Some Problems With Paralinguistic Hyper-Theme

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 190, 191):

The Themes (underlined in (20)) in the sequence of figures explored earlier compose a method of development which is predicted by its hyper-Theme. In this instance, the good stuff generalises the ideational meanings given thematic prominence in the waves which follow – that is, glucose, vitamins, amino acids and water.

… How does paralanguage support this foregrounding? At the beginning of this phase the lecturer is positioned to the far right of the lecture theatre. This in effect sets up an empty physical space to the left – a space about to be filled with meaning. His body rocks back on time and forward on filtrate in Figure 6.6, presaging his take-off from this position into the space to the left. 

In terms of body movement, his position for the hyper-Theme thus functions quite literally as ‘point of departure’ for his message – as paralinguistic movement through space is coordinated with language unfolding through time.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, 'hyper-Theme', a term coined by Daneš  for a Theme that is later repeated, is Martin's rebranding of the 'Topic Sentence' of writing pedagogy as linguistic theory. As linguistic theory, hyper-Theme is a function without a structure: there is no 'hyper-Rheme'; that is, there is a point of departure for the message, but there is no body to the message.

[2] To be clear, the good stuff links to glucose, vitamins, amino acids and water textually through cataphoric reference and lexical cohesion. The latter constitute the identity signalled by the demonstrative the, and good stuff is related to glucose, vitamins, amino acids and water by hyponymy. It is this that does the "predicting". 

[3] To be clear, any initial position of the lecturer is a point of departure for a walk around his lecture space. It is simply his location when he begins talking. Merely occupying a space before moving off does not highlight what is being said. And what is first said need not be a "hyper-Theme". That is, no realisation relation has been established between "hyper-Theme" and body location: a body location does not specify a "hyper-Theme" and a "hyper-Theme" does not specify a body location.

[4] As previously demonstrated, the co-ordination of movement with language, in this instance, is the co-occurrence of some of the lecturer's steps with the Focus of marked New information.

Misleading Claims About The Model Of Paralinguistic Deixis

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 178-9):

The discussion of textual semovergence to this point explores the cooperation of language and paralanguage as they keep track of people, things and places in the flow of discourse. PARALINGUISTIC DEIXIS is realised through an embodied vector which directs a viewer’s gaze to either [actual] or [virtual] phenomena. … As vectors, the expressions of PARALINGUISTIC DEIXIS direct students’ gaze, and thus their attention, to particular [actual] and [virtual] phenomena.

 

Blogger Comments:

[1] This is misleading because it is untrue. As the review of this chapter has so far demonstrated, the authors have not illustrated that body language "keeps track" of 'people, things and places in the flow of discourse'. This is merely Martin's characterisation of his system of IDENTIFICATION. Interestingly, the body language data included instances of endophoric reference, which functions cohesively within body language, but the authors don't recognise the distinction between exophoric and endophoric reference in their system of PARALINGUISTIC DEIXIS.

Moreover, as has also been demonstrated, the authors' system of PARALINGUISTIC DEIXIS is not a system of DEIXIS, because it does not make distinctions by reference to the here-&-now of the gesturer.

[2] To be clear, such a gesture would not signal that an identity is recoverable, and so would not serve a reference (identification) function. However, it was demonstrated that the DEIXIS feature 'virtual' only arises from the authors' misunderstandings. For example, of the' first two instances of virtual DEIXIS, the gesture in the first was not deictic in function, and the gesture in the second was not "unresolved".

Foreshadowing Problems With 'Textual Paralanguage'

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 161):

This chapter adopts a textual perspective on embodied meaning-making. It deals with the way paralanguage cooperates with spoken language in the management of information flow – how it keeps track of entities in discourse and how it composes waves of ideational and interpersonal meaning (Martin, 1992; Martin and Rose, [2003] 2007). Two linguistic discourse semantic systems are involved: IDENTIFICATION and PERIODICITY. IDENTIFICATION has to do with the resources for introducing and tracking entities. PERIODICITY, as the term implies, has to do with resources for structuring waves of information in discourse. The discourse semantic systems are introduced in turn, together with the related paralinguistic systems that model the potential for convergence with language, those of PARALINGUISTIC DEIXIS and PARALINGUISTIC PERIODICITY.

