Judy Diamondstone wrote:

> I'm not sure what you mean... Does your question have a function
> other than its function as a question? (yes -- it functions in
> relation to the rest of the text is some way[s])

So, the form of a particular utterance does not necessarily predict its
actual function.
If that is the case, then besides making us dizzy, what does an SFG
analysis get us?

> I'm not sure what you mean by "the underlying subjects and objects of
> a particular verb" -- you mean the sorts of subjects and objects that a
> particular verb can take?

Consider the following pairs.

        a) Bob likes the decision to acquit the President
        b) The decision pleases Bob.

Isn't Bob the experiencer of the particular emotion (liking and
pleasing) in both 1 and 2?  However, Bob does not have the same
grammatical function
in both sentences.  How does SFG handle this?  I can't figure it out.

> It takes many many instances of "parole" for
> there to be a "langue" -- not that parole comes first -- they grow up together,
> but they grow at different 'time depths'.

That, I think, is demonstrably false.  We have knowledge about "langue"
(competence) that
cannot possibly be predicted by "parole" (actual utterances that we have
heard).

Consider the following example with a verb you have never thought about,
and may not have ever heard.

As every adult native speaker of the language knows, the past tense form
of the verb stand is stood.  In fact, there are some compounds with
stand, withstand and understand, where the past tense form is withstood
and understood.

We all know what a grandstander is.  He is someone who grandstands.

What form of grandstand do you use in the following sentence?

Last night I saw Dennis Rodman.  He grandstanded/*grandstood too much.

Are your intuitions like mine?  I find grandstood decidedly odd and
grandstanded a clear preference.  I strongly suggest this intuition is
shared by all native speakers.

If your representation of SFG is right, that should not be the case.  In
fact, it should be just the opposite when we consider what we have heard
all of our lives.  How does SFG explain this?

I could go on with any number of examples of judgments about structures
you have never heard, yet we, as native speakers of English would all
agree, are the same.  Such agreement is not predicted by the claim that
langue and parole "grow up together".  Parole/performance ALWAYS
underdetermines what our underlying langue/competence is.

Bob Yates