What is it about?
This paper starts by studying all the participants in speech events in Arabic then it focuses on the main one i.e. the Sayer. Since verbal projection is omnipresent in different areas of the lexicogrammar, it only makes sense to look into these fractal motifs to have an idea about the different guises under which the Sayer appears. News reports, academic discourse and fictional narratives to name a few text types have been analyzed to properly account for the registerial variety in construing this role.
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Why is it important?
Projection as a notion was introduced by Halliday (1977 and 1985). This concept is extremely valuable as it helps account for aspects of the grammar that has not been described properly. Traditional accounts of Arabic as well as Standard reference grammars of Modern Standard Arabic did treat all that which is projected as complement/ object and by doing so they all missed out on accurately accounting for some nuances in the way this type of activity is construed. This article in this sense is an attempt to highlight one of those aspects that have not been properly accounted for viz. the different participants involved in this clause type and how Arabic construes them.
Perspectives
I hope that this article is one of many to come that would enrich the Arab tradition. Anyone who is familiar with the work of medieval Arab grammarians is in awe of the level of sophistication of their work. There are still areas for improvement though and I hope this article will provide an opportunity for discussions about ways the Arab tradition can be improved.
Mohamed Ali Bardi
Macquarie University
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: Semogenic variation in the construal of sayerhood in Arabic, Language Context and Text The Social Semiotics Forum, September 2022, John Benjamins,
DOI: 10.1075/langct.21014.bar.
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