 

Blogger Comments:

[1] For the theoretical problems with these discourse semantic systems in these two publications, see

• identification (Martin 1992)
• identification (Martin and Rose 2007)
• texture (Martin 1992)
• periodicity (Martin and Rose 2007).

[2] To be clear, Martin's discourse semantic system of IDENTIFICATION is his rebranding of the lexicogrammatical system of cohesive REFERENCE (Halliday & Hasan 1976) in which he confuses reference with deixis and ideational denotation (e.g. 'introducing entities'). It will be seen in the review of this chapter that the confusion of reference with deixis is the basis of the IDENTIFICATION (REFERENCE) system of PARALINGUISTIC DEIXIS.

[3] To be clear, Martin's discourse semantic system of PERIODICITY is his rebranding of writing pedagogy as linguistic theory, in which 'introductory paragraph' is rebranded 'macro-Theme', 'topic sentence' is rebranded 'hyper-Theme' (a misunderstanding of Daneš's term), 'paragraph summary' is rebranded 'hyper-New', and 'text summary' is rebranded 'macro-New'. it will be seen in the review of this chapter that the system proposed, PARALINGUISTIC PERIODICITY, is largely concerned with lexicogrammatical INFORMATION DISTRIBUTION, as realised through the phonological system of TONALITY. In the authors' terms, this makes the system 'sonovergent', not 'semovergent', which is contrary to their model.

Textual Semovergent Paralanguage

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 38, 233):

From a textual perspective³² we need to take into account how spoken language introduces entities and keeps track of them once there (IDENTIFICATION) and how it composes waves of information in tone groups, clauses and beyond (PERIODICITY). Semovergent paralanguage potentially supports these resources with pointing gestures and whole body movement and position.

³² Martinec (1998) interprets textual meaning as realised through cohesion, following Halliday and Hasan (1976); as introduced earlier for this monograph we follow Martin (1992) who reinterprets cohesion as discourse semantics (Martin, 2014), organised metafunctionally in Martin and Rose ([2003] 2007) as ideational resources (IDEATION, CONNEXION), interpersonal resources (NEGOTIATION, APPRAISAL) and textual resources (IDENTIFICATION, PERIODICITY).

Blogger Comments:

This is recycled almost verbatim from Martin & Zappavigna (2019). Here are the comments from the review of Martin & Zappavigna (2019): Textual Semovergent Paralanguage.

[1] To be clear, despite this claim, it will be seen that the authors provide no instances of semovergent paralanguage in this paper that either introduce entities or keep track of them.

Moreover, IDENTIFICATION is Martin's rebranding of Halliday and Hasan's (1976) grammatical cohesive systems of REFERENCE and ELLIPSIS-&-SUBSTITUTION, misunderstood, confused with ideational denotation and the interpersonal DEIXIS of nominal group structure, and relocated to discourse semantics; evidence here.

[2] To be clear, on the one hand, this confuses content (information) with expression (tone group), following Martin (1992: 384).  On the other hand, on Cléirigh's original model, any aspect of body language that highlights the focus of New information, or delineates a unit of information, functions as linguistic body language ("sonovergent" paralanguage), not epilinguistic body language ("semovergent" paralanguage).

[3] To be clear, PERIODICITY is Martin and Rose's (2003, 2007) reinterpretation of what Martin (1992: 393) models as interstratal interaction patterns as a textual systems of Martin's discourse semantic stratum.  However, Martin's model misrepresents writing pedagogy as linguistic theory, such that:

• introductory paragraph is rebranded as macro-Theme,
• topic sentence is rebranded as hyper-Theme,
• paragraph summary is rebranded as hyper-New, and
• text summary is rebranded as macro-New.

