Thursday 14 March 2024

David Kellogg Negatively Judging The Propriety And Tenacity Of ChRIS CLÉiRIGh

Here are two arguments against posting "informal logical fallacies" instead of actual linguistic (theoretical and practical) work on our list. See which you find more convincing.

a) The posting of informal logical fallacies facilitates petty one-up-manship; it's something people (overwhelmingly white men) do instead of real research, because it yields smugness and self-satisfaction without responsibility — and without results. (It is also cowardly because, as we saw with your very first example, it means you can insinuate and hint at names instead of engaging flesh-and-blood thinkers and their actual arguments!)

b) Informal logic, like formal logic, is simply one form of logic. But logic is, by its very nature, an abstraction based on millennia of historical generalisation. Logic always requires some kind of mediating system of concepts — always domain specific — before it can be applied. This is why one kind of logic obtains in arithmetic (where differences are always significant) and a different kind in statistics (where differences can be insignificant). This is why we have one kind of logic in the human sciences (where societies that look after the old, the poor, and the sick are considered more evolved) and a different kind in biology (where the survival of the infirm tends to devolution and extinction). As Vygotsky said, a "Marxist psychology" would be as sterile as a Marxist mineralogy:

(Personally, I find BOTH of them convincing; I suppose that means I am either tone-deaf or tone-unpoliced....)
Notice that ALL of the responses to my initial response to Chris's "tone policing fallacy" have been responses to a). That was the argument which included words like "one-up-manship", "smug", "self-satisfaction", "cowardly" to characterise what Chris was doing. …

Blogger Comments:


[1] An argument for posting types of informal fallacies to the sys-func list is that it may help scholars to identify fallacious arguments, and to thwart the bullies who use them. 

[2] To be clear, in presuming that either of the alternative arguments is "convincing", this is an example of the false binary fallacy:
A false dilemma, also referred to as false dichotomy or false binary, is an informal fallacy based on a premise that erroneously limits what options are available. The source of the fallacy lies not in an invalid form of inference but in a false premise. This premise has the form of a disjunctive claim: it asserts that one among a number of alternatives must be true. This disjunction is problematic because it oversimplifies the choice by excluding viable alternatives, presenting the viewer with only two absolute choices when in fact, there could be many.

[3] To be clear, these are examples of the argumentum ad hominem fallacy:

Ad hominem (Latin for 'to the person'), short for argumentum ad hominem, refers to several types of arguments, which are fallacious. Typically this term refers to a rhetorical strategy where the speaker attacks the character, motive, or some other attribute of the person making an argument rather than attacking the substance of the argument itself.

[4] This is the exact opposite of what is true, since it is not possible to identify the fallacies in an argument without engaging with the actual argument in order to determine its validity.

[5] To be clear, this mistakes different fields in which logic is applied for different types of logic. Logic is reasoning conducted or assessed according to strict principles of validity, wherever it is applied. The examples provided for the human sciences and biology are not different types of logic. The former is a value judgement of types of societies, and the latter is a self-contradictory misunderstanding of evolution which posits that survival leads to extinction.

[6] This misunderstands the fallacy of tone policing – which is arguing by

focusing on emotion behind (or resulting from) a message rather than the message itself as a discrediting tactic.

    Saturday 24 February 2024

    Yaegan Doran Falsely Accusing ChRIS CLÉiRIGh Of Impropriety

    Yaegan Doran wrote to ChRIS CLÉiRIGh on 23 Feb 2024, at 12:55:
    I understand that you disagree with David’s characterisation, and that is fine. Can I request though that when discussing it in asflanet you avoid sarcasm or ridicule such as this?

    We have had multiple people get in contact who have said they are not comfortable participating in the forum specifically because of a small set of people such as you, who at times writes in a way that people read as condescending, dismissive or ridiculing.

    I am writing this privately so as to avoid calling you out publicly, but I do request that you tone your messages down in this regard.


    Blogger Comments:

    This is not the first time Doran has attempted to bully CLÉiRIGh with a false accusation; see:

    [1] Here Doran grants CLÉiRIGh permission to disagree with Rose. But see also 

    But in this case, contrā Doran's claim, CLÉiRIGh wasn't disagreeing with Rose, and Rose wasn't presenting a characterisation. Rose had written:

    Perhaps we need to consider theories in relation to the communities that affiliate around them.

