Rebranding Interpersonal Semantics As Context: Internal vs External Tenor

Doran, Martin & Zappavigna (2025: 61):

Crucially, open propositions do not give enough information to be rendered – i.e. you cannot support or reject (externally speaking) the open proposition what’s it going to do? Rather, the normal responses would be to tender another proposition. …

To render an open proposition, you cannot render the content of the proposition as such; you rather have to support or reject exchange itself (using an 'internal' response). …

We can view the contrast between open and complete propositions more technically in terms of the distinction between external and internal rendering. As explained in the previous chapter, external rendering involves rendering the information being given in a proposition or proposal, while internal rendering involves rendering the position as a linguistic act. From this perspective, complete propositions can be rendered both externally … and internally … ; but open propositions can only be rendered internally …  – they cannot be rendered externally … .

ChatGPT Comments:

The proposed contrast between “internal” and “external rendering” introduces terminological noise not only within semantics but more crucially into the contextual stratum—specifically, the tenor of the situation. By reframing interpersonal semantic functions as if they were contextual categories, the authors mislocate meanings that properly belong at the semantic level. This amounts to a stratal confusion: rather than modelling tenor as realised through interpersonal semantics (such as speech role and commodity) and further realised in the lexicogrammar through mood, they retroject semantic patterns back up into context as if they were immediate situational features. What they call “internal rendering” is simply a supporting move in an information exchange—already accounted for through the speech function system at the semantic level and realised grammatically through mood. The metaphor of “rendering” thus functions not as a clarifying concept but as a misplaced abstraction that erodes the coherence of the stratified model of language and context.

The introduction of “internal” and “external rendering” also distorts the systemic treatment of negotiation. By recasting semantic moves as “renderings” of a speaker’s position, the authors collapse the dynamic structure of exchange into a static binary of response types. This flattens the negotiation process, obscuring the functional roles of initiation, support, and confrontation within the move structure. More problematically, by locating these “renderings” at the level of context—specifically tenor—they displace interpersonal semantics upward and sever the realisation pathway from semantic speech function to grammatical mood. In doing so, they bypass the core SFL insight that negotiation is a meaning potential realised through lexicogrammatical choice, not a contextual stance to be interpreted. The result is a pseudo-system that confuses evaluative uptake with semantic function, eroding both descriptive clarity and pedagogical utility.