A Linguistic Perspective on Knowledge-Building

1.1 What Is Knowledge?

Knowledge shapes society. There is an increasing recognition that the distribution of knowledge in society is associated with the distribution of power. The building of knowledge is, therefore, a research interest that attracts scholars from diverse theoretical backgrounds. In pursuit of democracy and social justice, scholars from various fields challenge the unbalanced distribution of knowledge in education systems around the world and appeal for its redistribution (e.g., Bernstein, 2000; Bizzell, 1992; Maton, 2014; McArthur, 2013). This book takes part in this schol-arly endeavour by exploring two essential questions: ‘what is knowledge?’ and ‘how can we make knowledge visible?’. Addressing these questions provides foundations for widening its accessibility.

Questions around knowledge-building have been asked from various disciplinary perspectives. In supporting students’ academic success, New Rhetoric studies, for example, recognise that academic discourse consti-tutes knowledge in an academic community. Academic writing is seen not just as a process of writing, but a process of knowing in a ‘discourse community’ (Bizzell, 1992; Maimon, 1981; Russell, 1991). The ‘construc-tion’ of knowledge is regularly interpreted in terms of the socioeconomic context in which knowledge is produced (Bazerman, 1988; Myer, 1990). In addition to the social and ethnographic process of knowing, however, we need to question ‘what is known’.

Studies from the background of English for Specific Purposes (ESP) approach knowledge construction by examining academic texts. Disci-plinary differences are explored in academic texts. A range of differences have been revealed in terms of the schematic structures of academic texts (Bhatia, 1993; Dudley-Evans, 1994; Swales, 1990, 2004), ‘inter-actional’ and ‘interactive metadiscourse’ (such as ‘hedges and boosters’, ‘self-mention’ and ‘endophorics’ (Hyland, 2005)), and academic and technical vocabularies (Chung & Nation, 2004; Hyland & Tse, 2007; Woodward-Kron, 2008). As far as content knowledge is concerned, stud-ies in ESP tradition focus primarily at the vocabulary level, recognising

A Linguistic Perspective on Knowledge-Building

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4 Motivation and Background

the significance of technical terms about disciplinary knowledge (e.g. Woodward-Kron, 2008). However, the understanding of the nature of technical terms beyond the ‘simple frequency counts’ (Flowerdew, 2015, p. 6) remains to be explored.

Apart from these studies, there has also been a body of cognitive research based on formal linguistic theory, specifically generative gram-mar, that conceptualises knowledge as semantic meanings that reside in minds (Jackendoff, Cohn, & Griffith, 2012; Lakoff, 1987; Levison, Donald, & Lessard, 2012). The exploration of knowledge in this tradi-tion tends to be associated with human’s perception as ‘mental models’ of knowledge about parts of a world ‘out there’ (Johnson-Laird, 1983; Lundquist & Jarvella, 2000).

Exploring knowledge in terms of its social and ethnographic context, as text structures and technical vocabularies, and as meanings residing in our minds, all put emphases on concepts related to knowledge rather than on knowledge itself, bypassing the question of what knowledge really is. This phenomenon is described by Maton (2014) as ‘knowledge-blindness’ (p. 3), writing from a perspective of the sociology of education (also known as ‘code theory’) (Maton & Muller, 2007).

In code theory, Bernstein (2000) describes knowledge produced and pedagogised in intellectual fields in terms of ‘knowledge structures’. He makes a primary distinction between everyday and academic knowl-edge as horizontal and vertical discourses and, within vertical discourse, makes a further distinction between different kinds of academic knowl-edge. Horizontal knowledge structure develops by bringing in new theo-ries and perspectives (Bernstein, 1999, p. 162) (such as the humanities), whereas hierarchical knowledge structure develops and organises itself by following ‘coherent, explicit and systematic’ principles (p. 159) (such as physical science). These distinctions treat knowledge seriously as an object of study and provide useful ways of conceptualising how different knowledge(s) are pedagogised in educational practices. However, despite their usefulness, the defining characteristics for the knowledge structures are somewhat vague and thus difficult to analyse with (see Maton (2014) and Maton and Doran (2017) for the extended reviews).

Maton (2014) takes an important further step conceptualising knowl-edge, knower and associated social practices, developing a range of theo-retical dimensions constituting the Legitimation Code Theory (LCT). In one of the theoretical parameters, Maton develops a topological account of ‘knowledge-knower structure’ to overcome the dichotomous types in Bernstein’s knowledge structures. Importantly, he emphasises that every knowledge structure involves a knower structure. Over the last decade, studies informed by LCT share a central aim, that is to make vis-ible knowledge practice and their organising principles (e.g. Christie & Maton, 2011; Maton, Hood, & Shay, 2015; Maton, Martin, & Doran, 2020).