    [2] This is misleading, because it is untrue. CLÉiRIGh was not using sarcasm or ridicule; he seriously meant what he said:

    Yes, good idea. Let's consider Creation Science and Natural Selection in relation to the communities that affiliate around them. It may not tell us much about the theories, but it will tell us a lot about the communities.
    The reason CLÉiRIGh judged Rose's suggestion to consider theories in relation to the communities that affiliate around them to be a good idea is that it would bring to light what is regarded as evidence for (or against) a theory in different communities.  See also David Rose On Theories, Communities And Academic Fields.

    [3] This is misleading, because it is untrue. In the SFL email discussion lists, the proportion of subscribers who participate in theoretical discussions is typically less than 1%. Here Doran merely repeats the previous bare assertion of his community colleague Dreyfus (recorded here).

    [4] This is misleading, because it is untrue. CLÉiRIGh posts to the asflanet list only extremely rarely, and many of its subscribers would not know anything about him. 

    [5] To be clear, Doran provides no evidence that any of CLÉiRIGh's few posts were condescending, dismissive or ridiculing. Again, here is part of a post in which CLÉiRIGh helped a list member to understand a theoretical point, for which he thanked him muchly off-list:
    But my main reason for commenting is just to say how great it is to see someone reasoning grammatically. More power to you.
    Moreover, if Doran were really serious about policing the tone of posts on asflanet, he would instead target David Rose, but Doran and Rose are, in Bernstein's terms, both priests of the same prophet, Martin. For just one example of Rose's behaviour on email lists, see the post here.

    [6] To be clear, Doran is a junior academic, half CLÉiRIGh's age. His inappropriate tenor of superior social status can be explained by the Dunning–Kruger effect:
    The Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which people reach erroneous conclusions and make unfortunate choices but their incompetence robs them of the metacognitive ability to realise it. The unskilled therefore suffer from illusory superiority, rating their own ability as above average, much higher than in actuality; by contrast, the highly skilled underrate their abilities, suffering from illusory inferiority. This leads to a perverse result where less competent people will rate their own ability higher than more competent people.

    Tone policing – focusing on emotion behind (or resulting from) a message rather than the message itself as a discrediting tactic.

    Tuesday 20 February 2024

    David Rose Positively Judging The ASFLA Community via Brad Smith

    Brad, your generosity, skill and humility are the soul of this community.
    thanks




    Blogger Comments:


    Rose used to openly boast, with glee, that he could turn people into 'pussycats' by flattering them.

    Saturday 10 February 2024

    Shooshi Dreyfus Falsely Accusing ChRIS CLÉiRIGh Of Impropriety

    Shoshana Dreyfus wrote to asflanet on 9 Feb 2024, at 10:33:

    Dear Kieran and Chris,

    One of the reasons a wide range of people in the SFL community don’t post to this discussion list is because of the public chastising that seems to happen sometimes when one does post.

    Perhaps if that could be toned down, or left out entirely, then people might feel more encouraged to join the conversation.


    Blogger Comments:


    To be clear, this is pure invention on Dreyfus' part. Firstly, the number of people willing to publicly discuss matters of theory or analysis on email discussion lists is typically about 1% of the total number of subscribers, and these usually being the same very small set of people, and this does not vary with CLÉiRIGh's extremely rare participation on lists other than Sys-func.

    Secondly, of the two posts sent, the first expressed admiration for an insightful post that everyone else was ignoring, and the second provided assistance to the list members by quoting Halliday on the adverbial group. They are repeated below.

    (1)

    Colm,

    I can see where you're coming from, because, in terms of meaning, the vast cloud of gas and dust did turn into the Earth, under the influence of gravity, 4,600 million years ago, and so the relation is one of identity, from that perspective. It's just that here it is worded as a material clause (e.g. unmarked present tense) with a circumstance of Manner: means.

    But my main reason for commenting is just to say how great it is to see someone reasoning grammatically.

    More power to you.

    Sláinte,
    ChRIS

    (2)

    Dear Scholars,

    The following might be helpful to anyone who has difficulty in distinguishing nominal groups from adverbial groups.

    Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 419-22):
    The adverbial group has an adverb as Head, which may or may not be accompanied by modifying elements. … Premodifiers are grammatical items like not and rather and so; there is no lexical premodification in the adverbial group. … The items serving as Premodifiers are adverbs belonging to one of three types – polarity (not), comparison (more, less; as, so) and intensification. … Postmodification is of one type only, namely comparison.

    ChEeRS,
    ChRIS


    Tone policing – focusing on emotion behind (or resulting from) a message rather than the message itself as a discrediting tactic.

    Saturday 2 December 2023

    Ed McDonald Positively Appraising The Winners Of The Inaugural MAK Halliday Prize

    Can I add my congratulations to the authors of the winning book on paralanguage. Although I have not yet got round to reading the book itself — too much interesting stuff coming out at the moment! — I did attend the launch last year at the ACU in North Sydney, where it shared the stage with the book on science teaching co-authored by Len Unsworth and his team. As I remember remarking to my landlady afterwards, the launch itself was one of the first such events I had attended post-lockdown, and it was no fluffy PR exercise but a serious academic session, with (from memory) all of the authors of both books either present or attending via Zoom and talking about their experience in doing the research and writing it up.

    Speaking personally, I am delighted to see such products of multidisciplinary team projects getting published. Given the enormous range of relevant knowledge, it is not feasible anymore for one or two authors from the same discipline to cover it all, and it was very clear from the launch of both books how much the participants had benefited from the cross-fertilisation and collegiality that such collaborations encourage.

    My congratulations again to the co-authors of the winning book — as well as to the runners up, all of whose books look like must reads — and to the organising committee for carrying through such a worthyand frankly very cheering!project.


    Blogger Comments:

    [1] To be clear, the authors' model of "paralanguage" is Cléirigh's model of body language, rebranded as their own work. See The Inaugural MAK Halliday Prize Awarded To Cléirigh's Plagiarisers.

    [2] To be clear, what the authors talked about was the meetings they had in order to try and understand Cléirigh's very simple model.

    [3] To be clear, the model was created by one person, Cléirigh, using just one theory in one discipline, SFL.

    Monday 21 August 2023

    Robin Fawcett Negatively Judging Hostility

    One certainly cannot but agree with Lise in that this environment should not be hostile. I believe that the whole X-Bar thread (opening with your question marks) should have been taken off list right from the start (at the very least).



    Blogger Comments:

    Here Fawcett is attempting to shift blame from himself to Bateman. For Fawcett's hostility 'in this environment', see his multiple ad hominem attacks on Bateman at:

    Robin Fawcett Negatively Judging John Bateman


    Although Fawcett can conceal his name, he lacks the self-knowledge to conceal his characteristic brazen hypocrisy. See:

    Robin Fawcett Negatively Judging And Negatively Appreciating Halliday And Matthiessen (1999)

    Sunday 20 August 2023

    Lise Fontaine Negatively Judging Bateman & Robin

    I would like to kindly remind you all that this list has hundreds of people on it and exchanges like this are the main reason why people don't like to post questions to the list. These exchanges are not furthering our understanding and if you want to continue your 'display' tactics, maybe do it on your own time. This line of 'argumentation' (whatever) is not helpful to this community. It's easy to just delete messages but the silent majority will simply not feel that they can take part in the community. What is this list for??

    I think there was some discussion at an AGM not too long ago about principles of communication within our community. Can we stop and think whether our messages are inclusive, kind, clear, etc?

    I know I'm not the moderator any longer but this is really tiring.


    Blogger Comments


    With regard to Fontaine's one positive judgement, and her own behaviour in this respect, see

    Lise Fontaine Personally Attacking Her Paper's Reviewer

    Saturday 19 August 2023

    Robin Fawcett Negatively Judging John Bateman

    I guess keeping your temper in line is mission impossible for you, which probably explains why you resort to your powerful discursive strategies (LOL!), but I will try to reason with you nonetheless

    That's typical of people with anger management issuesthey are usually 'not sure' about what they do wrong, even after being told by colleagues that their tone of voice is inappropriate. By the by, that quote above is a textbook example of passive aggressiveness, but I guess you're equally 'not sure' of that. Perhaps there are anger management people in Bremen who can help. …


    Blogger Comments:

    Although Fawcett can conceal his name, he cannot conceal the tenor of his emails when challenged. Bateman, on the other hand, was unaware that his interlocutor was Fawcett, and had treated him like any other underling who challenged his self-assigned status as primary knower.

