Functions of Language - Volume 22, Issue 2, 2015

This paper explores the language used by critics to appraise wine, at the same time investigating the validity and usefulness of categories in the Appraisal framework, as set out by Martin & White (2005). Our analysis of a corpus of wine reviews suggests that sub-categories of Appreciation — used to evaluate products, and non-human targets by reference to aesthetics and other values — may need extending or enhancing in terms of delicacy, depending on the register of the texts under investigation. An adapted version of the Appraisal system of Attitude is used as basis for our investigation. The assessment of our adapted model was carried out in the form of a comparison between two analysts’ independent annotations which function as a basis for a critical discussion of the proposed categories. The bulk of the paper discusses the relevance of our findings for the analysis of specialised genres in general, the field of wine criticism in particular and the application of the Appraisal model for discourse analysis. We conclude that the understanding and application of analytical categories is dependent on the analyst’s previous experience with the Appraisal model as well as acquaintance with the discourse field.

This article examines modal expressions with the comparative adverbs better, rather and sooner in American English, and assesses to what extent they have grammaticalized. The corpus data offer evidence that the three comparative modal groups exhibit considerable phonetic reduction in the 1810–2009 period studied. Analysis of several aspects of the constructions, such as subject types, temporal reference and comparative meaning, reveals which conditions promoted this erosion. However, the data also indicate that the three groups are semantically and constructionally quite heterogeneous. In fact, this article proposes a grammaticalization scenario for the rather and sooner structures that is different from the one posited for the better structures.

In this article we show that verbo-nominal expressions be on the/one’s way/road emerged as lexical composite predicates in Old English. These templates came to be elaborated by directional adjuncts, adjuncts describing states or events, and purpose clauses. In Late Modern English, the structure with a to-infinitive was functionally reinterpreted as a secondary auxiliary + lexical head, whose core sense is imminential aspect. On the basis of this case study, we develop a theoretical reflection on the differences between lexicalization and grammaticalization, as they emerge within a functional-constructional approach. On the syntagmatic axis, we adopt Boye & Harder’s (2007, 2012) principles for distinguishing lexicalized from grammaticalized uses on the basis of their having primary or secondary status in discourse usage. On the paradigmatic axis, we rethink the neo-Firthian distinction between lexis and grammar in diachronic terms. Individual lexical items are defined by their collocations (Sinclair 1991) and grammatical values by their systemic interdependencies (Halliday 1992). Lexicalization is then characterized by the development of distinctive collocational networks and grammaticalization by the acquisition of the defining interdependencies with values from related grammatical systems.