A STUDY ON GRAMMATICAL METAPHOR IN ENGLISH BUSINESS LETTERS

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

VŨ LỆ HUYỀN

A STUDY ON GRAMMATICAL METAPHOR IN
ENGLISH BUSINESS LETTERS
(Nghiên cứu về ẩn dụ ngữ pháp trong thư thương mại tiếng Anh)
M.A. MINOR THESIS

Field: English Linguistics
Code: 60 22 15

Hanoi, 2011


VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI
UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES
FACULTY OF POST-GRADUATE STUDIES

VŨ LỆ HUYỀN

A STUDY ON GRAMMATICAL METAPHOR IN
ENGLISH BUSINESS LETTERS
(Nghiên cứu về ẩn dụ ngữ pháp trong thư thương mại tiếng Anh)
M.A. MINOR THESIS

Field: English Linguistics
Code: 60.22.15
Supervisor: Dr. NGUYỄN HUY KỶ

Hanoi, 2011


3

STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP

I hereby certify that the thesis entitled A Study on Grammatical Metaphor in English
Business Letters is my own study in the fulfillment of the requirements for the M.A Degree at
Faculty of Post – Graduate Studies, University of Languages and International Studies,
Vietnam National University, Hanoi.
Hanoi, September 2011

Vũ Lệ Huyền


4

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

I am very glad to have this opportunity to give my heartfelt thanks to all who have
given me a lot of help and encouragement in my preparation of this thesis.
First of all, my heartfelt appreciation goes to Dr. Nguyễn Huy Kỷ , my supervisor, for
his wide knowledge, his constant support and endless interest towards my work. Without his
enthusiasm and encouragement, I would probably not complete the paper.
I also owe my warm thanks to Prof. Hoàng Văn Vân for his invaluable and interesting
lectures on Functional Grammar which provide me with the foundation of idea for this study.
I’d like to take this opportunity to thank all the lecturers as well as the officers working
at Faculty of Post-Graduate Studies, University of Languages and International Studies,

Vietnam National University for their great help
Besides, my gratitude goes to all the members in my family for their great
consideration, love, patience and support during my M.A course, especially the fulfillment of
the thesis.


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ABSTRACT
This study focuses on the investigation of grammatical metaphor in English business letters.
The theoretical framework for the analysis is mainly based on the systemic functional
linguistic theory by M.A.K Halliday, Christian Matthiessen, and James Martin, who are
considered as the representatives of systemic functional linguistics. The corpus of the study
contains 20 real life English business letters chosen randomly. Through a variety of methods,
namely qualitative and quantitative, synthetic and analytic, the study investigates the
frequency, the proportion and the types of grammatical metaphor used in the corpus. The
results of the study show that grammatical metaphor appeared considerably frequently in the
business letters. Then some suggestions for pedagogical implication are also given with the
hope of helping ESP students easily approach grammatical metaphor in general and in
business letter discourse in particular. It is also hoped that the findings will contribute to a
fuller understanding of business letter discourse.


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TABLE OF CONTENTS

STATEMENT OF AUTHORSHIP …………………………………………………………….i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS ……………………………………………………………………ii
ABSTRACT …………………………………………………………………………………..iii

TABLE OF CONTENTS …………………………………………………………………...... iv
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS ………………………………………………………………...vii
LIST OF TABLES AND FIGURES

PART A: INTRODUCTION ………………………………………………… 1
1. Rationale ……………………………………………………………………...1
2. Objectives of the study ………………………………………………………..2
3. Scope of the study …………………………………………………………….3
4. Methods of the study ………………………………………………………….3
5. Design of the study ……………………………………………………………3
PART B: DEVELOPMENT …………………………………………………...5
CHAPTER 1: THEORETICAL BACKGROUND: OVERVIEW ON
SYSTEMIC FUNCTIONAL GRAMMAR ………………5
1.1 Introduction ………………………………………………………………….5
1.2. Language and context ………………………………………………………5
1.3. Metafunctions ……………………………………………………………….7
1.4. Summary …………………………………………………………………..10
CHAPTER 2: THE NOTION OF GRAMMATICAL METAPHOR ……..11
2.1. Introduction ………………………………………………………………..11
2.2. Definitions of Metaphor …………………………………………………...11


