means that, unlike epilinguistic body language, it is also to be observed in other socio-semiotic species.

[2] This is misleading because it is untrue. The evidence that they are signs is that these gestures and postures mean something other than themselves. That is, they are signifiers of signifieds, tokens of values, expressions of content. The evidence that are protolinguistic is that they do not require the prior evolutionary or developmental emergence of language, as demonstrated by their use in other species.

[3] This is misleading because it is untrue. As previously demonstated, this "common recognition" was by colleagues using the same approach, and was the study of pictures, not body language. Because pictures are an epilinguistic semiotic system, their meaning is organised metafunctionally, not microfunctionally, and these colleagues simply interpreted the meaning of the pictures in terms of the metafunctions.

[4] As demonstrated above, this is a serious category error, since it miscategorises a semiotic system that does not require the prior emergence of language as one that does. As such, invalidates the authors' model.

[5] To be clear, this position of the authors is invalid because only epilinguistic body language ("semovergent paralanguage") is both metafunctional and paralanguage. As previously demonstrated, protolinguistic body language is not metafunctional, and linguistic body language ("sonovergent paralanguage") is not paralanguage but language.

[6] To be clear, unknown to the authors, this is simply the paralinguistic use of epilinguistic body language in Cléirigh's model.

Confusing Epilinguistic Pictures With Protolinguistic Body Language

 Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 62-3):

As we have seen, much of what is assigned to body protolanguage involves the expression of emotions. Here we meet again the challenge of discriminating somasis and semiosis. Nonetheless, in the analysis of visual depiction, Painter et al. (2013) propose VISUAL AFFECT as an interpersonal meaning system complementing that of verbal AFFECT within the linguistic domain of APPRAISAL. 

The details of the system remain unspecified by them, but Martinec (2001) provides networks of meaning options for basic emotions with realisations specified in terms of facial movements. These systems are again treated by him as belonging within the interpersonal metafunction and thus able to be put into play alongside meanings originating from within the other metafunctions. For our own work in this domain, see Chapter 5.

Blogger Comments:

[1] This is misleading, because it is untrue. As we have seen in previous posts, this false claim derives from the authors misconstruing Halliday's microfunctions of protolanguage as types of emotions. See

• The Problem With Reinterpreting Early Protolanguage As A System Of "Semioticised Affect"
• The Disadvantage Of Modelling Protolanguage From The Perspective Of Affect

In Cléirigh's model, following Halliday ((e.g. 2004 [1998]: 18), since emotions are personal states, they are restricted to the personal microfunction.

[2] This is misleading, because it is untrue. If body movements and postures mean something other than themselves, emotions, they are semiotic, not merely "somatic" (the authors' confusion of biological and social orders of complexity).

As previously explained, this challenge to the authors only arises from their taking the view 'from below' (body movements and postures) instead of the SFL view 'from above' (the meanings expressed), and this error derives from misunderstanding paralanguage as an expression-only semiotic system..

[3] As previously explained, visual depiction is an epilinguistic semiotic system — "semovergent" in the authors' terms — since it requires the prior evolution and development of language. This means that its meaning is metafunctionally organised. Painter et al simply applied the interpersonal metafunction to what is depicted in instances of an epilinguistic system. Importantly, the visual depiction of emotions is irrelevant to the issue of protolinguistic body language, since it is not concerned with the meanings that can be made by an organism of a social semiotic species in whom language has not developed. See the earlier post

• Misrepresenting Epilinguistic Pictures As Evidence Against Protolinguistic Body Language

For a more detailed consideration of the epilinguistic depiction of protolinguistic body language, see the review of Chapter 5 of this publication on interpersonal paralanguage.

[4] As previously explained, this is simply a description of paralanguage, whether protolinguistic or epilinguistic. As such, it does not serve the authors' argument against protolinguistic body language.

∞

Most importantly, just as an image of a pipe is not a pipe, an image of body language is not body language.

Misrepresenting Protolinguistic Body Language As Either Somatic Or Interpersonal

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 62-3):

What is common to most of the meanings assigned by Zappavigna and Martin (2018) to ‘protolinguistic’ microfunctions is that, if not simply somatic, they are interpersonal in nature – but not accommodated by a linguistic model that includes only SPEECH FUNCTION, MOOD and MODALITY in that metafunction.

Blogger Comments:

[1] Again, the authors (Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna) are not here arguing with themselves (Zappavigna and Martin); they are arguing to exclude protolinguistic body language from Cléirigh's model which they have claimed as their own. The plagiarism in this work is effected through myriad small steps.

[2] As previously explained, in Cléirigh's model, protolinguistic body language, by definition, excludes non-semiotic ("somatic") behaviour, and the authors' misunderstanding in this regard derives from taking the view 'from below' (body movement) instead of the view 'from above' (meaning). And, as also previously explained, in terms of orders of complexity, the authors' model of somasis confuses the biological order with the social order, and includes what Halliday (2004: 18) models as protolanguage.

