A Problem With Exercise 5: Practising Mood And Polarity Agnation

Martin, Matthiessen & Painter (2010: 214):

Exercise 5 Practising MOOD and POLARITY agnation

Analyse the verbal groups in the following clauses; construct agnate clauses to complement each example with respect to POLARITY (positive vs negative) and MOOD (declarative vs interrogative vs imperative).

 

Blogger Comments:

Here again the authors misrepresent the logical structure of the verbal group by including the Event as an element, and thereby mislead the reader to do likewise. Halliday & Matthiessen (2014: 411n):

A major point of difference between the verbal group and the nominal group is that the Event (unlike the Thing) is not the point of departure for the recursive modifying relationship. Hence it does not figure as an element in the notation.