    Monday 24 April 2023

    Christian Matthiessen Positively Appreciating Lise Fontaine's Move Back To Canada

    Christian Matthiessen wrote to Lise Fontaine on Sysfling on 31 Mar 2023, at 06:57
    Well, your news is mixed — sad for Cardiff U and all of us in the European community; but the good news overwhelms this sense of loss! So warm congratulations,
    And also applause to Université de Québec à Trois-Rivières for having made such a brilliant choice! 
    This is certainly a very exciting development — for you, but also for the whole SFL community: new possibilities will open up / be opened up by you! You’ll create a new community around you — without losing the vibrant community that you have been part of in Europe. As you say "surely Québec is European right?” — You’ll certainly help build a new trans-Atlantic bridge, create new collaborative opportunities.


    Blogger Comments:

    Saturday 18 March 2023

    David Rose Positively Judging The Acknowledgement Of Sources In Martin (1992)

    … So much of this has been worked out or flagged for further work in English Text, which continually acknowledges the work of others who went before it. …






    Blogger Comments:


    For some of the evidence that flatly contradicts Rose's claim, see:
    For evidence that much of the "acknowledgement" of sources, is actually the motivated misrepresentation of sources, see the following posts at English Text: System And Structure:
    Misrepresenting Hasan's Work On Speech Function
    Misrepresenting Halliday & Hasan On Reference
    Misrepresenting Hasan And Confusing Strata And Metafunctions
    Misrepresenting Halliday & Hasan
    Misrepresenting Halliday On The Stratification Of Content
    Misrepresenting Hasan's Work On Cohesion
    Misrepresenting Hasan's Cohesive Harmony
    Presenting Misunderstandings Of Hasan's Cohesive Harmony As Deficiencies In The Model
    Misrepresenting Hasan's Work On Coherence As Formalist
    Misrepresenting Cohesive Harmony
    Misrepresenting Firth On Context
    Misrepresenting Halliday On Formal And Contextual Meaning
    Misrepresenting Previous Work On Text Structure And Context
    Misrepresenting Hasan On Text Structure
    Misrepresenting Barthes
    Misrepresenting Barthes And Confusing Material & Semiotic Orders Of Experience
    Misinterpreting Pike
    Misinterpreting Hasan And Proposing Theoretical Inconsistencies
    Misrepresenting Hasan On Generic Structure Potential
    Misrepresenting Halliday
    Misrepresenting Longacre
    Misrepresenting Halliday On Context, Register And Genre
    Strategically Misrepresenting Hasan
    Misrepresenting Hasan
    Misunderstanding Semantic Variation And Bakhtin
    Misconstruing Bernstein's Coding Orientation As Ideology

    Saturday 3 September 2022

    Lise Fontaine Personally Attacking Her Paper's Reviewer

    Lise Fontaine wrote to Sysfling on 23 august at 01:11:

    Dear fellow Sysfling members

    Perhaps I should be flattered that 'The Blogger' has set up an entire blog for the sole purpose of discrediting me and the ideas I put forward in a paper from 2017. However, I don't appreciate it at all. I certainly have no objection to people disagreeing with those ideas, or to showing where I was wrong, misinformed or otherwise rubbish. However, this personal attack not only makes me feel very bad, I feel it is very bad for our community for a single person (presumably?) to anonymously attack someone without any recourse for dialogue.

    I am pretty sure I know who has done this. This sort of thing has happened before. I can't imagine what I've done to deserve these repeated misrepresentations and personal attacks but I hope this person realises that this kind of thing has career destroying potential especially at a time when evaluations of work can be done by searching online. Luckily I'm at the end of my career so I don't care too much but if anyone who is an early career academic gets this treatment by 'The Blogger', it could ruin their chances of getting promotion, getting invited on projects etc.