A Linguistic Perspective 5

Similar to those in code theory, studies informed by a social semiotic theory, known as the Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL), also take knowledge seriously as an object of study. However, SFL distinguishes itself by treating knowledge and semiotic resources as a unified phenom-enon. As explained by Halliday (1998/2004), social semiotics is not just a means of expressing knowledge, but of creating knowledge. From this theoretical perspective, knowledge is meaning and meaning is both cre-ated and expressed through semiotic resources evolved in our culture. Many modes of semiotics are knowledge-creating resources, including languages, images (Kress & van Leeuwen, 2006; Martin, Unsworth, & Rose, in press), body language (Hao & Hood, 2019; Hood, 2017; Hood & Hao, 2020; Martin & Zappavigna, 2019) and mathematical symbols (Doran, 2017; O’Halloran, 2005).1 Complementing the range of theoretical perspectives mentioned above, SFL takes context seriously in its recognition of social semiotic resources and takes the usage of social semiotics seriously when making any interpretation of our social-cultural contexts. This fundamental conception of semiotics characterises SFL as an ‘appliable’ linguistic theory (Halliday, 2008), meaning that the theory is appliable to describing the languages of actual usage and the descrip-tions are appliable to solve practical problems.

The study reported in this book is informed by SFL theories. It takes a particular kind of social semiotic resources of knowledge as its object of study—that is language. The question ‘what is knowledge?’ can be seen as a linguistic question of ‘what meanings are made?’ From decades of theo-retical and descriptive studies of languages (and other semiotic resources), SFL recognises that language is not a random collection of meanings, but it evolves as a system of meanings which organises itself in principled ways. The generalised underlying principles, which will be introduced in Section 1.3, provide guidelines for us to recognise systems and structures of any language of knowledge at stake. Through untangling and making visible the linguistic organisations, we can begin to address the question of ‘how to make knowledge visible’.

1.2 Foci of the Study

1.2.1 An Empirical Focus

This study aims to bring together language, context and texts in explor-ing knowledge-building. The language under focus is academic English in the communication of biological science at the undergraduate level. This undergraduate program is located at a leading university in the metropolitan region of Sydney, Australia. The program of coursework usually takes three years. Students who achieve distinguished grades after completing the course work can choose to pursue a research degree (undergraduate honours) undertaking a research project. This study


examines the process of knowledge development during the coursework training, focusing on examining students’ texts produced for assessment purpose across the three undergraduate years. The texts include both the laboratory reports and research reports. Other texts, including textbooks and laboratory manuals, are also examined whenever necessary to assist in understanding the associated language choices made in the students’ writing. The subject areas of the students’ texts, the text structures, and the rationale for text selection are further introduced in Section 2.6, Chapter 2.

Apprenticeship into a discipline at the undergraduate level is a critical transition period. While students typically start to develop basic scientific knowledge around year 7, and more discipline-specific knowledge from year 9, the training to professional science only starts at the undergradu-ate level (Martin & Rose, 2008, p. 226; Rose, McInnes, & Korner, 1992). By the end of the undergraduate training, students are expected to think and write like a scientist, producing texts that share similar features with published research articles (Hood, 2004; Hao, 2010). Undergraduate training is, therefore, a transition from acquiring recontextualised and pedagogised knowledge to engaging with new knowledge in the ongoing development of the discipline. In Bernstein’s (1990, 2000) term, this shifts from knowledge ‘reproduction’ to knowledge ‘production’. This study aims to explore aspects of this transition.

1.2.2 Descriptive and Theoretical Foci

Studies in SFL have explored the use of language for building scientific knowledge for decades. The studies are underpinned by one or more descriptions of languages across meaning-making levels, including lexi-cogrammar (e.g. Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014), semantics concerning clause-wide units (Halliday & Matthiessen, 1999), discourse semantics in text-wide units (Martin, 1992; Martin & Rose, 2007), social con-text (e.g. Halliday & Hasan, 1985), and stratified social context (Mar-tin & Rose, 2008). Informed by these descriptions, a train of studies on scientific discourse were conducted, including Lemke’s (1990) Talk-ing Science, Rose et al.’s (1992) Scientific Literacy, Halliday’s (2004) Language of Science, Halliday and Martin’s (1993) Writing Science, and several edited volumes including Reading Science (Martin & Veel, 1998) and Studying Science (Maton, Martin & Doran, 2020). Char-acteristics of scientific language have also been compared with those in other academic discourses, including English literacy, history, and social sciences, and non-academic discourse including domestic, rec-reational, and administrative discourses (see Christie & Martin, 1999, 2007; Christie & Maton, 2011).

From this broad body of studies, the language of science is characterised by its use of ‘technicality’ (Martin, 1993a, 1993b; Wignell, Martin, &


Eggins, 1993), ‘abstractions’ (Wignell, 2007) and ‘abstraction’ (Martin, 1993c; see also ‘theoretical abstraction’ in Halliday, 1998). All these phe-nomena are associated with a critical language device known as ‘gram-matical metaphor’ (Halliday, 1985), that is, a non-typical way of making meanings through grammar and semantics.