It will be seen that, unsurprisingly, the authors provide no instances of semovergent paralanguage in this paper that 'compose waves of information', let alone gestural realisations of introductory paragraphs, topic sentences, paragraph summaries or text summaries.

[4] To be clear, here Martin and his former student follow Martin (1992) in rebranding misunderstandings Halliday & Hasan's (1976) non-structural textual systems of lexicogrammar as structural discourse semantic systems across three metafunctions.

[5] To be clear, IDEATION is Martin's rebranding of Halliday and Hasan's (1976) textual system of LEXICAL COHESION, misunderstood, confused with logical relations between experiential elements of nominal group structure, also misunderstood, and relocated to discourse semantics as an experiential system; evidence here.

[6] To be clear, CONNEXION does not feature in Martin and Rose (2007), or in Martin (1992). The term 'CONNEXION' is a rebranding of Martin's CONJUNCTION by Martin's former student, Hao. CONJUNCTION is Martin's misunderstanding of Halliday and Hasan's (1976) textual lexicogrammatical system of cohesive conjunction as a logical system at the level of discourse semantics.  Moreover, it confuses non-structural textual relations with structural logical relations, and misunderstands and misapplies the expansion relations involved; evidence here.

That is to say, CONJUNCTION was the only one of Halliday and Hasan's cohesive systems that Martin neglected to rebrand as his own system, and this oversight was finally addressed by his former student.

[7] To be clear, NEGOTIATION is Martin's (1992) rebranding of Halliday's SPEECH FUNCTION.

Motion Used To Support Direction

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 33):

Motion can also be used to support direction in space or time. In Section 1.5.1 we illustrated two examples of hands sweeping right to left towards the past, concurring with the tone groups //2 bought / previously when I // (57) and // loved the / first time // (58). These contrast with left-to-right movement towards the future, concurrent with // hopefully next time I will //. This motion to the right is reinforced by a pointing gesture, which we discuss in Section 1.5.2.3 (as textual semovergence).

 Blogger Comments:

This is recycled verbatim from Martin & Zappavigna (2019). Here are the comments from the review of Martin & Zappavigna (2019): Gestural Motion "Supporting" Direction In Space Or Time.

[1] To be clear, here the authors propose a relation ('support') between the expression of one semiotic system, body language (direction of gesture movement), and the content of language ('direction in space or time').  That is, the authors are not concerned here with the content of body language itself.

[2] To be clear, here the authors interpret the direction of these two gestural motions as ideational in function, contradicting their previous (pp8-9) interpretation of it as textual in function:

In examples (2) and (3) the vlogger makes a sweeping right-to-left gesture referencing past time;

This same confusion is also found in the discourse semantic system of IDENTIFICATION (Martin 1992), where textual reference is confused with  reference in the sense of ideational denotation; evidence here.

[3] Here the authors deploy the logical fallacy known as begging the question (petitio principii), since they assume the very point that they are trying to make: that a gestural movement to the right signifies a "movement" to the future.

[4] To be clear, the claim here is that the direction of the body language gesture to the right agrees (is 'concurrent') with the meaning realised by the wording next time, which the authors interpret as 'movement toward the future'.

If next time is interpreted as a circumstantial Adjunct, then, as a circumstance of Location, it signifies 'rest' not 'motion'.  Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 317):

However, Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 612-3) list next time as an example of a conjunctive Adjunct (enhancement: spatiotemporal: complex).  On this reading, the meaning of next time is textual in metafunction, rather than ideational.

In Martin (1992), however, cohesive conjunction in the grammar is misunderstood as a logical system of discourse semantics (now termed CONNEXION).  That is, in Martin's terms, this gesture "concurs" with a logical relation between message parts in a message (here relabelled as figure and sequence, after Halliday & Matthiessen 1999).  However, the authors failed to recognise it as an instance of Martin's CONNEXION.

[5] To be clear, on the authors' model, a handshape realises an entity.  Since no entity is identified here, and the function is said to be textual rather than ideational, the conclusion must be that a pointed hand is not a handshape.

