Iconised Ideation or Attitudinal Mapping?

Doran, Martin & Zappavigna (2025: 88):

Iconisation is the process by which interpersonal meanings are charged, often at the same time as ideational meanings are discharged (Martin, 2010). From this perspective, bonding icons are highly iconised meanings that are often central to larger networks of meaning. (Carr, 2023) highlights that bonding icons such as the Olympic Flame can be treated as iconised ideation, since they take an ideational entity or occurrence and instil interpersonal meaning. In addition, she notes how already interpersonal terms such as respect (i.e., an attitude) can be iconised in contexts such as sex education classes as a means of organising the values at stake when navigating social relationships.

ChatGPT Comments:

The argument for iconisation risks rebranding established SFL processes under new terminology. What is described as “instilling interpersonal meaning” parallels appraisal theory’s projection and evaluation mechanisms, while “iconised ideation” resembles the familiar mapping of ideational entities into attitudinal structures. The term “iconisation” may add rhetorical weight but does not clarify novel system relations. Additionally, the simultaneous charging of interpersonal and ideational meanings is already accounted for in the Hallidayan model of semantic realisation across strata; presenting it as a separate process creates terminological inflation without analytic gain.