Despite the characteristics revealed, the linguistic distinctions between these descriptive terms and their association with grammatical meta-phor have been rather unclear. For example, in Martin (1993c), the term ‘abstraction’ is used to refer to both technical terms found in scientific discourse (e.g. erosion, deposition, deflation) and grammatical metaphors in history discourse (e.g. death, destruction, increase). At the same time, in other works (e.g. Martin, 1993a; Wignell et al., 1993; Eggins, Wignell, & Martin, 1993) ‘technicality’ is used to characterise scientific discourse and ‘abstraction’ is used to describe discourse of history. Apart from these variations, the term ‘abstract entity’ is used in Martin and Rose (2007) (c.f. Martin, 1997) to include technical (e.g. inflation, gene), institutional (e.g. regulation, policy), semiotic (e.g. fact, idea, concept) and generic terms (e.g. colour, time, type), and grammatical metaphors are treated there under the heading ‘metaphoric entity’. The relationships among ‘technical-ity’, ‘abstraction’ and grammatical metaphor are therefore far from clear.

These distinctions are unclear primarily because the differences among meanings in the discourse, lexicogrammar and the social context are not clearly recognised. The ambiguity among these levels is, in turn, a result of the fact that there is a lack of sufficient descriptions of discourse pat-terns and contextual patterns. The insufficient descriptions lead to (and at the same time result from) unclear theoretical conceptualisation of relationships among grammar, semantics, discourse (semantics), texts and context. There is, therefore, an urgent need of sorting out these descrip-tive and theoretical issues before we are able to examine the language of knowledge in a useful and productive way. This book, therefore, has two overarching aims. It firstly aims to sharpen the analytical tools in SFL, by offering a description of discourse semantics that can be useful for text analysis. While focusing on the language used in undergraduate biology, the description first and foremost makes visible the principles based on which discourse patterns can be identified, rather than offering a set of ready-made descriptive categories. The principles can then be appliable to dealing with different sets of data such as discourse in a different dis-ciplinary context. The second aim of the book is to apply the description to examining texts of undergraduate biology, offering a visible account of the language of knowledge in this context.

The following section, as part of an introduction to the subsequent chapters, outlines a set of fundamental SFL theoretical principles. These principles provide guidelines for recognising the organisations of language. The foundational theoretical understanding will help us consider criti-cally, in Chapter 2, the available descriptions of the scientific discourse.


Also, it will inform the descriptions in this study developed throughout Chapters 3, 4, 5 and 6.

1.3 Organising Principles of Language

Over decades of development (e.g. Halliday, 1978, 1985; Halliday & Matthiessen, 1999, 2014; Martin, 1992; Martin & Rose, 2008; Matthies-sen, 1995), SFL has generated a comprehensive theoretical architecture which involves several theoretical dimensions. This section introduces the dimensions relevant to this study, including stratification, metafunc-tion, rank, system/structure complementarity (axis), instantiation and semogenesis.

1.3.1 Stratification

SFL sees language as a stratified semiotic system (e.g. Halliday, 1985, 1994, following Hjelmslev, 1961)—that is, meanings are organised at different levels of abstraction. A primary relationship is the one between language and context. In SFL terms, language symbolises social context. ‘Symbolising’ means that our social reality is the ‘reality that we construe for ourselves by means of language’ (c.f. Halliday & Matthiessen, 1999, p. 3). The relationship between the two is thus natural and bi-directional. In Hjelmslev’s (1961) theoretical terms, context is connotative semiotic that is expressed by other semiotic systems, such as language, known as denotative semiotic. This view on language contrasts significantly to the formal linguistic notion that language is in opposition to the human mind or the notion that ‘reality’ exists ‘outside’ language.

Language as a denotative semiotic has its content plane and expres-sion plane. Its expression plane at the most concrete level, phonology/graphology, interacts with the physical materiality of speech/writing on the expression plane of language. The expression plane often represents the content plane arbitrarily; it has evolved based on the conventions of language users in the culture. For example, the meaning of the colour ‘red’ is symbolised in different cultures with different graphological signs, such as by “red” in English, “红” in Mandarin Chinese, and “rojo” in Spanish. The content plane of language is further organised into two meaning-making levels: lexicogrammar organises meanings made within a clause (Halliday, 1985) and discourse semantics organises meanings made throughout a text (Martin, 1992). Unlike the arbitrary relationship between lexicogrammar and phonology/graphology, discourse semantic meanings are realised naturally by lexicogrammar. It is important to note here that an alternative conceptualisation refers to the stratum above lexicogrammar as semantics (Halliday & Matthiessen, 1999). This book follows the discourse semantic conceptualisation. The differences between the two models will be discussed in detail in Chapter 2.


At the level of context, a further stratification is also made in Martin (1986, 1992) and has proven to be useful in many educational linguis-tics studies (e.g. Brisk, 2015; Humphrey, 2016; Rose & Martin, 2012; Schleppegrell, 2004). Context is stratified into two connotative semiotics: genre and register. At the highest order of reality, ‘genre’ refers to a sys-tem of ‘staged goal-oriented social processes’ that constitutes our social culture (Martin, 1986, p. 246). Genre is expressed through the register that is organised into three variables: field, tenor and mode (Martin, 1992, p. 495). Field is concerned with what is going on in social activi-ties, tenor with the relationship between interactants and mode with the role that language plays in a text (Martin & Rose, 2007, p. 296). As an intermediate stratum between genre and language, these register variables relate the use of language to the social processes in our culture. Figure 1.1 represents the hierarchy of stratification across language and context.

