At 04:07 PM 2/11/99 -0600, you wrote:
>Judy Diamondstone wrote:
>
>> >Consider the following pairs.
>> >
>> >        a) Bob likes the decision to acquit the President
>> >        b) The decision pleases Bob.
>
>>         SFG defines "grammar" differently. That's its point.
>>         The grammar of a language is described as three simultaneous
>>         ("metafunctional") systems. So Bob is the experiencer in both
>>         sentences. SFG would say that the "ideational metafunction" of
>>         grammar is realized in the same way (as "Bob") in
>>         both sentences. However, both "subject" (considered
>>         as part of the interpersonal metafunction of grammar)
>>         and "first position" or sentence theme (considered as part of
>>         the textual metafunction of grammar) are different for the 2
sentences.
>>
>>         SFG describes grammar as a system that evolved to serve
>>         these different functions.
>>
>>         And it correlates the metafunctions of the (lexico)grammatical
>>         system with the sorts of environmental pressures that the system
>>         has responded to (the "field" "tenor" and "mode" dimensions of
>>         register)
>
>I am confused.  So, how did the system "evolve" in just that way that
>for some
>verbs the experiencer is the grammatical subject and for others the
>experiencer
>is the grammatical object.

        Bob, you seem to assume that there is a particular grammatical
function for
for each class item, and there can be no variance. Or it might be you are
assuming
that, if language evolved in response to its environment, it wouldn't produce
verbs that work in different ways. If you are wedded to that assumption,
then SFG
will for sure remain gobbledygook for you.

        Halliday sees grammar as infinitely creative, ultimately
        constrained not only by its internal workings
        but more so by the purposes we put it to.

>>         SFG does not presuppose that children learn only the language,
exactly
>>         the language, that they have heard or spoken. That's a strawperson
>>         argument from the Chomsky school. I didn't mean to suggest anything
>>         like that, but I'm not sure that I have the language at this point
>>         to explain better what I mean. I will work at it though.
>
>I look forward to it.  Just a couple of points:
>
>I would love to know why you dismiss my example as "a strawperson
>argument."  It seems to me that this rather trivial aspect of the
>knowledge that ALL native speakers have about English has some very
>profound implications.
>
>        1) We have knowledge about our language for structures that we have
>never heard.  ALL NATIVE SPEAKERS HAVE THE SAME KNOWLEDGE AS MEASURED BY
>SHARED JUDGMENTS.  Where does that shared knowledge come from if such
>structures have never been heard before?
>
>        2) On this list, we are all language educators. I define that as
>educating our students about the nature of language and the nature of
>the knowledge our students have about language.  To think that our
>students already know a lot about language that has never been taught is
>good news for them and focuses our attention on what we need to teach
>and how we need to teach it.  Hardly being made of straw, I think the
>example of grandstand is an important foundation to think about what we
>do.

        I am inclined to agree with Johanna, who has addressed this
        issue better than I can, since I know generative grammar only
        through videotapes (VERY superficially) I agree that we have a
'built-in'
        disposition to learn language, that the disposition is not necessarily
        specific to language, and that it affords nothing unless we live
        in a (language-based) communicative environment. I also agree that
        competence as a speaker is not  necessarily available to the novice
        writer, who has to make deliberate choices specific to the demands
of (certain
        kinds of) written texts.


>Finally, in the correction message:
>
>                Spoken language and language "competence"
>                are interactive not only for the child
>                learning language (ontogenetically)
>                but also for a language-speaking
>                species (phylogenetically)
>
>I am not quite sure what this means.  Language changes and norms
>change.  So? I am reminded of Norman Fairclough's "The appropriacy of
>`appropriateness'" that talking about "competence" of language use is a
>very prescriptive endeavor.

        And I apologize because I am not sure what you mean, either.
        I'm not a fan of Fairclough's writing style but I generally
        agree with him, and I appreciate the work he has done to show
        that the boundaries of formal/informal are breaking down.
        I don't know what you read as suggesting "prescriptivism"
        in my message that you quoted.

        Ready for the next round, but also hoping we can become
        more clear about where we agree/ disagree,

        Judy



Judith Diamondstone  (732) 932-7496  Ext. 352
Graduate School of Education
Rutgers, the State University of New Jersey
10 Seminary Place
New Brunswick, NJ 08901-1183

Eternity is in love with the productions of time - Wm Blake