"A Second Problem Of The Representations In IFG"

Fawcett (2010: 289, 289n):

In the rest of this section we shall see how the present theory addresses a second problem of the representations in IFG. This is the problem that the 'box diagram' way of representing structure does not lend itself to showing, in the same diagram, the internal structure of a text-sentence. Indeed, it is one of the more surprising facts about IFG that it never provides us with a diagram that relates one layer of structure to another (e.g., a clause to a nominal group).⁵

⁵ This leads to a lack of clarity on a number of central issues, those that relate to the supposed 'verbal group' being discussed in Fawcett (2000 )and (forthcoming b).

 

Blogger Comments:

[1] This is misleading, because this is neither a problem, nor surprising, to anyone who understands SFL Theory, where formal constituency is modelled as a rank scale, with each unit on the rank scale as the entry condition to metafunctional systems that specify the metafunctional structures of that unit. This provides the means of representing the structures of all ranks in one diagram, if there ever were an explanatory advantage in doing so.

[2] To be clear, as the reasoned critiques on this blog have demonstrated, the lack of clarity, throughout this publication, has been in Fawcett's understanding of SFL Theory. On the other hand, the explanatory triumph of the verbal group, with regards to English, lies in the way it models tense as a recursive system that is realised by its logical structure, though of course the system of the verbal group makes other important distinctions as well. Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 410):