Along the hierarchy of stratification, each stratum of semiotic system realises the stratum at the higher level and is at the same time realised by the one at the lower level.2 Critically, the realisations along the cline are not a chain of one-to-one relationships, but a non-linear way of relating patterns of meaning at one stratum to another. Lemke’s (1984) notion of ‘metaredundancy’ provides a useful way to articulate the relationships among strata. Put simply, meanings at a higher-order stratum are patterns of meaning at the next lower-order one. For example, register is con-cerned with generalisations about discourse semantic patterns, which are themselves patterns of lexicogrammatical patterns (Caffarel, Martin, & Matthiessen, 2004, p. 36).

Figure 1.1 Stratification of language and context (adapted from Martin, 1992)


Some SFL linguists also offer an alternative model of context (e.g. Halli-day & Hasan, 1985; Halliday & Matthiessen, 1999, 2014; Hasan, 2009), treating context as one single stratum. However, this study follows the model of stratified context for two reasons. Firstly, the interstratal rela-tionship between genre and register provides a productive way of model-ling the relationship between social processes and disciplinary knowledge structures. Different disciplines may share a similar social process. For example, explaining a phenomenon can occur both in biology and his-tory. Also, each discipline can achieve many different social processes, such as describing and explaining phenomena, recounting experimental activities, arguing for a position, and so on. Secondly, this model makes it possible for us to explore the interaction among knowledge structure, social relation, and textual organisation for achieving a social purpose. As Martin argues,

the advantage of the genre perspective is that it provides a more holistic interpretation of text type which in turn makes it possible to account for the fact that field, mode and tenor variables are never ran-domly combined but rather settle into a number of relatively stable combinations reflecting the system of social process engendering a speech community.

(Martin, 1991, p. 131)

Chapter 2 will further discuss how this model of stratification informs the understanding of scientific literacy.

1.3.2 Metafunction

A second organising principle of language is its social functionality, known as metafunctions. Metafunctions are reflected in the fact that dif-ferent bundles of systems are oriented to different kinds of meaning. The concept of the system will be explained further in Section 1.4.3. Three metafunctions of language have been identified, including ideational, interpersonal and textual metafunctions (Halliday, 1967a, 1967b, 1968; Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014; Martin, 1992). Ideational meanings con-strue our experience of the external world (doing, happening, being and saying) and our internal world (thinking and feeling); interpersonal mean-ings enact our social relationships with people around us. Textual mean-ings compose ideational and interpersonal meanings in a text. Ideational meanings further include two subtypes, experiential and logical meanings, with the former concerned with configuring what is going on and the lat-ter concerned with sequencing the goings-on.

The functional organisation of language has been conceptualised as systematically related to the contextual organisation through register variables (e.g. Halliday, 1978, 1985; Martin, 1991, 1992), reflecting


the inherent relationship between language and context. Field is by and large realised through ideational meanings, tenor through interpersonal meanings and mode through textual meanings. The solidary relationship between the functional organisation of register and that of language allows us to predict the meanings in a text from its context, and at the same time allows the context to be understood based on the meanings made in the text. It is the simultaneous functional organisation of language and regis-ter variables that realises genres as social processes. Figure 1.2 maps the functional diversity onto the hierarchy of stratification.

The metafunctional organisation of language is not only reflected in the different bundles of systems, but also characterised by its different modes of expression (Halliday, 1979/2002). Extending Pike’s (1959) discussion of linguistic resources considered from the perspectives of particle, wave and field, Halliday (1979/2002) suggests that ideational meaning is expressed through particulate structure (constituent meaning), interpersonal mean-ing through prosodic structure (radiating meaning), and textual meaning through periodic structure (waves of meaning). Figure 1.3 illustrates these three types of structure using an example at the clause rank.

In another paper focusing specifically on grammatical structures (Hal-liday, 1981), Halliday makes a distinction between multivariate and uni-variate structures. A multivariate structure is a structure that involves more than one variable; a univariate structure is a structure that involves only one variable. Multivariate structure has been used in Halliday (1985) and in subsequent editions of his Introduction to Functional Grammar to generalise across particulate, prosodic and periodic structures associ-ated with the experiential, interpersonal and textual metafunctions; and

Figure 1.2 Metafunctional relations between language and context


univariate structure has been associated with serial structure in the logical metafunction.

An additional perspective on representing the particulate structure, including experiential and logical structures, is through nuclearity (Mar-tin, 1996; c.f. Halliday, 1979). While Halliday (1979) mainly employs linear representation for representing the particulate structure of experi-ential meaning, at the same time, he emphasises that there is no particular reason why the constituent representation should be linear. He suggests that ‘having a nucleus consisting of Process plus Goal with the other ele-ments clustering around it’ (p. 203) may be a more appropriate concep-tion and representation.

Martin (1992) develops further the nuclear representation of ideational structure. He models nuclearity by taking into account metafunction, rank and strata. He argues that as far as all three metafunctions are concerned, particulate structure or ‘constituency’ is, in fact, a reductive representa-tion, since it is as a crude way to represent the structures of ideational, interpersonal and textual meanings, yet none of their unique structural characteristics (i.e. nuclearity, prosody and periodic) can be successfully revealed. Therefore, it is necessary to dissociate constituency from the structure of any metafunction.