[3] This is misleading, because it is untrue. As explained in the previous post, this false claim derives from the authors misrepresenting epilinguistic pictorial systems, which do include interpersonal meaning, as protolinguistic body language, which does not.

[4] To be clear, a model of an evolutionarily prior system, protolinguistic body language, is not required to "accommodate" a model of an evolutionarily later system, a linguistic model, any more than a description of therapod dinosaurs must accommodate a description of the birds that evolved from them.

Misrepesenting Epilinguistic Pictures As Evidence Against Protolinguistic Body Language

 Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 62):

If we turn now to other SFL theorists, particularly those who have considered the visual depiction of human communicative interaction, we can see some common threads. There is a general agreement about the meanings of the way the body is oriented in relation to an addressee. 

For example, Kress and van Leeuwen’s (2006) system of INVOLVEMENT within their ‘visual grammar’ explains the meaning as relative detachment or involvement of the viewer with the content of the image. The meaning is realised by horizontal angle, with an oblique angle signifying greater detachment than a front-on angle. 

Painter et al. (2013) extend this to analysis of the depicted interacting characters in picture books to propose a system of ORIENTATION with different orientations between characters (face to face, side by side, back to back) comparably realising different degrees of engagement, solidarity or detachment. 

Martinec (2001) similarly has a comparable system of ANGLE (operating alongside one of SOCIAL DISTANCE) again with similar realisations.  

In all of this work the meaning systems are placed within the interpersonal metafunction and are thus seen as available alongside textual and/or ideational paralanguage systems and all three metafunctions of language.

Blogger Comments:

[1] This is misleading, since these are not independent theorists. Painter et al, at least, theorise on the basis of Kress and van Leeuwen's work, at least.

[2] Importantly, visual depiction is an epilinguistic semiotic system — "semovergent" in the authors' terms — since it requires the prior evolution and development of language. So here the authors are using an epilinguistic system as evidence that a protolinguistic system is epilinguistic.

[3] To be clear, Kress and van Leeuwen are concerned with a human's interpretation of an image, and Painter et al are concerned with relations within an image. Both are irrelevant to the issue at hand, since neither is concerned with the body language of an organism of a social semiotic species.

[4] To be clear, because visual depiction is an epilinguistic semiotic system, its meaning is metafunctionally organised. These colleagues have simply applied the interpersonal metafunction to what is depicted in such epilinguistic systems.

[5] To be clear, this is simply a description of paralanguage, whether protolinguistic or epilinguistic. As such, it does not serve the authors' argument against protolinguistic body language.

Misrepresenting Protolinguistic Paralanguage As Evidence Against The Category [2]

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 62):

Another group of behaviours from Zappavigna and Martin’s (2018) ‘body protolanguage’ category involves relative uprightness of body posture, frontal or oblique facial and body orientation and the leaning forward or backwards of the torso in relation to the addressee. These expressive movements of the body are similarly independent from any ideational meanings with which they may combine and, similarly to facial movements, may also combine with other interpersonal strands of meaning, whether linguistic (e.g. a variety of spoken mood forms) or paralinguistic (e.g. smiling or widening the eyes). There is thus neither fusion of ideational/interpersonal meaning in relation to ‘content’ nor multimodal fusion in the form of expression. The characteristics of protolanguage as a developmental semiotic are not therefore in evidence.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, the use of the terms 'behaviours' and 'expressive/facial movements' here again betray the authors' misunderstanding of body language as an expression-only semiotic system.

[2] Again, the authors (Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna) are not here arguing with themselves (Zappavigna and Martin); they are arguing to exclude protolinguistic body language from Cléirigh's model which they have claimed as their own. The plagiarism in this work is effected through myriad small steps.

[3] To be clear, these postures and orientations also occur in other social semiotic species, such as rainbow lorikeets. When they are meaningful, they are protolinguistic on the basis that they do not require the evolutionary or developmental emergence of language.

[4] To be clear, on Cléirigh's model, these are simply examples of protolinguistic body language accompanying the ideational or interpersonal meanings of language; that is, of protolinguistic body language being used paralinguistically. 

The authors' confusion here derives from their misunderstanding that such body language expressions realise the metafunctional meanings of the linguistic instance rather than the microfunctional meanings of the protolinguistic instance. This misunderstanding, in turn, derives from the authors' notion of convergence, in which paralanguage expression is said to converge with language content. This misunderstanding, in turn, derives from the authors' misunderstanding of body language as an expression-only semiotic system — a misunderstanding that invalidates their model of paralanguage.

[5] To be clear, on the one hand, the ideational and interpersonal metafunctions are irrelevant to a characterisation of protolanguage, since they do not evolve or develop until the emergence of language. The microfunctions are predecessors of the metafunctions, not a fusion of them. On the other hand, as Halliday's previously cited data (Halliday 2004 [1975]: 36) demonstrate, multimodality is not a necessary condition of protolanguage.

[6] To be clear, the characteristics of protolanguage as a developmental semiotic are merely characteristics of protolanguage in relation to the ontogenesis of language. Protolinguistic body language is concerned with protolanguage in its own right, not as a means to a linguistic end. 

