Re: Word culture

Gordon Wells (gwells who-is-at oise.on.ca)
Wed, 18 Oct 1995 23:17:17 -0400 (EDT)

Jim's answer to my question about how meaning is made in music has
considerable appeal. But it still leaves unanswered the question about
what sort of meaning it is.

On my reading of Hallidayam metafunctions, all three metafunctions are
involved in any _linguistic_ text; furthermore, they are the realization
of the categories (respectively) of field, tenor and mode in the semiotic
construal of the situation. If field:ideational meaning is elided in
music, (? i.e. music is not "about" the activity ongoing in the
situation), what _is_ it "about"? Or, if that is an inappropriate
question, what would be a better way of expressing my puzzlement?

Gordon Wells, gwells who-is-at oise.on.ca
OISE, Toronto.

On Thu, 19 Oct 1995, James Robert Martin wrote:

>
> Re Gordon Wells 3rd point on the different ways in which meaning is made
> in music and verbiage - one way of thinking about this in terms of
> Hallidayan metafunctions (ideational, interpersonal and textual) is that
> music typically elides ideational meaning, thus foregrounding
> interpersonal and textual meaning - which is to say that generally it is
> not concerned with construing a 'reality' that appears to us as natural.
>
> Jim Martin
> Department of Linguistics, University of Sydney
>
>