Ideationally, given the distinction between experiential and logical meanings, Martin (1996) distinguishes the principle of nuclearity into an orbital structure, which is a mono-nuclear configuration, and serial, which is a multi-nuclear structure due to the recursion of elements.3 Fig-ure 1.4 represents these structures.

Nuclearity is not only useful for representing grammatical structures, but also for representing meanings at other strata including genre (e.g. Martin, 1996; Iedema, 1997; White, 1997; Christie, 2002) and discourse

Figure 1.3 Three kinds of meanings associated with three modes of expressions


semantics (Martin, 1992). Chapter 4 will illustrate how nuclearity can inform our description of ideational discourse semantics.

1.3.3 System and Structure

Both stratification and metafunctions are underlined by a more fundamen-tal principle—that is, semiotics, including language, are organised as a network of relationships. The network of relationships is organised based on axial principles, or axis (Martin, 2013a; Quiroz, 2013, 2019). Axis relates two sets of relationships—one is paradigmatic relations organising systems; the other is syntagmatic relations organising structures (Halliday, 1966/2002, following Saussure, 1974; Firth, 1957; Hjelmslev, 1961). In addition to strata and metafunction, axis is also an underlying principle of ranks, which will be introduced in Section 1.4.4.

Paradigmatic relations are realised through those that are syntagmatic.4 Two configurations are considered on the syntagmatic axes, including both functions and classes. An arrangement of classes is a syntagm. Func-tions specify ‘actual syntactic relations into which the classes enter’ (Hal-liday, 1966/2002, pp. 107–108). The example below demonstrates the structure of a clause, I kicked the ball:

I kicked the ballfunction: Actor Process Goalclass: nominal group verbal group nominal group

This clause is configured through grammatical functions (Actor^ Process^Goal), which specify its syntagmatic structure. These functions are then realised in the form of classes (i.e. nominal group, verbal group and nominal group), which specify the realisation of functions in terms of the unit next below. Note that the relationship between function and class is not one-to-one. Most grammatical functions can be realised by

Figure 1.4 Orbital and serial structures (adapted from Martin, 1996, p. 51)


more than one class, and a given grammatical class can perform more than one function (Martin, 2013a, pp. 36–37). For example, a nominal group tomorrow can realise a Participant function as in the deadline is tomorrow, or a Circumstance of time as in we will go to the zoo tomor-row; and a Circumstance can be realised by different classes, such as a nominal group (e.g. we will go to the zoo tomorrow) and a prepositional phrase (e.g. we will go to the zoo in the morning). Paradigmatic opposi-tions and syntagmatic organisations are modelled in SFL through system networks. Figure 1.5 provides an example of system networks, using an interpersonal system at the stratum of lexicogrammar.

Reading from left to right, this system has an entry condition, which is a clause. The name of the system is written conventionally in small caps (i.e. mood). The square bracket specifies a number of features in the paradigmatic opposition, which are written in lowercase (e.g. indica-tive, imperative). A diagonal arrow under the features reads ‘realised by’, which relates the paradigmatic oppositions of features to their syntag-matic organisations. Following the arrows, the realisation statements specify a number of functions and their relationships; for example, ‘+’ means ‘insert function’ and ‘^’ means ‘followed by’ (e.g. in declarative, Subject is followed by Finite). A feature in a system can be an entry condi-tion of another system; for example, ‘indicative’ in Figure 1.5 is an entry condition of another system, with the features ‘declarative’ and ‘interroga-tive’ features conventionally enclosed in square brackets in running text. In system networks, all features refer to classes (e.g. indicative clause). Most structures in realisation statements are specified by functions (e.g. Subject^Finite). Functions represent ‘the syntagmatic role some unit is playing’; classes provide ‘the paradigmatic potential of a unit’ (Caffarel et al., 2004, p. 34).

All the features in a network are ranged on a scale of delicacy, from less delicate features on the left to more delicate ones on the right. In this mood network, the relationships between the features are logical ‘or’ (i.e. either indicative or imperative). We can also include logical ‘and’

Figure 1.5 A basic system network of mood (adapted from Caffarel et al., 2004, p. 25)


relations in a system network. For example, at clause rank, the experien-tial system transitivity, the interpersonal system mood and the textual system theme constitute the meaning potential of a clause as simultane-ous systems. A simplified system network including these three systems is shown in Figure 1.6. The brace positions transitivity, mood and theme as simultaneous systems. For a detailed account of system networks see Matthiessen and Halliday (2009) and Martin (2013a).

In SFL, system networks are used to model paradigmatic and syntag-matic relations at all strata. A system at a given stratum can be usefully related to systems from above, around and below. Retaking mood system as an example, when looking from around at the stratum of lexicogram-mar, mood is associated simultaneously with the experiential system transitivity and the textual system theme. This multi-functional view is evident in Figure 1.3 above.

