Doubting claims about Systemic Functional Linguistics a a Critical Tool
Friday, 6 May 2016, 14:56
Visible to anyone in the world
Edited by Steve Bamlett, Saturday, 14 May 2016, 07:45
Hi
I believe,
admittedly from, a possibly less than fully informed viewpoint, that there is a
contradiction in Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) that precisely hangs around the term 'function' when it is
used as a criteria for evaluating success.
The role of
'evaluating success' of linguistic representations as a means of addressing
'real world problems' seems fixed in 'blame-culture’ and individualistic
readings of history. I also don't believe the world would be rid of 'real-
world problems' if only people balanced areas of meaning production (ideation, interpersonal
and textual) more successfully. That seems to be the problem in allowing SFL a
lead role in critical analysis.
The issue I have with the focus on evaluating
success is probably rooted in epistemological assumptions about language (and
perhaps the world in toto). Yet I can't see how we cannot be invited to do
other than apply those assumptions if using SFL as sole critical tool.
I root my objection in a very old-fashioned approach to textual study: Wimsatt,
W.K. & Beardsley, M.C. (1954) The Verbal Icon Lexington,
University of Kentucky Press (relevant extract available from: http://faculty.smu.edu/nschwart/seminar/fallacy.htm.)
These
philosophically-minded literary critics berated the judgements made about
literary works (by the New Critics) in terms of their success in realising a
specified formal function.
If we have no
'prescriptive' notion of genre then we can only judge success against the
author's 'intention' (the 'function’ they intended this communication to serve)
modified by the degree of control actually exercised over the discourse - its
spontaneity or otherwise.
Now Wimsat &
Beardsley (1954) called this the 'intentional fallacy'. They write (of poetry):
The words of a poem, as Professor Stoll
has remarked, come out of a head, not out of a hat. Yet to insist on the
designing intellect as a cause of a poem is not to grant the design or
intention as a standard by which
the critic is to judge the worth of the poet's performance.
If
we substitute 'text' for 'poem' here, I think the argument of SFL feels to me
(at least in the version asked for in TMA04) is equally implicated in the
potential strength of their objection to the 'intentional fallacy'.
Examples
in Coffin et. al. (2009) often seem to me to judge function by analysing it
from the text as given and then assuming from that some notion of authorial
intention.
But
is intention available to us for any text? Even if the author themselves
expressed 'their intention', would we believe that they were privileged to
adjudge that issue alone. That would be to assert that individuals were
entirely responsible for their own action (even 'speech acts') when they were
not entirely spontaneous. This is not a view of the person I hold - as a
central directing and controlling consciousness (only apt to not know itself
when it speaks 'spontaneously).
In
fact I don't believe that the meanings of much language are really entirely in
control of their authors even under conditions of optimum control. Even then
the paradigm of what constitutes control will be determined, at least in part,
socio-culturally.
For
me this is the guiding argument for the insubstantiality of claims for seeing
SFL as a 'critical' discipline.
For
instance, I feel that the text we are analysing in Exercise 2 is capable of success in
multiple ways – many that cannot be thought be ‘owned’ or intended by the
writer (registering for instance the threshold moment in his education
represented by this exercise).
Doubting claims about Systemic Functional Linguistics a a Critical Tool
Hi
I believe, admittedly from, a possibly less than fully informed viewpoint, that there is a contradiction in Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) that precisely hangs around the term 'function' when it is used as a criteria for evaluating success.
The role of 'evaluating success' of linguistic representations as a means of addressing 'real world problems' seems fixed in 'blame-culture’ and individualistic readings of history. I also don't believe the world would be rid of 'real- world problems' if only people balanced areas of meaning production (ideation, interpersonal and textual) more successfully. That seems to be the problem in allowing SFL a lead role in critical analysis.
The issue I have with the focus on evaluating success is probably rooted in epistemological assumptions about language (and perhaps the world in toto). Yet I can't see how we cannot be invited to do other than apply those assumptions if using SFL as sole critical tool.
I root my objection in a very old-fashioned approach to textual study: Wimsatt, W.K. & Beardsley, M.C. (1954) The Verbal Icon Lexington, University of Kentucky Press (relevant extract available from: http://faculty.smu.edu/nschwart/seminar/fallacy.htm.)
These philosophically-minded literary critics berated the judgements made about literary works (by the New Critics) in terms of their success in realising a specified formal function.
If we have no 'prescriptive' notion of genre then we can only judge success against the author's 'intention' (the 'function’ they intended this communication to serve) modified by the degree of control actually exercised over the discourse - its spontaneity or otherwise.
Now Wimsat & Beardsley (1954) called this the 'intentional fallacy'. They write (of poetry):
The words of a poem, as Professor Stoll has remarked, come out of a head, not out of a hat. Yet to insist on the designing intellect as a cause of a poem is not to grant the design or intention as a standard by which the critic is to judge the worth of the poet's performance.
If we substitute 'text' for 'poem' here, I think the argument of SFL feels to me (at least in the version asked for in TMA04) is equally implicated in the potential strength of their objection to the 'intentional fallacy'.
Examples in Coffin et. al. (2009) often seem to me to judge function by analysing it from the text as given and then assuming from that some notion of authorial intention.
But is intention available to us for any text? Even if the author themselves expressed 'their intention', would we believe that they were privileged to adjudge that issue alone. That would be to assert that individuals were entirely responsible for their own action (even 'speech acts') when they were not entirely spontaneous. This is not a view of the person I hold - as a central directing and controlling consciousness (only apt to not know itself when it speaks 'spontaneously).
In fact I don't believe that the meanings of much language are really entirely in control of their authors even under conditions of optimum control. Even then the paradigm of what constitutes control will be determined, at least in part, socio-culturally.
For me this is the guiding argument for the insubstantiality of claims for seeing SFL as a 'critical' discipline.
For instance, I feel that the text we are analysing in Exercise 2 is capable of success in multiple ways – many that cannot be thought be ‘owned’ or intended by the writer (registering for instance the threshold moment in his education represented by this exercise).
All the best
Steve