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).