The 3 Fundamental Misunderstandings That Invalidate The Model In This Book

Doran, Martin & Zappavigna (2025: 18):

Reconsidering context in this way in turn opens up the possibility 

• of reconceiving (from the perspective of instantiation) the types of field classifications pursued by previous models as syndromes of technicality, iconisation and aggregation (mass); 
• of reconceiving types of mode as syndromes of implicitness, negotiability, and iconicity (presence); and 
• of reconceiving types of tenor as syndromes of reciprocity and proliferation (association). 

And this in turn opens up the possibility of abandoning the classificatory approach to modelling field, tenor, and mode along the realisation hierarchy – and replacing it with a social semiotic perspective on register variables as resources for construing phenomena (field), enacting social relations (tenor) and composing information flow (mode). 

Developing SFL along these lines in turn opens up the possibility of re-confirming the resonance between field, tenor, and mode and metafunctions that is put at risk by research dedicated to classifying fields, tenor, and modes in relatively common-sense terms.

Reviewer Comments:

[1] To be clear, the authors' first proposal is to miscontrue context as language; specifically, to

• misconstrue contextual field as the ideational meaning of language (mass) — sub-classified as ideational meaning (technicality), interpersonal meaning (iconisation) and textual meaning (aggregation);
• misconstrue contextual mode as the textual meaning of language (presence) — sub-classified as ideational meaning (iconicity), interpersonal meaning (negotiability) and textual meaning (implicitness); and
• misconstrue contextual tenor as the interpersonal meaning of language (association).

[2] To be clear, the authors' second proposal is to misconstrue language as context; specifically, to

• misconstrue  construing experience as ideational meaning as field;
• misconstrue enacting social relations as interpersonal meaning as tenor; and
• misconstrue composing information flow as textual meaning as mode.

[3] This is misleading because it is not true. On the one hand, context-metafunction resonance is not put at risk by Halliday's characterisation of field, tenor and mode, and on the other, if it were put at risk, the authors' reconceptions could not assist in this regard, since they confuse context with language.

As previously explained, the authors misunderstand context-metafunction resonance to mean an exclusive relation between context and language on the basis of metafunction. However, what context-metafunction resonance actually means is that

• differences in field are realised by differences in ideational meaning,
• differences in tenor are realised by differences in interpersonal meaning, and
• differences in mode are realised by differences in textual meaning.

Why Mass, Presence, And Association Cannot Be Principles Of Instantiation

Doran, Martin & Zappavigna (2025: 18):

Instantiation is typically considered in terms of the coupling of choices as conditioned by varying probabilities in different texts, text types and diatypes. 

But recognising the concepts of mass, presence, and association (i.e., status/contact) as metafunctionally diversified syndromes of choice offers a perspective on instantiation that can help explain why certain choices co-occur in certain situations. That is, mass, presence and association can be considered principles of instantiation – principles underpinning the co-selection and arrangement of features across strata and metafunctions. This can help us move away from relatively ad hoc explanations as to why particular choices are taken up in particular texts or situations and move us into considering different texts and the various domains they enter into in terms of a multidimensional set of principles. 

For example, scientific writing tends to involve significant interlocking networks of activity, taxonomy and property, but relatively little evaluative language in comparison to other disciplines (e.g. Halliday & Martin, 1993). We could explain this in terms of science’s aim for very strong ideational mass (technicality) but relatively weak interpersonal mass (iconisation). We could also describe the fact that it regularly aims to link theory to data as illustrating a wide range of ideational presence (iconicity).

Reviewer Comments:

[1] Here the authors misrepresent their own misunderstanding of instantiation as the "typical" view. As a process, instantiation is the selection of features and the activation of their realisation statements in logogenesis. At the system pole of the cline of instantiation, every feature of system has a probability of instantiation relative to other features in the system, and at the instance pole, texts vary by the relative frequency of feature selection.

The midway point of variation on the cline can be viewed from the system pole as register ("diatype"), or from the instance pole as text type, with registers varying in terms of the probability of feature selection, and text types varying in terms of the frequency of feature selection.

Importantly, at ontogenetic and phylogenetic timescales, the probabilities of feature selection in the system are altered by the frequencies of feature selection in the instances.

[2] To be clear, even if mass, presence and association provided a theoretically valid model of context, they could not "be considered as principles underpinning the co-selection and arrangement of features across strata and metafunctions" simply because instantiation is not an inter-stratal relation. Instantiation is the relation between system and instance at each stratum. There is no instantiation relation between context and language. Context and language are related by realisation, elaborating identity, so there is no causal (enhancing) relation between them.

[3] This is misleading, because this is simply the imposition of terms that do not provide explanation. That is,

• it does not explain why science writing has less evaluation, it just labels it as strongly technical;
• it does not explain why science writing has less evaluation, it just labels it as weakly iconised.

[4] As demonstrated here, the authors' notion of iconicity misunderstands a congruent relation between ideational lexicogrammar and ideational semantics as an iconic relation between the ideational content of language (text) and the ideational dimension of context ("what it is talking about").

A Misunderstanding Underlying 'Association'

Doran, Martin & Zappavigna (2025: 17):

We won't attempt a more detailed discussion of metafunctional diversification and Poynton's principles here. Suffice it to say that it is very difficult to restrict these patterns of usage to interpersonal meanings alone. So alongside mass and presence, (Doran, Martin, & Herrington, 2024) suggests the cover term association to manage the metafunctional distribution of all the status and contact (reciprocity and proliferation/contraction) patterns in play.

Reviewer Comments:

[1] This continues the authors' misunderstanding of context-metafunction resonance as requiring that variation in a contextual parameter, in this case: tenor, not be realised by variation in the language of unaligned metafunctions, in this case: ideational and textual meaning. As previously explained, it is variation in the interpersonal meaning of language that identifies variation in tenor (and vice versa).

[2] As previously demonstrated in the review of Rethinking Context: Realisation, Instantiation, And Individuation In Systemic Functional Linguistics (Doran et al 2024), the authors' 'association' is the meaning of language misunderstood as the contextual parameter of tenor.