SCHLESINGER ALEJANDRA YAEL

DIAZ LORENA PAOLA

LANGUAGE AS SOCIAL PHENOMENON

CICLO DE LICENCIATURA EN INGLÉS

UNAM

COMISIÓN 3

CONSTRUING THE NOTION OF SELF INVOLVEMENT IN THE CONTEXT

CONSTRUING THE NOTION OF SELF INVOLVEMENT IN THE CONTEXT

Introduction:

Text analysis can be approached from a variety of different disciplinary perspectives. However, from a functional point of view, language is seen as the means by which knowledge, experience and meaning are represented. In other words, a text is a functional language (Halliday and Hasan, 1985). It has texture—the way the meaning in the text fits coherently with each other and its structure—the obligatory elements appropriate to the purpose and context.

It is understood that the Systemic Functional approach is stressed on the belief that language cannot be disassociated from meaning. In SFL analysis it is considered that function and semantics are the basis of human language and communicative activities. How a text makes meaning within the context of a particular situation can be described throughout the analysis of Field, Tenor and Mode within language. Moreover, systemic functional linguistics constitutes an approach to linguistics that allows us to explore texts as a means of building experience.

In the context of SFL text analysis, it is considered that the main function of language is to communicate meaning in a particular context. Thus, this paper aims to show the way people represent their knowledge and experience differently by making singular sets of choices in language constituents. Textual and ideational metafunctions of the chosen texts will be explored in order to illustrate the different expressions of experience and the relations of participants with the contexts. Through these two analyses of the content of the texts we will be able to distinguish the representation of the context of situation within which the processes involve the participants in certain circumstances.

In both texts, Cooke and Churchill managed to describe the scenarios surrounding them in a formidable style so as to provide the audience with a sense of the context, making people the very observers of the scene. Also, both writers were able to blend narration and description, retelling facts to their audiences and construing an intimate background of the contexts. However, the notion of self involvement with the context changes as we change texts, transforming Cook into a mere commentator keeping his involvement to a minimum. When working in a SFL-oriented analysis of texts, we shall concentrate in notion of building different levels of participation in contexts and then look at how language acts upon, and is constrained and influenced by, these particular contexts.

1

Analysis

A variety of similar and dissimilar features can be identified when analyzing the two selected texts. Firstly, the language used in both is narrative and descriptive, as both texts deal with scenery depiction. They share participants of two types; conscious and unconscious things, the scenario and the narrator respectively. See figure 1. In addition, the writers construe the idea of involvement with the context surrounding them by using similar sets of semantic choices, yet obtaining different results.

Participants Alistair Cooke’s text Winston Churchill’s textThing the Southwest The train

Conscious things “The Observer” (narrator) “The Participant” (narrator)Fig.1 Participants

An important feature to mention is Topicalisation which represents the idea of “what a text, or part of a text, is about” (Downing & Locke; 1992). Depending on the level into which they operate, topics are classified into subordinate, basic-level and superordinate topics. Superordinate topics refer to the universal proposition in a text, that is to say, the main idea of a text, or part of it. Regarding our analysis we believe that superordinate topics are: a) American Summer: to be in the Southwest in midsummer; b) A Roving Commission: getting away in a train. In the case of basic-level topic, it makes reference to the Participants which are involved or take part in the scene such as the inhabitants in the AS and the train in ARC. Finally, subordinate topics are considered to be aspects or features of the different participants involved in the scenery (p.224); for example: the gardens in Cooke’s text or the engine in Churchill’s.

Following Downing & Locke’s (2006) definition “theme is the point of departure of the message” (p. 222), therefore we can establish that thematic structure refers to how the writer organizes messages, the way information is distributed throughout the text. Theme choices in AS are mostly marked and these are realized by prepositional and adverbial structures, in other words, circumstantials of spatial and temporal location. These realizations help the reader project a representation of the physical context of situation, presenting him/her with a frame for the rest of the message. It is significant to add that there is an interactive note in the thematic choice of the pronoun “you” stressing on the actor of what the writer exposes as some kind of advice. See figure 2. Such choices of theme are seen as common in advertising genre as “they provide an economical means of packing the information around a main topic entity”. (Downing & Locke, 2006)

On the other hand, theme choices in ARC are mainly topical unmarked, which are largely realized by nominal groups highlighting the importance of the different participants rather than the surrounding context. In addition, there are various cases where the cohesive resource of ellipsis is found avoiding the repetition of a previous thematic choice, signaling the continuous progression of theme realized by ‘zero anaphora’.

2

Most of the year you would have trouble snapping pictures of the inhabitants…

Textual Theme Experiential Theme

Rheme

“ “ burrowed in among them.Elliptical Experiential Theme Rheme

Fig. 2 Theme

When looking at the texts from an experiential perspective, we focus on the way the writers encode their experience throughout the language. This enables to see how our chosen writers construe the contexts of situation by choosing different sets of events and participants. At this point we can state that processes in AS are highly realized by relational attributive processes, signaling the existence of a relationship between the Carrier and the Attribute characterizing it. There are also attributive identifying processes that comprise Identified and Idenfiers which are used to signify the equivalence of the two participants. See figure3. In the case of the Material processes found in AS, they are mostly in passive forms allowing the writer to place new information at the end of the clause as well as maintaining topic linear progression. Going along with Downing & Locke (2006), they are used to “cut out unnecessary given information” or “to maneuver important information into end position” (p. 253).

Its gardens .......................................................................................are always in flowerIt ........................................................................................................... is below sea-levelIt ........................................................................................ was 118 degrees in the shade

Fig. 3 Relational Process

Relational processes are also found in ARC, yet here they simply signal the existence of a relationship. Actually, the different actions in this text are by large realized by Material Processes, making things take the role of actors in many cases. Yet, the outstanding actor in ARC is the writer himself, represented by the pronoun “I” (in some cases elliptical). Different from AS, these particular choices of process and semantic role imply the involvement of the writer in the context of situation, not just describing the context but making him the main participant. This helps the reader creating the idea of the writer being a part of the context, experiencing it, not just being surrounded by it as in AS. See figure 4.

I crawled on top and burrowed in among them.Actor Process Circumstance

Fig. 4 Material Process

In the case of tense in ARC, while the continuous form highlights the dynamicity of the processes and the direct observation, the past tense allows us to situate the events in time. On the other hand, by the use of the present tense in AS the author makes

3

reference to processes and states which are previous and continue to exist providing the audience with a description of context more than a narration of events.

4

Conclusion:

A Systemic Functional view of language implies that the former is a resource for making meaning, thus texts are semantic units made up of forms through which this meaning is realized. In this view the meanings relate to the representation of experience (ideational), the interaction of language as social relationship (interpersonal), and the organization of language into logical and coherent texts (textual). Regarding Halliday (2000) there are several purposes for analyzing texts, though in this paper we seek to expose the way AS and ARC’s authors construe meaning throughout different resources of language organized in meaningful sets and functionally joined.

In American Summer, the writer makes use of a formidable descriptive power; he provides the reader with a perfect scene of an American place in different aspects. The audience can infer how things look like in that place as well as how people act there. However, he keeps his involvement with the context to the minimum, describing the context as being a storyteller or a commentator of the situation, as well as making readers to become observers of the whole scenario. However, in A Roving Commission, the writer exposes himself enjoying the place where he is, felling thankful to be there. Readers can infer that he is part of the context, not just surrounded by it. He presents himself as being satisfied with what he is doing, feeling safe escaping from an unpleasant place, from his enemies.

5

Corpus:

Several times I have had the misfortune to be in the Southwest in midsummer, and once I was going through the Great American dessert. A small town that lies there, in the Imperial Valley, is a marketing centre called El Centro. It is below sea-level. Its gardens are always in flower, but only because they are irrigated, for they have there about three inches of rain a year. Most of the year you would have trouble snapping pictures of the inhabitants, and in summer it would be next to impossible. For they cling like lizards to the deep shades of the arcades, that are built over the storefronts and run from the top of the first storey high across the sidewalk. El Centro is on that highway which, when it was only a path, was well christened by the early Spanish priests the Journey of Death, or the Devil’s Highway. Only a few miles to the south are beds of fossilized oyster-shells, and petrified fish left there when this bone-dry region was an ocean bed. El Centro, you will gather, is out of this world and ought to stay there. At three in the afternoon the houses and stores glowed pink with heat and the desert beyond was a white glare to bruise the eyes. It was 118 degrees in the shade. But when I asked a policeman if it would be quicker to drive to the coast by a northern route going through another inferno called Indio, he looked at me in a tender sort of alarm. “Say,’ he said, “if you want to stay comfortable, better keep out of Indio. That is one hot town.”

From American Summer by ALISTAIR COOKE

The train started slowly, but gathered speed sooner than I had expected. The flaring lights drew swiftly near. The rattle grew into a roar. The dark mass hung for a second above me. The engine driver silhouetted against his furnace glow, the black profile of the engine, the clouds of steam rushed past, Then I hurled myself on the trucks, clutched at something, missed, clutched again, missed again, grasped some sort of hand-hold, was swung off my feet—my toes bumping on the line, and with a struggle seated myself on the couplings of the fifth truck from the front of the train. It was a goods train, and the trucks were full of sacks, soft sacks covered with coal dust. I crawled on top and burrowed in among them. In five minutes I was completely buried. The sacks were warm and comfortable. Perhaps the engine driver had seen me rush up to the train and would give the alarm at the next station: on the other hand, perhaps not. Where was the train going to? Where would it be unloaded? Would it be searched? Was it on the Delagoa Bay line? What should I do in the morning? Ah, never mind that. Sufficient for the day was the luck thereof. Fresh plans for fresh contingencies. I resolved to sleep, nor can I imagine a more pleasing lullaby than the clatter of the train that carries you at twenty miles an hour away from the enemy’s capital.

From A Roving Commission by WINSTON CHURCHILL

6

Reference:

Thompson G, “Introducing Functional Grammar”, ARNOLD 1996

Halliday, M. 2004; “An introduction to Functional Grammar” London: Arlnold

Teun A. van Dijk, “Discourse Analysis: Its Development and Application”; From Journal of Communication; 1983 Volume 33:2

Halliday, M. A. K.: “El lenguaje como semiótica social. La interpretación

Social del Lenguaje y del Significado”. México, FCE, 1982

Michal Boleslav Měchura; “A Practical Guide for Functional Text Analysis”; Document last updated on Thursday, 22 September 2005

7