Misrepresenting IFG On Structure Markers

Fawcett (2010: 311, 311n):

In his reply to Matthews' paper, Halliday (1966:110-8) accepts that it is at least worth considering one idea floated by Matthews, i.e., that items such as and and or might be treated as "markers" (as he suggest punctuation might be) rather than as "constituents".¹ 

¹ In his 1988 review of IFG, Huddleston suggests (ironically, presenting the idea as a possible source of support for the 'rank scale' concept) that, Halliday may have taken up Matthews' suggestion, and that he would analyse the genitive element 's in my father's as a "structural signal rather than a constituent" (Huddleston 1988:141), and that "the same probably holds for co-ordinators such as and and or." But there is no indication in Halliday's analyses in IFG that this would be his solution to any of the four types of problem mentioned above. There he classifies both 'linkers' and 'binders' (together with 'continuatives') as types of 'adverbial', and so as 'constituents' rather than as 'structural signals' (p. 214). The problem of how best to handle these four cases in a 'rank scale' grammar therefore remains unresolved.

Blogger Comments:

[1] This is potentially misleading. What Halliday (2002 [1966]: 125) actually wrote was:

Given an adequate representation of the underlying grammar, there is no need to insist that every element should be assigned constituent status at all; it is quite usual not to recognise intonation features as constituents, and the same considerations could apply, as Matthews points out, provided limitations were stated, to markers such as and and or. I do not know how to specify in a general formation the conditions under which accountability in constituent terms would not be required. But this problem is no more difficult for a rank grammar, which has at least the concept of total accountability to refer to as a point of departure, than for a rank-free grammar, which has not.

[2] To be clear, in Systemic Functional Grammar, these are analysed as constituents of their respective rank units that function as structure markers. Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 425, 611):

The exception is prepositional phrases with of, which normally occur only as Postmodifier; the reason is that they are not typical prepositional phrases, because in most of its contexts of use of is functioning not as minor Process/Predicator but rather as a structure marker in the nominal group (cf. to as a structure marker in the verbal group). …

The logico-semantic relation is marked by a conjunction – either by a non-structural one that is used only in this way, i.e. only cohesively, such as for example, furthermore, consequently; or by a structural one whose prototypical function is to mark the continuing clause in a paratactic clause nexus. The former serve as conjunctive Adjuncts and are very commonly thematic; the latter are simply analysed as structure markers and are obligatorily thematic as structural Theme.

[3] See the preceding two posts.

[4] To be clear, 'adverbial' is the class of these words as formal constituents, whereas 'structure marker' is the function of these forms.

[5] This is misleading, because it is the opposite of what is true, as demonstrated above and in the preceding two posts.