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2.3. Grammatical metaphor …………………………………………………….12
2.4. Grammatical metaphor vs. Lexical Metaphor ……………………………13
2.5. Classification of Grammatical Metaphor …………………………………15
2.5.1. Ideational Metaphor …………………………………………………...15
2.5.2. Interpersonal Metaphor ………………………………………………..18
2.5.2.1. Modality metaphors …………………………………………….18

2.5.2.2. Mood metaphors ………………………………………………..18
2.6. Summary …………………………………………………………………..19
CHAPTER 3: GRAMMATICAL METAPHOR IN ENGLISH BUSINESS
LETTERS …………………………………………………….21
3.1. Introduction ………………………………………………………………..21
3.2. Definition of Business Letters ……………………………………………..22
3.3. Classification of Business Letters …………………………………………22
3.4. Characteristics of Business Letters ………………………………………..23
3.4. 1. Characteristics of Business Letters in general …………………...... 23
3.4.2. Characteristics of business letters in terms of field, tenor and mode....24
3.5. The use of Grammatical Metaphor in Business Letters …………………...26
3.5.1. Data analysis framework …………………………………………. …26
3.5.2. Results ………………………………………………………………..33
3.5.2.1. Frequency of use of grammatical metaphor …………………….33
3.5.2.2. Types of Grammatical metaphor used ………………………….33
3.5.3. Discussion ………………………………………………………...35
3. 6. Summary ………………………………………………………………….36

PART C: CONCLUSION …………………………………………37
1. Recapitulation ……………………………………………………………….37


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2. Implications …………………………………………………………………38
3. Limitations of the study ……………………………………………………..38
4. Suggestions for further studies ………………………………………………39
REFERENCES ………………………………………………………………………..40
APPENDIX 1 …………………………………………………………………………...I
APPENDIX 2…………………………………………………………………………..X

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LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS
SFG: Systemic Functional Grammar
GM: Grammatical Metaphor
ESP: English for Specific Purposes

LIST OF FIGURES AND TABLES
Figure 1: Genre, register and language ………………………………………………………7
Figure 2: Metafunctional Layering ……………………………………………………………8
Figure 3: Independence of metafunctions ……………………………………………………..9
Figure 4: Mapping of components ……………………………………………………………12
Figure 5: Two perspectives on metaphor ……………………………………………………..13
Figure 6: Two perspectives on metaphorical variation ……………………………………….15
Figure 7: Direction of metaphorization………………………………………………………..30
Table 1: Types of grammatical metaphor……………………………………………………..29
Table 2: Frequency of use of grammatical metaphor in business letters ……………...............33
Table 3: Types of grammatical metaphor used in the corpus ………………………………...35


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PART A: INTRODUCTION
1. Rationale
Metaphor, based on the association of similarity, is one of the two basic types of semantic
transference (metaphor and metonymy) that have been an interest for a great number of
linguistic researchers. According to Galperin (1981), the term “metaphor” can be understood
as the transference of some quality from one subject to another. Halliday gives a more detailed

