A second new concept in the Sydney Grammar is 'hypotaxis', which is contrasted with 'parataxis' (i.e., co-ordination in a broad sense of the term). As we saw in Section 2.6.1 of Chapter 2, 'hypotaxis' is a relationship between two units in which one is said to be 'dependent' on the other, but without being embedded in it (i.e., without filling one of its units). It is noteworthy that, while quite a number of Halliday's ideas have been adopted by other grammarians who are writing functionally-oriented descriptions of English such as Quirk and his colleagues, they have not taken over either of these ideas. And here, in the appropriate sections, I have explained why they are not used in the present theory. See Section 12.6 for a discussion of an example that in IFG would be analysed as containing 'hypotaxis' rather than embedding.
Blogger Comments:
[1] This is misleading. To be clear, the interdependency distinction between hypotaxis and parataxis is not "new" but foundational to SFL Theory ("the Sydney Grammar").
[2] To be clear, the traditional concept of 'co-ordination' corresponds to paratactic extension in SFL Theory (Halliday 1994: 230).
[3] This is misleading. To be clear, one reason why Quirk and his colleagues have not taken up Halliday's ideas is that SFL Theory is not the model they use. Here again Fawcett indulges in the logical fallacy known as the argument from authority (argumentum ad verecundiam).
[4] This is misleading, because Fawcett has merely presented his alternative model; he has not yet presented an argument for rejecting the model of SFL Theory.
[5] To be clear, in that discussion (p290), Fawcett argues that a dependent clause must be embedded simply because it cannot stand alone as a single clause. In SFL Theory, this is precisely what distinguishes it from an independent clause.
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