    If anyone is close to 'The Blogger' please encourage this person to think carefully about the damage they are doing to academic discussion in our community, not to mention to individuals.

    Here is the website in question: https://lexisasmostlocalcontext.blogspot.com/

    with best wishes
    Lise

    Blogger Comments:

    [1] This is misleading because it is untrue. The blog is a meticulous review of Fontaine (2017) which uses theory and reasoned argument as evidence to clarify and critique the ideas put forth in the paper. Any intelligent scholar can deepen their knowledge of SFL Theory by taking the trouble to read the review closely. If anything discredits Fontaine, it is the quality of her paper and her misrepresentation of the review as a personal attack.

    personal attack (plural personal attacks)

    1. An abusive remark on or relating to somebody's person instead of providing evidence when examining another person's claims or comments.

    [2] This is misleading, because it falsely claims that the blog does not show "where I was wrong, misinformed or otherwise rubbish", and falsely claims that Fontaine has no objection to this being shown.

    [3] This is misleading, because it dismisses all the carefully reasoned argumentation in the review as a personal attack. More importantly, Fontaine has chosen to negatively judge ("personally attack") the reviewer instead of addressing any of the argumentation in the review of her publication.

    [4] This is misleading because it is untrue, since the review is not anonymous and "recourse for dialogue" is afforded for every post by the provision to make comments.

    [5] This is misleading in two respects. On the one hand, it falsely claims that the reasoned arguments in the review are repeated misrepresentations and personal attacks. On the other hand, it falsely claims that Fontaine has only acted at all times with propriety, despite having previously abused her position as Sysfling manager to unsubscribe her reviewer from the list when she was made aware of the review of Fawcett (2010), by Robin Fawcett posing as 'Dmytro Poremskyi' on the NASFLA site; see here.

    [6] This is misleading because it is inconsistent with Fontaine's claim that the content of the review is repeated misrepresentations and personal attacks, rather than reasoned argumentation. On the one hand, this is an unintentional acknowledgement of the validity of the argumentation, and on the other hand, it argues that institutional promotion should not be based on the academic standards demonstrated by the candidates.

    [7] This is misleading, because it is the lack of reasoned argumentation that threatens the academic and intellectual standards of work by members of the SFL community.


    It is error only, and not truth, that shrinks from inquiry.
    — Thomas Paine

    Without freedom of thought, 
    there can be no such thing as wisdom,
    and no such thing as public liberty 
    without freedom of speech.
    — Benjamin Franklin

    Sunday 17 July 2022

    Mick O'Donnell And David Rose Positively Judging Jim Martin

    Mick O'Donnell wrote to sys-func on 14/7/22 at 9:16:

    Jim Martin has always impressed me as someone who, while respecting the whole, is willing to change core assumptions, when the needs of linguistic modeling require it. … what is important is that Jim has been (and continues to be) willing to throw out established ideas (even his own) if they don't fit new data. And anyone who is not willing to do similarly is kidding themselves if they think they are doing linguistic science.

    and David Rose replied at 9:23:

    At great personal risk

     

    Blogger Comments:


    Cf. Martin & Rose (2007: 62) on Martin:
    His communion with Mandela, at such a distance in so many respects …



    For an examination of Martin's theorising, see the review of Martin (1992) here.

    For an example of Martin's "propriety", see his falsely accusing Ruqaiya Hasan of plagiarism at a symposium convened to celebrate her life's work after her death here.

    Friday 1 July 2022

    Mick O'Donnell Misrepresenting The Content Of A Blog He Thinks No Longer Exists

    Mick O'Donnell replied to David Kellogg on sys-func on 29/6/22 at 00:43  
    Don't get me wrong, I appreciate Chris's quotes from MAKH. it is not the positive presentation of the center, but rather the continual negative portrayal of the differing views. But not usually on sys-func, more typically on one of Chris's blogs, I think intended most for his friends. I see he has dropped http://thoughts-that-cross-my-mind.blogspot.com, a site that regularly snidely put down anyone he didn't like (I was sometimes there), but more importantly, he got negatively personal regarding people I care about, including unethical things (lifting stuff from a friend's Facebook, putting it on his blog, and when she asked him to take it down, he didn't, just posted on the blog her privately-sent request to remove it.)