notion, metaphor is a verbal transference; a variation in the expression of meanings which
involves a non-literal use of a word. In particular, metaphor is an irregularity of content
that consists on the use of a word in a sense different from its proper one and related to it in
terms of similarity. Let’s see examples (1) and (2).
(1) The sky is crying.
(2) The old professor emeritus is a rock that is becoming brittle with age.
Following the previous definitions, (1) includes an example of metaphor, i.e. “crying”.
This word is used for something resembling that which it usually refers to, that is, it is
used to refer to the weather state of being raining although it usually refers to the physical
and emotional state of being crying. Example (2) includes a metaphor, too. In this case, the
word “rock” is used in an improper sense, it refers to beings having the quality of being
hard and the reason for this transference is the resemblance between the literal and
metaphorical references of this term, that is, the resemblance between rocks and hard
persons.
Metaphor is a very important feature in human language and is always a subject of central
interest in the study of stylistics. But traditional linguistics has long focused only on lexical
metaphor whereas systemic functional linguistics has paid much attention on grammatical
metaphor, a term derived from the notion that "the form of the grammar relates naturally to the
meanings that are being encoded" (Halliday 1994: xvii).


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To be a teacher of ESP of business field, I have found that grammatical metaphor seems to be
a strange notion to our students so I would like to make an investigation into grammatical
metaphor in business letters with the hope of bringing this knowledge into my teaching work.
English has been widely used in almost every field, particularly in business. As a popular
means of communication, English is considered a key to success in international business. And
in this business world, in spite of widespread developments in communication technology,
business letters are still widely used in the world as a main channel of business

correspondence. To achieve desirable results in communicating through business letters,
besides taking some remarkable features into account such as: style, language, structure of a
business letter, an aspect of the lexicogrammar which involves a higher level of complexity
in the process of production and interpretation of clauses – the use of grammatical metaphor
should be paid a great attention, too. However, it has not attracted enough research attention. If
we have a good knowledge of grammatical metaphor, we can achieve the desired effect when
dealing with business letters. We may have a better and more thorough understanding of this
written type of discourse.
A functional analysis of grammatical metaphor in discourse, especially in business letters will
be very helpful to benefit English learners in better understanding and employing target
language and thus improving the communicative competence more effectively.
Those theoretical and practical significances have inspired me to carry out A Study
on Grammatical Metaphor in English Business Letters.

2. Objectives of the study
The objectives of this paper are:
(i) to give a general understanding of grammatical metaphor in the light of functional
linguistics.
(ii) to examine some typical characteristics of business letters to show the general features of
this genre.
(iii) to give an analysis of the corpus of business letters in terms of grammatical metaphor in
order to see how this notable feature is used.


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It is hoped that with these objectives, a full understanding of the use of grammatical metaphor
in business letters will be achieved.
Therefore, the research questions raised here are:
1) What is the frequency of the use of grammatical metaphor in English business letters?

2) What types of grammatical metaphor are used in English business letters?

3. Scope of the study
Within the limitation of a minor thesis, this study only attempts to find out grammatical
metaphor in the chosen corpus of English business letters. The corpus is a collection of 20
authentic real-life English business letters randomly chosen from the eBook titled Instant
Business Letters Kit by Shawn Fawcett. I think such a corpus is large enough for a M.A minor
thesis. However, the conclusions are by no means representatives of business letters in all
cases.
The theoretical framework for the analysis of grammatical metaphor in this paper is mainly
based on the systemic functional linguistic theory by M.A.K Halliday, Christian Matthiessen,
and James Martin, who are considered as the representatives of systemic functional linguistics.
After analyzing grammatical metaphor used in the chosen letters, some suggestions for
pedagogical implication are also given with the hope of helping ESP students easily approach
grammatical metaphor in general and in business letters in particular.

4. Methods of the study
The study employs the combination of qualitative and quantitative methods. Qualitative
method helps the study approach the business letter samples and find out the general features
and grammatical metaphor used in these letters. After the qualitative analysis, the data is also
quantitatively analyzed. In the investigation of data, the descriptive method is employed to
give a detailed description of grammatical metaphor found in the corpus. After the description
of the data, the combination of analytic and synthetic methods will be employed.

5. Design of the study
The study consists of three parts:
Part A: Introduction. This part introduces the rationale, the objectives, the scope and the
methods of the study.