Hand Shapes

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 32):

As noted earlier, for this paralinguistic sequence hand shape and motion are combined. In other cases hand shapes occur on their own. In the following sequence our vlogger concentrates on the size of the snack she has given her children, without setting the bowl in motion:

(70) //3 then they had a / snack I

(71) //4 gave them / each a / bowl - like a heaping / bowl

(72) //3 full of / Chex Mix and an

(73) //4 applesauce / squeeze and they //

Blogger Comments:

This is recycled almost verbatim from Martin & Zappavigna (2019). Here are the comments from the review of Martin & Zappavigna (2019): Gestures Realising Elements Rather Than Figures.

[1] To be clear, epilinguistic body language (rebranded here as 'semovergent paralanguage') is potentially expressed through the whole body, not just through handshapes and their movements.

[2] To be clear, the timing of these gestures functions as linguistic body language (rebranded here as sonovergent paralanguage'), since they beat with the rhythm of the speech, the first on the salient syllable hea-, the second on the tonic bowl, the focus of New information.

[3] To be clear, this demonstrates that these gestures realise elements rather than figures, the latter being what the authors claim to be analysing. These two very rapid gestures are made while the speaker utters the two words heaping and bowl, suggesting that they realise the semantic elements Quality (sense-measurement) and Thing (non-conscious material object) in parallel with the meaning realised in the wording.

[4] To be clear, this is not a sequence.  The two figures

• then they had a snack
• I gave them each a bowl like a heaping bowl full of Chex Mix and applesauce squeeze

are not structurally (logically) related into a sequence.  Any implicit relation between them is a cohesive (textual) relation between messages.

Moreover, the [four] tone groups presented as a sequence are further misanalysed for tonality [and tonicity].  [(71) actually comprises [two] tone groups, with tonic prominence [in (72)] on Mix, highlighting [it] as a Focus of New information.

Identification: Meaning Beyond The Clause

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 16-7):

In terms of meaning beyond the clause IDENTIFICATION allows us to identify and track indefinitely long phases of discourse; the demonstrative that is used in this way in (54) to reference the ‘national night out’ activities that were soon to get underway

(54)

It is two twenty and I just got out of the shower and I just put some makeup on because it is national night out – and I put a fancy shirt on. I like never wear this. I think I have worn this one time since I got it. I’m usually in like a tank top with sports bra with these like yoga pants. So. But it is National Night Out like I said and our neighbourhood gathers together and we have like a potluck and the police come and the fire truck come and there are neighbours that I see like once a year and I wanted to look – I wanted to look presentable. Different than they normally probably see me every single day walking with the kids. I wanted to look nice.

⇑

So that’s kind of exciting.

Blogger Comments:

To be clear, meaning 'beyond the clause' is realised by lexicogrammatical cohesion. In this case, the demonstrative that makes anaphoric reference to the preceding text. This is what Halliday & Hasan (1976: 66) term 'extended reference':

Identification: Lexicogrammatical Diversification

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 16):

The key textual systems are IDENTIFICATION and PERIODICITY. IDENTIFICATION comprises resources for composing discourse with respect to introducing and then tracking entities. In terms of diversification it allows us, for example, to track entities through a range of nominal resources.

(50) Andy went and got it yesterday at the store.

(51) He said not to film it.

(52) Our neighbourhood gathers together.

(53) Amy’s husband did Q-and-As with her.

Blogger Comments:

To be clear, IDENTIFICATION is Halliday & Hasan's (1976) lexicogrammatical system of cohesive REFERENCE rebranded as Martin's discourse semantic system. However, as demonstrated in great detail here, it is a mass of confusions. For example, Martin's model

• confuses cohesive REFERENCE with the nominal group system of DETERMINATION
• confuses cohesive REFERENCE with LEXICAL COHESION
• confuses the reference item with the referent
• confuses reference in the sense of cohesion with reference in the sense of ideational denotation.

