Happy Sunday
Theories are also constellations of icons that adherents affiliate around
(thanks Michelle Z and Ken Tann). Basil Bernstein recognised the roots of
secular theories in medieval theology, following Durkheim (‘the fundamental
categories of science are of religious origin’, 1915:418) and Max Weber (the
original ‘legitimation’ theorist). Here’s BB in 2000...
The religious field is constituted by three positions which stand in various
relations of complementarity and opposition. In the religious field, we have
the prophets, we have the priests, and we have the laity. The rule is that one
can only occupy one category at a time. Priests cannot be prophets, and
prophets cannot be priests, and the laity cannot be either. There is a natural
affinity between prophets and laity, and there is a natural opposition between
prophets and priests. These are the lines of opposition structuring the
religious field.
If we look at the structure of the pedagogic field, we also have basically
three positions that provide analogues to the prophets, priests and laity. The
‘prophets’ are the producers of the knowledge, the ‘priests’ are the
recontextualisers or the reproducers, and the ‘laity’ are the acquirers. Thus,
we have the structure of the pedagogic field.
Icons like immanence and transcendence are borrowed directly from theological
beliefs about the relation of spirit to matter, for which adherents could be
excommunicated or worse :-( Bateson’s metatheorising was explicitly
theological, rebadging god as ‘mind’ which he believed was immanent in the
‘supreme cybernetic system’. In Lexie’s quote below, he is concerned with the
theological question of ‘truth’.* In contrast, Lemke is more interested in the
‘usefulness’ of theories, or as MAKH would call it, ‘appliability’.
David
* Distinct from philosophical argumentation about truth value of propositions,
which is closer to Chris’ yes/no questions of ‘validity’ here.
From: asflanet-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <asflanet-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> on behalf
of Dr ChRIS CLÉiRIGh <c.cleirigh@xxxxxxxxx>
Date: Wednesday, 14 February 2024 at 5:18 pm
To: asflanet@xxxxxxxxxxxxx <asflanet@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [asflanet] Re: Criticism in SFL
Yes, in the rhetorical-ethnographic orientation to meaning that SFL takes
(Halliday & Matthiessen 1999: 415),
meaning is immanent, so there can be no precise correspondence between the
meanings of language
and the meanings beyond semiotic systems, because, in this view, there are no
meanings beyond semiotic systems.
Theories evolve in context, the context construed as material, and the context
construed as semiotic.
When there is theorising without criticism, there is evolution without
selection, i.e. random drift.
As Halliday pointed out, we don't argue about truth, we argue about validity.
Are the assumptions on which this theory is founded valid?
Is this theoretical description valid?
Is this interpretation of theory valid?
I agree with Lexie.
Bateson is very relevant here.
ChRIS
On Wed, 14 Feb 2024 at 12:54, <eldon@xxxxxxxxxxxxx<mailto:eldon@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>>
wrote:
the warrant here being that linguistics is a science?
anyway, here's another quote on the same topic as that of lemke's:
1 . SCIENCE NEVER PROVES ANYTHING
Science sometimes improves hypotheses and sometimes disproves
them. But proof would be another matter and perhaps never occurs except
in the realms of totally abstract tautology. We can sometimes say that
if such and such abstract suppositions or postulates are given, then
such and such must follow absolutely. But the truth about what can be
perceived or arrived at by induction from perception is something else
again.
Let us say that truth would mean a precise correspondence between our
description and what we describe or between our total network of
abstractions and deductions and some total understanding of the outside
world. Truth in this sense is not obtainable. And even if we ignore the
barriers of coding, the circumstance that our description will be in
words or figures or pictures but that what we describe is going to be in
flesh and blood and action-even disregarding that hurdle of translation,
we shall never be able to claim final knowledge of anything whatsoever.
Gregory Bateson (1979: 27) Mind and Nature. A necessary Unity. New York:
Dutton
On 2024-02-13 16:37, David Rose wrote:
An interesting feature of SFL, in contrast to some other linguistic--
schools, is an absence of published criticism of each other’s work.
You can see this ethic of learning from each other and getting on with
it continually in Halliday’s interviews. Somewhere he criticises
some linguists’ quasi-scientific notion of ‘falsifying’ with
counter-examples, but I can’t find it now. Instead, here’s Jay
Lemke on theories and observations...
Theories are complex ways of talking about phenomena that are
constantly modified to be more useful, but which are never proven and
almost never disproven, either. They are used when they seem useful,
modified again and again until they have become in effect new
theories, and sometimes are simply allowed to fall into disuse because
they answer questions no one wants to ask anymore, or because a new
theory seems more useful or more interesting.
Observations are always descriptions in the language of some theory.
The observer decides what to look for on the basis of a theory,
decides how to look for it, again using the theory, and decides when
he has found it, again using criteria of theory...
Sometimes a theory is added to or modified in the course of trying to
give a better description of some observation, and if others find the
modification useful, it will continue to be used and become a part of
the theory.
Lemke, J. L. (1990). _Talking science: Language, learning, and
values_. Ablex
https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED362379.pdf<https://protect-au.mimecast.com/s/mox-C71R2NTz5LZD7f8llYs?domain=files.eric.ed.gov>
Martin, J. R. (Ed.). (2013). _Interviews with MAK Halliday: Language
Turned Back on Himself_. Bloomsbury.