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Part B: Development. This part is divided into three chapters.
Chapter 1 deals with the theoretical background of the study. An over view of
functional grammar is provided with important concepts relevant to the topic framework.
Chapter 2 focuses on the notion of metaphor from traditional and new views. Then the
notion of grammatical metaphor will be clarified. Types of grammatical metaphor will be also
discussed in this chapter.
Chapter 3 is the main part of the study. Firstly, some linguistic features of English
business letters will be taken into consideration. Then the analysis of the corpus in terms of
grammatical metaphor and the results of the study will be presented in this chapter.
Part C is the conclusion of the study which provides the recapitulation with reference to the
methods, the objectives and the findings of the present study. Then some implications for ESP
teaching and learning at tertiary level are also provided. After that it gives some suggestions
for further studies basing on the limitations of the thesis.


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PART B: DEVELOPMENT
THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
CHAPTER 1: OVERVIEW ON SYSTEMIC FUNCTIONAL GRAMMAR
1.1 Introduction
We use language to interact with one another to construct and maintain our interpersonal
relations and the social order that lies behind them and in doing so we interpret and represent
the world for one another and for ourselves. Language is a natural part of the process of living,
it is also used to store the experience built up in the course of that process, both personal and
collective. It is (among other things) a tool for representing knowledge or to look at this in
terms of language itself, for constructing meaning (Matthiessen & Halliday).
From this point of view, Systemic Functional Grammar (SFG) w a s developed by Michael

Halliday and his colleagues. This has been a great contribution to linguistic theory. It is
different from all the previous models of grammar in that it interprets language as interrelated
sets of options for making meaning and seeks to provide a clear relationship between
functions and grammatical systems (Halliday, 1994). Our overview on the SFG will focuse on
some of the key points (Language and social context, Context of culture, Context of situation,
Metafunctions… ) of this theory in the next part.
1.2. Language and context
A full understanding of a text is often impossible without reference to the context in which
it occurs. And context can be considered from two perspectives: the context of culture and
the context of situation. The former refers to the broad sociocultural environment, which
includes ideology, social conventions and institutions. Halliday argues that it is the social
context for communication that regulates the way the semantics of language are employed.


15

The latter relates to the specific situations within the sociocultural environment (Droga &
Humphrey, 2002).
Systemic-Functional Linguistics (SFL) is a theory of language centred around the notion of
language function. While SFL accounts for the syntactic structure of language, it places the
function of language as central (what language does, and how it does it), in preference to more
structural approaches, which place the elements of language and their combinations as central.
SFL starts at social context, and looks at how language both acts upon, and is constrained by,
this social context. Knowledge of context (culture and situation) tells us significant
information about how language will be used.
A central notion is 'stratification', such that language is analyzed in terms of four strata:
Context, Semantics, Lexico-Grammar and Phonology.
SFL treats language and social context as complementary levels of semiosis, related by the
concept of realisation. The interpretation of social context then includes two communication
factors, genre (context of culture) and register (context of situation) (Martin,1992:495). The

context of culture can be thought of as deriving from a vast complex network of all of the
genres which make up a particular culture. Genres are staged, goal oriented social processes in
which people engage as members of the culture.
The context of situation of a text has been theorised by Halliday (Halliday and Hasan,
1985:12) in terms of the contextual variables of Field, Tenor and Mode.
Field of discourse: refers to what is happening, to the nature of the social action that is taking
place: what is it the participants are engaged in, what is the text about?
Tenor of discourse: refers to who is taking part, to the nature of the participants, their statuses
and roles: what kinds of role relationship obtain among the participants, including permanent
and temporary relationships of one kind or another…
Mode of discourse: refers to what part the language is playing, what it is that the participants
are expecting the language to do for them in that situation: the symbolic organization of the
text, the status that is has, and its function in the context, including the channel (is it spoken or
written or some combination of the two?) and also the rhetorical mode, what is being achieved
by the text in terms of such categories as persuasive, expository, didactic and the like.


