Using the alias 'Dmytro Poremskyi', Robin Fawcett wrote to sys-func on 23 Sept 2021, at 05:13 and on 25 Sept 2021, at 02:42:I'm curious to know your (functionally grounded) opinion regarding the following usage recommendation:
(taken from Oxford American Wordpower Dictionary for Learners of English)It is obvious that one may find quite a few instances of 'forget' + location: place across oral and written corpora, but do you think SFG could shed some light upon the reason behind the (prescriptive?) preference here? I wonder if it can be somehow linked to process type analysis, perhaps involving the comparison with 'leave' ...
… However, quite a few native speakers of different varieties of English would maintain that it is perfectly normal to forget something somewhere:
Do you think SFL can account for this seeming deviation?
Blogger Comments:
To be clear, Fawcett's first extract distinguishes four usages of 'forget':
- forget about something
- fail to remember to do something
- fail to bring something with you
- stop thinking about something
and the claim that a Location cannot be construed with 'forget' applies only to the third usage.
In Fawcett's second extract, on the other hand, the writer mistakenly assumes that the claim applies to all usages of 'forget'. Of course, other usages of 'forget' can be construed with a Location, as exemplified by:
However, in the third usage, above, 'forget' serves the same function as the verbal group complex 'forget to bring', and so serves as a material Process:
The reason why at home cannot be added in this usage of 'forget' is that such a 'rest' Location (Halliday & Matthiessen 2014: 317) is inconsistent with the directed motion of 'bring'. Cf He is bringing his passport at home. However, when directional 'bring' is made explicit, with or without 'forget', directional Locations can be construed:
In Fawcett's Systemic Functional Syntax, the Cardiff Grammar, there is no verbal group, and so, no verbal group complex. This is one reason why Fawcett is unable to answer his own question.
