David Kellogg On The Stratification Of The Content Plane

After ChRIS CLÉiRIGh clarified Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 26, 237) on sys-func on 6/6/2022 at 12:21:

What I take them to mean is that lexicogrammatical form and its function originate as one. As they say, if it weren't for grammatical metaphor, semantics and lexicogrammar could probably be modelled as function and form. The relation of function to form is one of symbolic identity: they are two perspectives on the same phenomenon, like the form and function of a chair.

On Halliday's model, a child's content plane before the move into language is very different from the semantic stratum of language. 

 

David Kellogg replied on sys-func on 6/6/22 at 13:00:

That's what I thought he meant too, Chris. But here is MAKH talking about Nigel's transition from Phase I (bistratal) language into Phase II (tristratal):

"There is, with Nigel, a discontinuity in the expression, as well as, of course, the discontinuity that arises from the introduction of a third level of coding into the system. But there is no discontinuity in the content. The social functions that have determined the protolanguage--satisfying immediate needs, controlling people's behaviour, being 'together', expressing the uniqueness of the self, exploring the world of the non-self and creating a world in the imagination — all these evolve gradually and naturally into the social contexts and situation types that we characterise as semiotic structures; and the semantic system, the meaning potential that derives from these functions, evolve likewise. The progressive approximation of the child's meanings to those of the adult through interaction with and reinforcement by older speakers, begins before these meanings are (necessarily) realised through the words and structures of the adult language, and continues without interruption. Without this continuity, the semantic system could not function effectively in the transmission of the social system from the adult to the child."

("A sociosemiotic perspective on language development", in Collected Works of MAKH Vol. 4, p. 109)

… I think his attempt (if it is his attempt rather than Christian's attempt) to use logic rather than historical materialism here doesn't work for me. The differentiation of the content plane isn't a logical operation — it's a historical one, and, seen as something that happens first between people and then is neurologically encoded within them, it is a process that is just as material as the (corresponding) differentiation of the expression plane into phonetics and phonology and subsequently into phonetics and graphology. These weren't logical operations: logic was an afterthought. As Halliday says (and as Engels said), logic is just history with the messy bits left out.

 

Blogger Comments:

[1] To be clear, the Halliday & Matthiessen quote is concerned with lexicogrammatical form and its function as two perspectives on the same phenomenon. This is theoretically distinct from the process of ontogenesis as outlined in the Halliday quote.

[2] This misrepresents Halliday's model. For Halliday, the stratifying of the content plane is both an historical process, at ontogenetic and phylogenetic timescales, and a social process ("something that happens between people").

[3] To be clear, the neurological encoding is simultaneous with the social interaction. The former takes a biological system perspective, the latter takes a social system perspective.

[4] To be clear, contrary to the implication here, Halliday stresses the importance of understanding language as physical, biological, social and semiotic. Halliday & Matthiessen (1999: 509):

It can be studied as a physical system, in acoustics and in the physical aspect of articulation (air pressure measurements and so on). It can be studied as a biological system, in the physiological aspect of articulation and in the neurophysiology of the brain. It can be studied as a social system, as the primary mode of human interaction. And of course it can be studied as a semiotic system, in the core areas of lexicogrammar, phonology and semantics. If linguistics is conceived of as a discipline — that is, as defined by its object of study (in this case, language) — then it must encompass within itself theories and methods of all four different kinds.

[5] This misrepresents Halliday's model. For Halliday, the ontogenetic stratifying of the content plane is not a "logical operation". This confuses the process of stratifying, with the relation between strata: elaborating identity.