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Theme’ in English: Their Syntax, Semantics and Discourse Functions

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Theme’ in English: Their Syntax, Semantics and Discourse Functions The Many Types of ‘Theme’ in English: their Syntax, Semantics and Discourse Functions Robin P. Fawcett The Many Types of ‘Theme’ in English: their Syntax, Semantics and Discourse Functions Robin P. Fawcett Emeritus Professor of Linguistics Cardiff University This book is being worked on, intermittently, so please forgive any inconsistencies of numbering, etc. I would be very grateful if you felt able to send me your comments and suggestions for improvements, including improvements in clarity. However, plans for publishing this work in this form in the near future have been shelved, as a result of the decision to focus on three other books: Fawcett forthcoming 2009a, forthcoming 2009b and forthcoming 2010 (for which see the References). The last of these will include material from the descriptive portion of the present work. I still intend to bring this work up to book- publishing standard at some point in the near future. Meanwhile I am happy for it to be used and cited, if you wish. CHANGES TO BE MADE Networks derived from Figure 2 will be added at appropriate points throughout. The figure numbers will be changed to start anew for each chapter. Notes comparing this approach with the networks in Halliday and Matthiessen 2004 and Thompson 2004 will be added (noting Thompson’s use of our term ‘enhanced’). Other possible changes (marked by XXX) will be considered. Perhaps I shall add the ‘fact’ that the word beginning with ‘t’ that was looked up most frequently on dictionary.com in 2005 was ‘theme’! Contents Preface 1 Introduction 1.1 Three perspectives on ‘theme’ 1.2 The components of a Systemic Functional Grammar 1.3 Functional syntax: the systems for ‘theme’ viewed ‘from below’ 1.4 Discourse functions: the systems for ‘theme’ viewed ‘from above’ 1.5 The systems for ‘theme’ viewed ‘at their own level’ 1.6 Is there a unified concept of ’theme’? 1.7 The goals of this book 1.8 The role of Figure 2 in this book 2 A selective overview of the literature on ‘theme’ 2.1 The topics to be covered in this overview 2.2 The literature of ‘thematic progression’: a critical survey 2.3 The literature concerning the structures that realize ‘thematic’ meanings 2.4 The literature concerning the discourse purposes expressed in ‘thematic’ meanings and structures 2.5 The literature concerning the semantic systems for ‘thematic’ meanings 3 The many systems for SUBJECT THEME 3.1 The structure of this chapter 3.2 Criteria in assessing system networks 3.3 How many systems are there for SUBJECT THEME? 3.4 Probabilities in systems 3.5 Form and meaning 3.6 The explicit representation of meaning - i.e. semantic features 3.7 The Performer’s discourse purpose in making a Participant Role a Subject Theme 3.8 Some TRANSITIVITY system networks that do not enter the SUBJECT THEME system 4 The many systems for MARKED PARTICIPANT ROLE THEME 4.1 Form and meaning 4.2 More on probabilities on features in systems 4.3 Changing the probabilities in systems 4.4 The units that fill Marked PR Themes 4.5 The Performer’s discourse purposes in making a Participant Role a Marked PR Theme 4.6 Marked PR Themes of Location and Direction: a variant of the construction 5 The thematization of Adjuncts, Vocatives and Main Verb Extensions 5.1 Adjuncts in general 5.2 The form and meaning of a typical circumstantial Adjunct 5.3 The units that fill Adjuncts and the items that expound them 5.4 The many discourse purposes of Adjuncts 5.5 The ‘Respect’ and ‘Topic-marking’ Adjuncts 5.6 The Vocative 5.7 The Main Verb Extension 6 Multiple ‘themes’ 6.1 Halliday’s position on ‘multiple themes’ 6.2 An alternative position 6.3 The problem of the claim that there can be only one ‘experiential’ Theme 6.4 The problem of the claim that initial well and but are Themes 6.5 Summary so far 6.6 The three main sources of ‘multiple themes’ 6.7 From ‘simple Themes’ to ‘thematic structures’ 7 Existential Enhanced Theme 7.1 Form and meaning: a first account 7.2 A variant of the construction 7.3 Form and meaning: a fuller account 7.4 The Performer’s discourse purpose 8 ‘Referent as role in event’ as Subject Theme 8.1 The relationship between this construction and some others 8.2 The form and meaning of the construction: a first account 8.3 Where this construction occurs (1) systemically and (2) structurally 8.4 The problems caused by the established name for this construction 8.5 The form and meaning of the ‘referent as role in event’ construction: a fuller account 8.6 The Performer’s discourse purposes 9 Experiential Enhanced Theme 9.1 The high frequency of this