    This is not what MAKH was about: he was always fair, did not attack other views (with rare exceptions), but rather painted a picture of what he believed was best.

    So, positive quotes, good, reasoned arguments, good, snide comments on semi-hidden blogspots, not so good.


    Blogger Comments:

    [1] Here O'Donnell misrepresents as "snidely putting down anyone he didn't like" the reasoned arguments on Thoughts That Cross My Mind that explain why the confidently expressed views of colleagues are in fact inconsistent with SFL Theory.

    [2] To be clear, the blog is intended to help anyone who wants to improve their understanding of SFL Theory, especially those who are taught by colleagues who do not understand it. To date, the blog has been viewed 82,254 times, which is equivalent to about 100 views for every subscriber to Sysfling, the largest SFL email list.

    [3] The question here is why O'Donnell raises the issue of a blog which he believes no longer exists. To be clear, it is because O'Donnell falsely believes that the blog no longer exists that he feels safe in being able to misrepresent its content. The incident that O'Donnell regards as "unethical" was the downloading of Fontaine's image from her university website so it could be placed next to her two posts on the blog. Fontaine wasn't singled out in this regard. All posts on the blog feature an image of the colleague whose views are examined. The image at the time was simply:


    As regular viewers of the blog in the intervening 10 years can testify, no private request for the picture to be removed appears on the blog. It might be added that this incident "blew up" at the same time as I was being dishonestly vilified on the Sysfling list in the week of my mother's funeral:


    [4] To be clear, currently there are 22 posts on the blog that examine O'Donnell's understanding of SFL Theory, all of which can be viewed here.

    [5] Again, O'Donnell misleads by implying that the reasoned arguments that explain why colleagues' views are misunderstandings of theory are not reasoned arguments, but merely an "attack on other views" that do not "paint a picture" of what is consistent with theory.

    [6] This is misleading. To be clear, the blog  Thoughts That Cross My Mind is not "semi-hidden", as demonstrated by the fact that it has been viewed more than 80,000 times. A link to the blog also appears at least once a week on the Sys-func list. O'Donnell's complaint here is that what he misrepresents as 'snide comments' are not as publicly available as they should be.


    Again, O'Donnell engages in the very act that he deplores in others: making personal attacks instead of reasoning on the basis of evidence.

    Wednesday 29 June 2022

    Mick O'Donnell Falsely Accusing The Sys-Func Moderator Of Misogyny

    Mick O'Donnell wrote sys-func on 28/6/22 at 19:37:

    Chris, your blogspot is a place where you choose to insult those who are not as pure as you. In some cases, your misogynist tendencies shine through. This is the worst of what we have become.








    Blogger Comments:


    1. Here O'Donnell indulges in the behaviour he falsely accuses his colleague of doing: insulting.

    2. 'Pure' here means being true to theory (theoretically consistent).

    3. There is no misogyny on the blog Thoughts That Cross My Mind, as the blog itself demonstrates, and with regard to gender, the blog treats males and females equally. Here O'Donnell has told an outright lie in order to vilify.

    4. A few years ago, O'Donnell, supported by John Bateman, tried to deceive ChRIS into writing a paper for a non-existent collection they dishonestly claimed to be putting together.

    5. As a postgraduate student, O'Donnell and his former collaborator, Peter Sefton, routinely ridiculed a female student from another country to her face, taking advantage of the fact that she trusted them to act sincerely and was unable to recognise the ridicule. This behaviour was observed not only regularly in the Sydney University Linguistics Department but more publicly at the 1992 ISFC at Macquarie University. She subsequently dropped out, and soon after had a nervous breakdown.

