Johanna,
Thanks for the Hopper&Thompson reference. I'll look for that. I found
that Halliday treatment a little odd thirty-five years ago, and that
hasn't changed.
Herb
-----Original Message-----
From: Assembly for the Teaching of English Grammar
[mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Johanna Rubba
Sent: Monday, November 01, 2004 1:04 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Horton hears a Who
Herb,
We're getting into hairsplitting here, so I ask the forgiveness of those
on the list who lose us here in the ether ...
I guess we'd need to agree on a def. of "action" and "transitivity".
Linking verbs are, at best, processes rather than actions ("become" is
certainly a process, but not quite something undertaken by an agent,
which is how I view an action).
There is an old paper by Hopper & Thompson called "Transitivity in
Grammar and Discourse" which makes good arguments for the use of this
property for discourse rather than semantic purposes. I don't remember
their arguments, but it is a very interesting paper.
In any case, whatever a linking verb portrays, it definitely "affects"
only the subject (in the sense that it links the subj. to the
complement). This is short of the usual understanding of "affects".
Maybe the best way to say it is to say that "become" is definitely NOT a
transitive verb, at least by non-Hallidayan definitions.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Johanna Rubba Associate Professor, Linguistics
English Department, California Polytechnic State University
One Grand Avenue * San Luis Obispo, CA 93407
Tel. (805)-756-2184 * Fax: (805)-756-6374 * Dept. Phone. 756-2596
* E-mail: [log in to unmask] * Home page:
http://www.cla.calpoly.edu/~jrubba
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web
interface at:
http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html
and select "Join or leave the list"
Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/
To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface at:
http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html
and select "Join or leave the list"
Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/
|