Looking from above at the discourse semantic stratum, mood is asso-ciated with the more abstract interpersonal discourse semantic system

Figure 1.6 A simplified network system of clause (adapted from Martin, 1992, p. 9)


speech function. Separating mood and speech function is motivated in part by the phenomenon of grammatical metaphor, which refers to the possibility of stratal tension between discourse semantics and lexico-grammar (Martin, 2008, 2013a). For example, using Martin’s (2013a, pp. 80–81) example of grammatical metaphor in interpersonal meta-function, requesting information in speech function, such as asking someone’s name, can be realised through an interrogative clause (e.g. what is your name?), a declarative clause (e.g. your name is . . . ?), or an imperative clause (e.g. tell me your name). Given the phenomenon of grammatical metaphor, one system/structure cycle at one stratum is not sufficient to model the meaning-making potential of the language as a whole. It is necessary to have two system/structure cycles situated at two strata—one at lexicogrammar and the other at discourse seman-tics (Martin, 2013a, p. 83). The relationship between the two strata is referred to as interstratal relationship. Chapter 2 will review grammatical metaphor in the ideational metafunction that is of particular relevance to knowledge-building.

Looking from below at the level of phonology, choices in mood can be realised by choices in the tone system (Halliday & Greaves, 2008; Mar-tin, 2013a). When the relationship between mood and speech function is congruent, choices in mood are associated with the tones naturally. For example, a declarative choice is realised by tone 1 (falling tone) (//1 We played India//), and a polar interrogative choice can be realised by tone 2 (rising tone) (//2 Did you win?//). However, when the relationship between mood and speech function is marked, a mood choice can combine with different tones to achieve different effects of speech functions. For example, a request for information may be realised through a declara-tive clause, which is expressed through a rising tone (e.g. //2 they played India// (‘did they play India?’)).

The critical point here is that as far as stratification is concerned, a system network at any stratum (except for the highest and lowest ones) is associated simultaneously with systems from the strata above, around, and below.

1.3.4 Rank

Alongside the organisation of systems through metafunction and stratum, at each stratum, bundles of systems are also organised onto ranks at each stratum ‘according to the size of units they are classifying’ (Martin, 2013a, p. 62). Each system thus has its point of origin at a particular rank.5 The compositional hierarchy of ranks is known as a rank scale.

At the stratum of lexicogrammar, a clause is decomposed into groups/phrases. These are then broken down into words, which may be further broken down into morphemes. Figure 1.7 exemplifies a rank scale from a clause to word. As outlined in this tree diagram, each rank is represented


by one class/function cycle. Clause rank is represented by its functional configuration (Actor^Process^Goal). The classes (e.g. nominal group) that realise the clause-rank functions provide further environments for the constituency at group rank, which involves functions of smaller units (e.g. Deictic, Thing, Finite, and Event).

System networks determine the organisation of a rank scale. Each class is the entry condition of a system at a particular rank, and it provides an environment for potential paradigmatic oppositions. For example, the clause is an entry condition of transitivity; the nominal group is the entry condition of a nominal group system. The relationship between systems at different ranks of the same stratum is an intrastratal relation-ship. The relationships along the rank scale are determined critically by the function/class cycle on the syntagmatic axis. That is, the class that realises the function at the higher rank is the entry condition of a system at the lower rank.

The systemic organisation of rank scale allows us to describe the phe-nomenon of rank-shift, meaning that units at the higher rank may realise a function at the rank below. The down-ranked unit is also referred to as an embedded unit. The example in Figure 1.8 demonstrates this. Instead of being realised by a nominal group, the Actor participant at the clause rank is realised by an embedded clause (i.e. burning coal), which has its own clause structure. Rank-shift has the effect of expanding grammatical resources, as the meaning potential of a higher-ranking unit enriches the meanings at the lower rank (Halliday & Matthiessen, 1999, p. 10).

Rank scales are not unique to lexicogrammar. For example, at the dis-course semantic level, speech function and negotiation systems are organised at different ranks in interpersonal meaning (Ventola, 1987; Mar-tin, 1992, 2013a). At the level of genre, rank allows the constituency of social processes to be described. Genres can be decomposed into functional stages, which may be further constituted by phases (Martin & Rose, 2008).

Figure 1.7 An example of rank scale in lexicogrammar


To consolidate the SFL theoretical dimensions I have so far laid out, the complementarity of system and structure underlies the organisation of systematic functional model of language. A system can be associated simultaneously with a system at another stratum, at another rank, and in another metafunction. Figure 1.9 represents these simultaneous theoreti-cal dimensions, following Martin (1991).

Figure 1.8 An example of embedded clause

Figure 1.9 Simultaneous dimensions of stratification, metafunction and rank (adapted from Martin, 1991, p. 115)


Informed by axis, stratification, ranks and metafunction, SFL employs a methodological principle in language description—that is, language choices need to be considered from a threefold trinocular perspective (Martin, 2013a; Martin, Quiroz, Wang, & Zhu, forthcoming; Mat-thiessen & Halliday, 2009). This means that choices at any given ‘level’ including strata and ranks are not considered in isolation, but are based simultaneously on related choices at other levels. Depending on our stand-point of the description, the trinocular scope can vary. For instance, to describe discourse semantic resources, we need to consider, interstratally, choices at the stratum of register (a perspective from ‘above’), at the stra-tum of lexicogrammar (a perspective from ‘below’), and at the stratum of discourse semantics (a perspective from ‘around’). A particular discourse semantic choice can also be explored intrastratally in terms of its relation-ship to choices at the lower, higher and the given rank.6 Developing a description that integrates choices at all strata needs to ‘shunt’ (Halliday, 1961) up and down to adjust the trinocular scope.