In fact, Martin's system can be interpreted as largely an 'experientialising' of Halliday & Hasan's textual system, as shown by its focus on entities and nominal groups rather than referents and reference items:

• In (50), Andy is an experiential participant ('entity'), but neither a reference item nor a referent.
• In (51), both He and it are experiential participants ('entities'), and reference items without referents.
• In (52), Our is a reference item without a referent.
• In (53), Amy's husband is an experiential participant, with neither reference item nor referent. The reference item here is her and its referent is (ambiguously) Amy's.

Appraisal: Meaning Beyond The Clause

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 16):

In terms of meaning beyond the clause APPRAISAL allows us, for example, to evaluate indefinitely long phases of discourse. The extended connexion example we used as (25) earlier does more than elaborate a proposition; it also positions viewers to bond attitudinally in a specific way around a recurring parking lot event.

(25')

Oh another thing that has been really annoying this summer is –

⇓

you know when you go to a parking lot and it’s a busy place. You get in your car and you don’t necessarily want to leave immediately. Like you might want to – I might want to have Henry test his blood sugar, give the kids snacks. Or if we were at the pool, like change or look at my phone or send a text message or whatever. It drives me crazy when a car is like sitting there following you and then they just wait for you to leave.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, for Halliday (2008: 179), ATTITUDE is a grammatical system realised by the selection of lexical items, so any meaning 'beyond the clause' is realised textually through lexical cohesion.

[2] To be clear, APPRAISAL is enacted in the unfolding of discourse, the creation of text, logogenesis.

[3] To be clear, this instance is not the elaboration of a proposition. Ideationally, it is the elaboration of a Value by a Token, where, textually, the Value is the point of departure for the Token. Interpersonally, the clause realises a single proposition, with several clauses embedded in the Complement realising several propositions.

Negotiation: Grammatical Metaphor

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 15):

In terms of grammatical metaphor NEGOTIATION allows us to realise moves directly, or metaphorically through so-called indirect speech acts:

(39)
What’s his name? (congruent interrogative clause requesting information)
- Andy. 

(40)
Tell me his name. (metaphorical imperative clause requesting information)
- Andy. 

(41)
His name is…? (metaphorical declarative clause requesting information)
- Andy.

Blogger Comments:

[1] This misunderstands grammatical metaphor. To be clear, NEGOTIATION (Halliday's SPEECH FUNCTION) does not enable ("allow") moves to be realised congruently ("directly") or metaphorically by the grammatical system of MOOD. That is, SPEECH FUNCTION is not the Agent of realisation but the Medium or Range of the realisation.

[2] To be clear, the technical term here is demand, not request. A request is typically a command: a demand for goods-&-services.

[3] To be clear, this metaphorical clause realises a demand for a service: a process of saying (tell).

[4] To be clear, this metaphorical clause deploys cohesion: the ellipsis of the Identified/New after presenting the Identifier as Theme.

Connexion: Meaning Beyond The Clause

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 14):

In terms of meaning beyond the clause CONNEXION allows us to connect indefinitely long phases of discourse to one another (viz. the long explanation of why subscribers are watching a random chatty vlog rather than a prepared video below):

(32)

Hi everybody it is August first and I’m going to do just a random chatty vlog for you guys.

⇓ (implicit cause)

I had a video for today. I filmed it and I was going to edit it. It was a type one Tuesday. I was showing all the diabetes supplies — like the extra supplies we brought on vacation but I had bent down like before I started filming and my shirt got caught in my bra so it was like sitting — it just — it’s all I could see the whole time so I was like ‘I’m not posting this video ’cause that’s all people would be looking at.’

⇑ (explicit cause)

So this is what you get today.

Blogger Comments:

To be clear, the 'cause: result' relation in this text is expressed first structurally, and so is not "meaning beyond the clause", and then cohesively, through the textual grammatical system of CONJUNCTION (Halliday & Hasan 1976), which Martin rebrands as his logical discourse semantic system of CONNEXION.

Connexion: Lexicogrammatical Diversification

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 13-4):

CONNEXION comprises resources for relating discourse semantic figures (both occurrence figures and state figures) to one another in sequences (via additive, comparative, temporal and causal relations). In terms of lexicogrammatical diversification it allows us to connect figures to one another in a variety of ways:

(26) Due to him harassing her, she left the parking lot.

