Appraising glances: evaluating Martin's model of APPRAISAL

Abstract

The development of APPRAISAL theory has opened up areas of interpersonal meanings that had been relatively neglected within Systemic Functional Linguistics and other approaches to the analysis of discourse. The model is comprehensive and discourse-based, and in many respects it works well in practice. However, text analysis using the model has thrown up a number of problematic aspects; and in this paper I explore some of the problems in the attitudinal systems. In particular, I question whether all representations of feeling (through mental processes or agnate attributes) should be categorized as AFFECT, and I propose a more restricted definition of AFFECT. I also examine critically the criteria for distinguishing between JUDGEMENT and APPRECIATION, particularly in the area ofbehavior. Finally, I discuss what I call the 'Chinese box' issue: the possibility of seeing APPRAISAL choices as layered, with a choice in one system functioning as a token of a choice in a different system. This appears to be necessary in order to capture how APPRAISAL works in discourse, but it can become dangerously impressionistic. I argue for an approach to analysis which, while taking such layering into account, consistently stays as close to the wording of the text as possible.

“Apparently, women don't know how to operate doors": A corpus-based analysis of women stereotypes in the TV series <i>3rd Rock from the Sun</i>

“…This is identified as evoked (implicit) appraisal (cf. Eggins & Slade, 1997: 126;Thompson, 2008). A case in point is provided by Kaltenbacher (2006), who, in his research on tourism websites, claims that the sentence "On a hot summer day, a beach on the lake is the place to be!"…”

“…Consequently, the same item can exhibit multiple appraisal features and thus admit a primary and a secondary evaluation. Thompson (2008) defines this as the 'Chinese box' effect, i.e., the possibility of seeing Appraisal choices as layered, with a choice in one system functioning as a token of a choice in a different system. In the analysis of 3RFS, when faced with two or more rival interpretations, a decision was made to include only one evaluation (cf.…”

“…The present study, mainly due to space limitations, is text-oriented. The analytical framework applied here is eclectic and relies mostly on the insights of Appraisal Theory (Martin & White, 2005;Thompson, 2008), Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) and the methodological principles of CorpusAssisted Discourse Studies (CADS). Discourse analysis is a vast and complex field (cf.…”

“…The present research is mainly text-oriented (cf. Thompson, 2008) and focuses on the verbal construction of stereotypes, thus taking into account some relevant discourse variables, in particular, the positions that characters adopt towards their propositional content. The results obtained provide new insights into gender ideologies and how they are humorously negotiated or subverted in the sitcom.…”

Expressive Speech Acts in Educational e-chats

“…In the last years, however, there seems to be a growing interest in expressive acts (Ronan, 2015) and the expressive function of language in general (Potts, 2007;Bednarek, 2008;Thompson, 2008;Riemer, 2013;Foolen, 2016, among many others). This paper is intended to contribute to this growing body of research on the expressive function of language by means of a data-driven approach to a corpus of naturally occurring computer-mediated communication (CMC henceforth) at a Spanish University with two groups of students: in group 1, the students' mother tongue (i.e.…”