1.3.5 Instantiation

Systems and structure underlie the organisation of strata, metafunction and rank. Through system networks, we can describe ‘how it is pos-sible for meanings to be made’ (Halliday, 2008, p. 120). At the same time, our description of systems is always dependent on language usage in texts. The relationship between language as meaning-making potential (i.e. system) and as actual usage in a text (i.e. instance) is referred to in SFL as instantiation (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2014, p. 26). Instantiation is a cline of generalisation. At the most generalised pole, we can locate language as systems (the meaning potential of a language) and the mean-ing potential can be ‘actualised’ as particular instances organising a text.

When describing a language, we are concerned with both the actual instances in a text and generalised systemic potential at the same time. In other words, our observation of what a speaker ‘actually says’ has to be interpreted in association with what the speaker ‘can say’ (Halliday, 1978, p. 40). It is often necessary to shunt back and forth, making generalisa-tions on the basis of instances, and at the same time identifying instances according to systemic potential.

As far as the systemic interlocking of stratification, metafunction and rank is concerned, the process of instantiation relates systems to instances at any given stratum, at any given rank and in any given metafunction (Martin, 2010, p. 22). Figure 1.10 represents these dimensions.

1.3.6 Semogenesis

One last theoretical principle we need to get familiar with is semogenesis, that is, semiotic change. Semiotic systems are not static but continuously


changing. SFL models this change along three timescales. The relatively short timescale, known as logogenesis, is concerned with the unfolding of text. Instances on this time scale are ‘continually modified in the light of what has gone before’ (Halliday & Matthiessen, 1999, p. 18). A relatively longer timescale, ontogenesis, is concerned with the semiotic growth of individual speakers, such as the language development of a child (Painter, 1999). The most extended timescale of semiotic change, phylogenesis, is concerned with a change of culture. Through these timescales, meanings are ‘continually created, transmitted, extended and changed’ (Halliday & Mat-thiessen, 1999, p. 18). Meanings made within the smaller timeframe allow the meanings in the bigger timeframe to emerge, and the meanings in the bigger timeframe condition the choices of meaning made in the smaller one.

1.3.7 Summary

To consolidate, SFL conceptualises language as a meaning-creating resource. Language is a system of meanings in a given culture. It is organised by metafunctions, strata and ranks. Choices in the systems are instantiated in texts; at the same time, it is the cumulation of instances (and texts) that enables systems to be developed. For a discourse analyst, instances recognised in an unfolding discourse can never be dissociated

Figure 1.10 Realisation and instantiation (adapted from Martin, 1991, 2010)


from their systemic potential, from their relationships to other instances in the same text, and from their relationships to similar instances in other texts throughout the semiotic change.

It can be a challenging task to employ the SFL multidimensional tools to examine language. It is critical to shunt back and forth between theory and practice, and gradually acquire the skills to look at texts and language choices in a ‘meaningful’ and productive way.

1.4 Outline of the Book

This chapter has introduced the scope of this book, that is, to examine knowledge-building in undergraduate biology through language, drawing on an appliable linguistic theory—i.e. systemic functional linguistics. The chapter has familiarised the reader with the multidimensional theoretical principles in SFL. Drawing on the underlying theoretical principles, in the next chapter, we critically examine the previous SFL descriptions of language and their appliability to studying scientific discourse. While all theoretical dimensions matter, we will see that stratification is a central theoretical and descriptive concern. Chapter 1 and Chapter 2 together constitute the first section of this book, providing us with the foundational knowledge for our descriptive and analytical departure.

Building on the theory, Section II and Section III address respectively the two overarching aims of this study: 1) sharpening the descriptive tools of discourse semantics and 2) analysing knowledge-building in undergradu-ate biology. Section II (from Chapter 3 to Chapter 7) builds a discourse semantic description that can be applied to examining scientific discourse. The description draws on the large data set collected in the study, includ-ing both students’ writing and pedagogic materials. Section III (Chapter 8 and Chapter 9) applies the descriptions to examining knowledge-building in undergraduate biology, including building scientific taxonomies and activities. The analyses trace the knowledge development by examining a set of selected texts produced by one individual student throughout the undergraduate years. Finally, Section IV (Chapter 10) concludes the book by offering a summary of the study and points out directions for future research.

Notes1. Studying semiotics from a systemic functional perspective is referred to in a

broad term as systemic functional semiotics (SFS).2. ‘Realise’ has also been referred to in SFL through the wordings of construe (i.e.

realise) and activate (i.e. realised by) (e.g. Hasan, 1996).3. Similarly, Matthiessen (1995, p. 196) interprets clause structure along a cline

of ‘nuclearity/peripherality’ by drawing on the grammatical functions in the ergativity system. The cline is ranged across three layers of units, reflecting the degree to which Participants and Circumstances are involved in the process.