construction 9.2 The problems caused by the established name for this construction 9.3 Form and meaning 9.4 The two basic types 9.5 Three combinations of an experiential enhanced theme and another type of ‘theme’ 9.6 The frequency of ellipted forms of this construction 9.7 The Performer’s discourse purposes 10 Evaluative Enhanced Theme 10.1 Introduction: its place in the system network 10.2 The problems caused by the established name for this construction 10.3 Form and meaning 10.4 An alternative functional explanation of the construction 10.5 Some problematical examples: the case of the case etc. 10.6 The combination of an evaluative experiential enhanced theme with other types of ‘theme’ 10.7 The Performer’s discourse purposes 10.8 Testing the model: variants in the form of the evaluative enhanced theme construction 10.9 Testing the model: variants in the range of ‘evaluative’ meanings in the construction 10.10 Three final possible counter-examples 10.11 Summary 11 Event-relating Enhanced Theme 11.1 Introducing the ‘event-relating’ class of Process 11.2 Form and meaning 11.3 A second type of enhanced theme construction that occurs with ‘event-relating’ Processes 11.4 The Performer’s discourse purposes 12 The four types of Enhanced Theme construction compared 13 A thematized Process and its dependent roles 13.1 Form and meaning 13.2 The Performer’s discourse purposes 14 Cases which some scholars treat as ‘theme’ but which are not 14.1 The basic principle: meaning implies choice 14.2 Elements that ALWAYS come early in the clause: Linkers and Binders 14.3 Elements that ALWAYS come early in the clause: Mood-marking elements 14.4 Elements that ALWAYS come early in the clause: ‘relating out’ expressions 14.5 A Respect Adjunct or a ‘Preposed Theme’? 14.6 Reporting Processes as ‘Marked Themes’? 14.7 Reported texts with direct quotations as ‘Marked PR Themes’? 14.8 Summary 15 Overt and covert Subject Themes 15.1 Two types of covert Subject Theme 15.2 Covertness arising from non-realization 15.3 Covertness arising from ellipsis 15.4 Summary: the importance of this concept 16 Summary: the many types of ‘theme’ Preface Let me begin with two statements, each of which is likely to appear controversial to at least some readers. The first is that the linguist who has made the greatest contribution to our understanding of the nature of language in the last century is Michael Halliday. And the second is that no one - not even Halliday! - should be expected to get everything ‘right’ in the description of a complex phenomenon such as human language at the first attempt - or even to get virtually everything right. Yet this is precisely what many people seem to believe that Halliday has achieved. Indeed, you need to believe this - or something close to it - if you are using the description of English in the second or third edition of IFG (Halliday 1994, Halliday & Matthiessen 2004) as your guide to analyzing texts. The reason is that, if you make a careful, page-by-page comparison between the 1994 edition of IFG and the 2004 edition (as I have done), you will find that the overwhelming majority of the substantive sections of description (as opposed to the examples) are, word for word and paragraph after paragraph, virtually unchanged from the 1994 edition. Moreover, the same relationship holds between the description of English given in the 1994 edition and that in the first edition, which was published over two decades ago, in 1985. So the substantive portions of the third edition are virtually unchanged from the first . One doesn’t expect a completely new grammar from a new edition of a book, of course, but one would normally expect at least SOME significant changes, including changes derived from the work of other scholars working in the same framework. 1 But this general pattern of ‘minimal change’ goes back even further. The first edition of IFG in turn reflects quite closely Halliday’s unpublished An Outlook on Modern English (e.g. as cited in Berry 1975), which was circulating informally in the early 1970s. And Outlook in turn resembles extremely closely the description of English that Halliday was presenting in his lectures in 1970 (e.g. those at University College London, which I attended when working there on my PhD). Thus most of Halliday’s current description of the lexicogrammar of English is essentially as it was in the late 1960s. What are we to infer from this? It is surely that we have here a situation that is either extremely worrying or approaching the miraculous. But which? What makes the fact that Halliday’s description of English has changed so little particularly surprising is the set of three revolutionary changes in his theory of language that he made in the 1970s.
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