Misrepresenting Protolinguistic Paralanguage As Evidence Against The Category [1]

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 61):

To explore this, some examples of adult paralinguistic behaviour classified by Zappavigna and Martin (2018) as protolinguistic will be briefly discussed. One group comprises various facial expressions such as smiling, raising, lowering or widening the eyes, opening the mouth and the presence or absence of eye contact with the addressee, all features of ‘social communion’ that predate even protolanguage (see Figure 2.1).  

As has been discussed, during the transition phase there is evidence that facial affect can be separated from other strands of interpersonal expression (e.g. looking happy while saying oh dear) and in the adult semiotic system affective facial expressions can clearly combine freely with any ideational meaning. In these respects, such expression forms are unlike protolinguistic signs, and the issue to be resolved in a particular case is whether that instance is somatic or semiotic.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, the authors (Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna) are not here arguing with themselves (Zappavigna and Martin); they are arguing to exclude protolinguistic body language from Cléirigh's model which they have claimed as their own. The plagiarism in this work is effected through myriad small steps.

[2] To be clear, the use of the terms 'behaviour' and 'expression(s)' here betray the authors' misunderstanding of body language as an expression-only semiotic system.

[3] To be clear, this misunderstanding arises from again giving priority to the view 'from below', facial expression, instead of the view 'from above', meaning. The meanings of facial expressions cannot predate protolanguage, since protolanguage is the initial semiotic system. Before protolanguage, such facial expressions have a social function only: the selection of value in the other, not a semiotic function: the expression of symbolic value for the other.

[4] Here the authors provide evidence against their own argument. To be clear, a child looking happy while saying oh dear, and an adult combining facial expressions with language are both instances of the paralinguistic use of protolinguistic body language. They are paralinguistic because they are used alongside language, and they are protolinguistic because they are semiotic systems that do require the prior evolution and development of language.

[5] This is misleading. The difference here is only that, in these instances, the protolinguistic signs are being used paralinguistically, rather than pre-linguistically.

[6] To be clear, the issue to be resolved in a particular case is whether the instance is social (carries value) or protolinguistic (carries symbolic value). As previously explained, the authors' category of 'somatic' confuses two distinct orders of complexity: the biological and the social.

Misrepresenting The Microfunctions As Criterial Of Protolinguistic Body Language

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 61):

Nor is it possible to argue that certain forms of adult paralanguage are organised in terms of microfunctions simply because it is possible to interpret them this way. As explained earlier, there is no formal way to determine the microfunction of an infant expression – it is an interpretation from context. Therefore, given that any adult communication could be assigned to a microfunction on contextual grounds, since adult language has limitless uses, this does not in itself count as evidence for microfunctional organisation. It would therefore be more appropriate for the term ‘protolanguage’ to be used only if it can be shown that the defining characteristics of protolinguistic communication are apparent, that is, if the expression form is an irreducible multimodal complex and if the meaning is similarly an inseparable bundle of ideational and interpersonal meaning.

Blogger Comments:

[1] This is very misleading indeed, because it misrepresents the micofunctions that are used to model protolanguage as criterial of the category. To be clear, protolinguistic body language is simply body language that does not require the prior evolution or development of language, and as such, can be found in all other species with a social semiotic system. The microfunctions are not criterial in determining the category 'protolinguistic', they are merely Halliday's means of modelling paralanguage.

So here again the authors are arguing against their own misunderstanding of Cléirigh's model, instead of against Cléirigh's model itself. In terms of logical fallacies, this is an example of the

Straw man fallacy – refuting an argument different from the one actually under discussion, while not recognising or acknowledging the distinction.

[2] This is misleading, because it is untrue. For example, protolinguistic interjections like yuck! and ouch! are not expressed by "an irreducible multimodal complex". Halliday (1994: 95):

Exclamations are the limiting case of an exchange; they are verbal gestures of the speaker addressed to no one in particular, although they may, of course, call for empathy on the part of the addressee. Some of them are in fact not language but protolanguage, such as Wow!, Yuck!, Aha! and Ouch!.

Moreover, Halliday's publications provide a wealth of examples of expressions that are not multimodal. For example, Halliday (2004 [1975]: 36):

In other species, the expression may be unimodal or multimodal. For example, in rainbow lorikeets, a 'prohibitive' regulatory function, which could be glossed as 'you just try it!) is expressed as rough growl with low rising tone (tone 3), whereas a 'threatening' regulatory function, which might be glossed as 'you're asking for it!', is expressed by the arching of the back, a lowering of the face and eye ridges, a fierce glare, and multiple wing-flaps while standing on 'tippy-toes' as if the bird was about to make a flying attack. Other examples can be found here.

[3] To be clear, this characterises human protolanguage in terms of the semiotic system it will evolve and develop into, metafunctional language, instead of in its own terms as microfunctional protolanguage. In evolutionary terms, this is analogous to characterising the features of therapod dinosaurs in terms of the features of birds.

Halliday (2004 [1975]: 52) provides a summary of the development from microfunction to metafunction: