Mick O'Donnell On Projection And Clause Complexing

On 17/10/13, Mick O'Donnell wrote to the sys-func and sysfling lists:

Truing [sic] to get my head around Halliday's treatment of projection as clause complexing:

a) Many believe that John is right.

b) That John is right is believed by many.

If (a) Is a clause complex, how do I analyse (b) which seems to be the passive form of the same?

Blogger Comment:

(a) is not a clause complex.  It is a clause simplex with an embedded projection (i.e. a 'pre-projected fact') serving as Phenomenon, and (b) is its receptive agnate.

Reasoning:

From 'roundabout': (a) is agnate with Many believe the fact that John is right

From 'above': the projection was not created by the process of believing.  It was projected by a previous figure of a senser sensing or sayer saying (i.e. 'pre-projected'), and the process of believing ranges over it as a metaphenomenon.

See a transitivity analysis here.

See why (ranking) projections are not clause constituents here.