    6. For some, dishonest vilification like O'Donnell's is "the worst of what we have become". See also:

    Sunday 19 June 2022

    David Rose Negatively Judging The Late Ruqaiya Hasan

    It was sad to be reminded of RH’s ‘refutation’ of JRM’s work, especially as he constantly refers and defers to her throughout English Text and ever since, building the field respectfully on the work of its elders. There has been nothing else like it in SFL that I know of. The nearest in my own experience was the dismissive review of The Western Desert Code in AJL, which aimed to keep Australian descriptivists in the dark about SFL for another generation. It was sad I think for herself, as Cohesion in English established her as a major authority in discourse analysis, but her later research retreated from its visionary discourse semantics to cataloguing message types. It was sad for MAKH because it asked him to choose between his ally and leader of the next SFL generation, and the stance of his life partner. He also retreated from the discourse semantic trajectory of CinE to ambivalence and guarded acknowledgements, such as in Ch9 of IFG...
    ‘The organisation of text is semantic rather than lexicogrammatical, and (at least as far as cohesion is concerned; we are not going into questions of register/ contextual structure in this book; see Halliday & Hasan, 1985; Hasan, 1984; Martin, 1992: Ch. 7, Martin & Rose, 2003, 2008) much looser than that of grammatical units.’
    It was sad also for SFL, as it aimed to split a community that was and remains vulnerable to its institutional competitors. A sad legacy for a brilliant career.

     

    Blogger Comments:


    [1] Rose begins by negatively appreciating Kellogg mentioning Hasan's refutation of Martin's model of context because the refutation — which was without equal — was Hasan being disrespectful to Martin despite the fact that Martin has always been respectful of Hasan.  That is, Rose is not at all concerned with the question of whether the refutation has any validity. 

    On the positive judgement of Martin's propriety, the reason why Martin "constantly refers" to Hasan in his English Text (1992) is that Halliday & Hasan (1976) is the data for Martin's theorising. That is, as explained here, Martin's discourse semantics is Halliday & Hasan's cohesion misunderstood, relocated from textual lexicogrammar, and rebranded as Martin's systems.

    Moreover, it is simply not true that Martin has always been respectful of Hasan. For example, with regard to Martin (1992), see, for example:

    Presenting Misunderstandings Of Hasan's Cohesive Harmony As Deficiencies In The Model
    Misrepresenting Hasan's Work On Coherence As Formalist
    Not Acknowledging Hasan As Intellectual Source
    Under-Acknowledging Hasan As Theoretical Source
    Strategically Misrepresenting Hasan

    More importantly, after Hasan's death, a symposium was organised to celebrate her life's work, and Martin was one of the speakers. In his talk he falsely accused Hasan of plagiarism, and urged his audience to use his model instead of hers. When pressure was later put on Martin to retract his claim, he only acknowledged his factual error; there was no apology. See Jim Martin "Honouring" The Late Ruqaiya Hasan. The truth, of course, is that it was Martin who practiced the plagiarism, and at Hasan's expense.

    [2] Rose then accuses his own reviewers of the type of behaviour he himself engages in: disparaging work he does not align with. Again, Rose is not at all concerned with the question of whether the review had any validity. 

    [3] Rose next positively appreciates Hasan for her work that he misrepresents as discourse semantics (Martin's model) so that he can negatively appreciate her for her subsequent (non-Martinian) work which he falsely reduces to mere 'message semantics'.

    [4] Rose then negatively judges Hasan for forcing Halliday to choose between her and Jim Martin, whom Rose positively appreciates as the 'leader of the next SFL generation'. On the first point, Halliday's "choice" is his own model. On the second point, Halliday "chose" Matthiessen, not Martin, to edit later editions of his seminal work Introduction to Functional Grammar.

    [5] Rose next negatively judges Halliday for not adopting Martin's discourse semantics, and for not recommending it highly enough. On the one hand, the acknowledgement was added by Matthiessen — it does not appear in Halliday's editions — and on the other hand, it generously endorses the work of Martin and Rose, without judgement.

    [6] Rose then negatively judges Hasan by misrepresenting her intention in critiquing Martin's model to be to 'split' the SFL community. On the one hand, Rose is again uninterested in the validity of her critique, and on the other hand, any 'splitting' of the community arises from the 'splitting' of the theory — by Martin.

    [7] Rose finishes by contrasting a positive appreciation of Hasan's career with a negative appreciation of her legacy.


    Rose's post proved so outrageous that he was forced to apologise in order to staunch the flow of condemnation from colleagues on the sys-func list. And, for this very pragmatic response, Rose was then congratulated for being 'brave'. However, as his apology, below, demonstrates, Rose only acknowledges that his post was 'poorly framed', and continues blaming Hasan's critique of Martin's model for 'the split in the community':