(27) Because he was harassing her, she left the parking lot.

(28) He harassed her, so she left the parking lot.

(29) He harassed her. Consequently she left the parking lot.

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, the use of the ideational semantics of Halliday & Matthiessen (1999) makes the use of Martin's CONNEXION redundant, since the former subsumes the latter by relating figures in sequences.

[2] To be clear, the reason why Martin's CONNEXION is only concerned with these particular expansion relations is because that was the state of development of Halliday's model of textual cohesive conjunction in Halliday & Hasan (1976) which Martin rebranded in Martin (1992) as his own model of logical discourse semantics. There is no projection in Martin's model of logical discourse semantics because projection is not used cohesively.

[3] To be clear, in (26) the first figure is realised metaphorically as a prepositional phrase. In (27) and (28), two figures are realised congruently as clause complexes, each clause structurally related through hypotaxis (27) or parataxis (28). In (29), the two figures are realised by two clauses that are not structurally related, but instead related textually through cohesive conjunction.

The Term ‘Connexion’ And 'Grammatical Terminology In Semantics'

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 12, 232):

The key ideational discourse semantic systems are IDEATION and CONNEXION.¹⁴

¹⁴ The term ‘connexion’ is taken from Hao (2015, 2018), replacing Martin’s earlier term ‘conjunction’ in order to more clearly differentiate discourse semantic and lexicogrammatical terminology (reacting in particular to confusion invited by the use of grammatical terminology for semantic description in several SFL publications, particularly those dealing with grammatical metaphor (e.g. Halliday and Matthiessen, 1999).

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, the system of conjunction in Martin (1992) is the textual grammatical system of cohesive conjunction in his source, Halliday & Hasan (1976), confused with Halliday's logical grammatical system of clause complexing, and rebranded as his own logical discourse semantic system. Rebranding the name of the system merely completes the rebranding process.

[2] To be clear, this is merely a pretext for Martin's rebranding of the original work of Halliday and Hasan. On the one hand, grammatical terms abound in Martin's model of discourse semantics, so this cannot be the reason for renaming the system. Moreover, it will be seen that the authors nevertheless adopt the ideational semantics of Halliday & Matthiessen (1999), in preference to Martin's experiential discourse semantic system of IDEATION, putting the lie to the claim that it is discourse semantics.

To be clear, the grammatical terminology used in modelling grammatical metaphor include 'process', 'participant' and 'circumstance', which are the functions of the grammatical forms verbal group, nominal group, and prepositional phrase. A functional grammar interprets grammatical form in terms of its function, which is to realise meaning. In grammatical metaphor, the meaning of a grammatical form is incongruent with the meaning being realised, creating two levels of meaning on the semantic stratum. It is the use of meaning terminology on both strata that enables the systematic description of grammatical metaphor. And again, as Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 237) point out:

Of course, what we are recognising here as two distinct constructions, the semantic and the grammatical, never had or could have had any existence the one prior to the other; they are our analytic representation of the overall semioticising of experience — how experience is construed into meaning. If the congruent form had been the only form of construal, we would probably not have needed to think of semantics and grammar as two separate strata: they would be merely two facets of the content plane, interpreted on the one hand as function and on the other as form.

Discourse Semantics, Meaning Beyond the Clause, And Convergence

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 11-2):

We will briefly introduce six discourse semantic systems here, organised by metafunction as per Table 1.2.

For a detailed presentation of these systems, see Martin (1992), Martin and White (2005) and Martin and Rose ([2003] 2007); useful introductory overviews include Butler (2003), Martin (2009, 2014, 2015a, 2019) and Tann (2017). For each system we will note the diversification of grammatical systems realising discourse semantic ones, including where relevant what we will refer to as metaphorical realisations; and we will exemplify what we mean by co-textual relations between units of discourse that are not grammatically related to one another (i.e. meaning beyond the clause). As will be introduced later, in our model paralanguage converges with discourse semantic systems in language, not lexicogrammatical ones — IDEATION, APPRAISAL, IDENTIFICATION and PERIODICITY in particular.