4. Note that while the relationship between system and structure is also typi-cally referred to in terms of realisation, their relationship is not a relationship between different strata (i.e. an interstratal relationship), but an intrastratal relationship which organises meanings at a given stratum. Apart from axial relations, other intrastratal relationships include the relationship between meanings along the cline of delicacy in a system and the relationship between different ranks (Matthiessen, 1993). For clarification of different kinds of ‘realisation’, see also Table 2.3 in Chapter 2.

5. The conceptualisation of rank in SFL has mainly been associated with con-stituency, which privileges the particulate structure in ideational metafunction, while Caffarel et al. (2004) point out that “units at each rank can normally be probed for evidence of orbital, prosodic and periodic organisation, and in addition enter into serial complexes” (p. 32).

6. It is important to note that recognising rank scale at the discourse semantic stratum is still an ongoing theoretical and descriptive challenge in SFL. For the extended discussion on this issue, see Martin (2018).

References1. Complementing epistemological meaning, the other two metafunctions can be

considered regarding disciplinary knowledge, in particular the values negoti-ated in a community (Martin et al., 2010; Martin, 2017; Hao & Hood, 2019). This point will be elaborated in Chapter 10.

2. It is important to note again here the role of multimodal resources in configur-ing genres (Bateman, 2008). In scientific texts, semiotic modes such as images, graphs, tables and symbols of mathematics often interact with verbal language to compose a genre (Doran, 2017; Guo, 2004; Martin & Rose, 2008; Martin, Unsworth, & Rose, in press; van Leeuwen & Humphrey, 1996).

3. Note that in Martin and Rose’s categorisation of entities, an additional cat-egory ‘indefinite pronouns’ is also included (e.g. some/any/nothing/one). These instances function textually in tracking ideational resources in the text. They are set aside in the review of ideational categories.

1. The differentiation between people and publication is less explicit in the dis-course of humanities and social science than in that of science. For the discus-sion of the realisation of explicit and implicit knowers in the discourse, see Hood (2011).

1. Note that there may be a grammatical ambiguity in terms of whether a measured or a perceived dimension is realised through a Focus [descriptive quality]^Thing or Thing^Qualifier structure. Further exploration of this gram-matical distinction is needed. Nonetheless, at the level of discourse semantics, what construed is the augmentation of entities.

1. The Participant [Range:process] from an ergative perspective in Halliday (1994) and Martin (1992) is also known as a process Scope (Halliday & Mat-thiessen, 2004, p. 193) from the transitive perspective.

2. Meteorological process is identified by Halliday and Matthiessen (2014, p. 309) as a process type at borderline of existential and material processes.

3. Davidse (1991) distinguishes directed action (e.g. They hunted the rabbit) and non-directed action (e.g. The cat broke the glass) in effective clauses. In the directed clause, the nuclear participant Medium is the participant that is being ‘done to’ and has no control of the process. In the non-directed clause, the Medium is the participant that is ‘done to’ and it is at the same time involved in ‘doing’. This fine-tuned distinction is not made in the discussion here since it does not affect the general structure of orbitality at stake.

4. Beneficiary (i.e. Client, Recipient, Receiver) is also likely to be positioned in inner orbit. However, since few Beneficiary Participants occurred in the data of this study, they are set aside from the discussion.

5. For the detailed discussion of relational process types, particularly the distinc-tion between encoding and decoding types of identifying process, see Davidse (1991, 1992).

6. Note that Initiator is not an additional Agent in descriptive (non-directed action) material process (Halliday, 1967a). In the descriptive operative voice, Initiator can play the role of the first Agent, such as He [Initiator/Agent] marched the prisoners [Actor/Medium]. In the descriptive middle voice, the initiator is at the same time the Actor, playing the ergative Participant role Medium, such as the prisoner [Initiator/Actor/Medium] marched.

7. Martin (1992, p. 319) suggests that ‘causative’ is the margin in the orbital structure of verbal groups, which can be associated with the instigation sug-gested here.

8. There is an alternative interpretation in the literature; that is, to treat the rela-tional process as an agentive one, with the configuration of Assigner^Token (e.g. the method [Assigner] showed [Process] (the fact) [[that the pipette is

accurate]] [Token] to be a fact [Value]) (See Halliday, 1985, pp. 153–154; Martin, 1992, p. 228).

1. Note that figure can also be realised by α clause in the non-finite hypotactic projection, as in the following examples: The result also displayed a strong lin-ear relationship [figure], SUGGESTING [connexion] || the pipette is both accurate and precise throughout its range [figure].

2. There is an additional realisation of connexions, that is through an Epithet (e.g. causal, subsequent), as discussed in Halliday (1998/2004, pp. 41–42). However, they have not been accounted for in this study, as few instances of such realisations were found in the data.

1. Note that ‘projection’ is used in a metaphorical sense to describe the level of field, although it can be realised through mental, verbal and fact projection in lexicogrammar. For other discussions of one field ‘projects’ the other at the level of register, see Christie’s work on curriculum genre (e.g. Christie, 1997, 2002), which draws on Bernstein’s work (e.g. 1990) on pedagogic discourse.

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A Linguistic Perspective on Knowledge-Building