Blogger Comments:

[1] For a detailed review of Martin (1992), see English Text: System And Structure. For a detailed review of Martin and Rose (2007), see Working With Discourse: Meaning Beyond The Clause.

[2] This misunderstands "cotextual relations". To be clear, what Martin means by 'meaning beyond the clause' is modelled in SFL Theory as lexicogrammatical cohesion (Halliday & Hasan 1976). It involves relations that are lexicogrammatical, but are not structural. In Martin (1992), these systems of cohesion are rebranded as Martin's systems of discourse semantics.

[3] Here yet again, the authors remind the reader that Cléirigh's model of body language is their model of paralanguage.  The plagiarism in this work is effected through myriad small steps.

[4] To be clear, this flatly contradicts the authors' definition of sonovergent paralanguage as 'phonologically convergent' (p22). Moreover, sonovergent paralanguage is neither sonovergent nor paralanguage. Sonovergent paralanguage is the authors' rebranding of Cléirigh's linguistic body language, in which gestures serve the same function as prosodic phonology. That is, sonovergent paralanguage is language, not paralanguage, and it is divergent from phonology and convergent with the lexicogrammar that prosodic phonology realises, not with discourse semantic systems.

Meaning Beyond The Clause And Sonovergent Paralanguage

Ngo, Hood, Martin, Painter, Smith & Zappavigna (2022: 11):

The second major advantage of stratifying the content plane has to do with meaning beyond the clause. This allows SFL to move beyond a lexicogrammatical conception of text as a bag of clauses and set up systems and structures dealing with cohesive relations of indefinite extent (Martin, 2015b). These discourse semantic systems will be introduced in Section 2.2. They are crucial to our work on paralanguage since in our model it is these systems rather than lexicogrammatical ones that converge with paralanguage in spoken discourse.

Blogger Comments:

[1] This is seriously misleading, especially to the intended readership of this section: those unfamiliar with SFL Theory. Firstly, "text as a bag of clauses" is not a "lexicogrammatical conception" of SFL Theory; it is merely Martin's longstanding misunderstanding. In SFL Theory, text is a semantic unit, and semantics is realised by — not composed of — lexicogrammar, both by its systems that are realised by structures, and systems of the textual metafunction that are realised by cohesive relations. Moreover, cohesive relations, in themselves, do not warrant the stratification of the content plane. As Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 237) point out:

Of course, what we are recognising here as two distinct constructions, the semantic and the grammatical, never had or could have had any existence the one prior to the other; they are our analytic representation of the overall semioticising of experience — how experience is construed into meaning. If the congruent form had been the only form of construal, we would probably not have needed to think of semantics and grammar as two separate strata: they would be merely two facets of the content plane, interpreted on the one hand as function and on the other as form.

Secondly, the discourse semantic systems that Martin (1992) set up to deal with cohesive relations are merely the systems in Cohesion In English (Halliday & Hasan 1976) rebranded as Martin's systems of IDENTIFICATION (cohesive reference and ellipsis), CONJUNCTION, now CONNEXION (cohesive conjunction) and IDEATION (lexical cohesion).

[2] Here again, the authors remind the reader that Cléirigh's model of body language is their model of paralanguage. The plagiarism in this work is effected through myriad small steps.

[3] To be clear, this flatly contradicts the authors' definition of sonovergent paralanguage as 'phonologically convergent' (p22). Moreover, sonovergent paralanguage is neither sonovergent nor paralanguage. Sonovergent paralanguage is the authors' rebranding of Cléirigh's linguistic body language, in which gestures serve the same function as prosodic phonology. That is, sonovergent paralanguage is language, not paralanguage, and it is divergent from phonology and convergent with the lexicogrammar that prosodic phonology realises.

To be absolutely clear, one of the authors' two types of paralanguage is not paralanguage — because it is language. This alone invalidates the authors' model of paralanguage.