16

The summary of the relationship between language and context is displayed in Figure 1 below:

Figure 1: Genre, register and language
Martin and Rose (2003: 254)
1.3. Metafunctions
With respect to the context of situation, all the situational differences between texts can be
explained by three aspects of the context, namely, field, tenor, and mode. Field refers to what
is to be talked or written about; tenor is the relationship between the speaker and listener or
the writer and reader; mode refers to the channel of communication (Butt, et al., 2000). These
three aspects reflect the three main functions, or metafunctions of language. Halliday (1994)
describes the three metafunctions as follows:

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(1) The ideational/experiential metafunction: It enables people to use language to represent
experience, and is influenced by field.
(2) The interpersonal metafunction: It enables people to use language to enact social
relationships, and is influenced by tenor.
(3) The textual metafunction: It enables people to use language to construct logical and
coherent texts, and is influenced by mode.
Each of the three metafunctions is about a different aspect of the world, and is concerned with
a different mode of meaning of clauses. The ideational metafunction is about the natural world
in the broadest sense, including our own consciousness, and is concerned with clauses as
representations. The interpersonal metafunction is about the social world, especially the
relationship between speaker and hearer, and is concerned with clauses as exchanges. The
textual metafunction is about the verbal world, especially the flow of information in a text, and
is concerned with clauses as messages. The ideational metafunction relates to the context of
culture, the interpersonal metafunction relates to the context of situation, and the textual
metafunction relates to the verbal context.
In each metafunction, an analysis of a clause gives a different kind of structure composed from
a different set of elements. In the ideational metafunction, a clause is analysed into Process,
Participants and Circumstances, with different participant types for different process types. In
the interpersonal metafunction, a clause is analysed into Mood and Residue, with the mood
element further analysed into Subject and Finite. In the textual metafunction, a clause is
analysed into Theme and Rheme.

Figure 2: Metafunctional Layering
(Matthiessen & Bateman, 1991)

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Figure 2 shows an analysis of the sentence “In this job, Anne, we're working with silver” into
three different structures in the three metafunctions. This kind of diagram is called a
“metafunctional layering” diagram in SFG.
The metafunctional theory is part of the “functional” side of SFG, but it is also important in
the “systemic” side of SFG. Each metafunction has a principal system in the networks for
clauses, verbal groups and nominal groups. For example the transitivity system is the principal
system for the ideational metafunction in the clause network. An important theoretical point is
that in general, in the system networks, the systems within each metafunction are closely
interconnected, but are largely independent of systems in the other metafunctions. This is
illustrated in Figure 3.

Figure 3: Independence of metafunctions
(Matthiessen and Halliday)


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In this network fragment, there are normal dependency relationships within the mood region
of the interpersonal metafunction, between the mood type and indicative type systems and
between the indicative type and interrogative type systems, and there is also a further
interconnection: the tagging system can be entered either from the imperative feature of the
mood type system or from the declarative feature of the indicative type system. But there are
no interconnections at all between the mood region of the interpersonal metafunction and the
trasitivity region of the ideational metafunction.
1.4. Summary
In this chapter, an overview of systemic functional linguistics has been briefly given. It is
described as a functional-semantic approach to language which explores how language is used
in different contexts, and how it is construed for using as a semiotic system. Language is

analyzed in terms of four strata: Context (context of culture and context of situation),
Semantics, Lexico-Grammar and Phonology. SFL treats language and social context as
complementary levels of semiosis, related by the concept of realization. The context of culture
is related to the genres which make up a particular culture. Genres are staged, goal oriented
social processes in which people engage as members of the culture.
The context of situation of a text can be analyzed in terms of the contextual variables of Field,
Tenor and Mode. These three aspects reflect the three main functions, or metafunctions of
language (ideational, interpersonal and textual) which then can be realized through one or
more of the lexico-grammatical systems (transitivity, mood or theme). On this linguistic
background, a phenomenon occurs. It is called grammatical metaphor, which is introduced by
Halliday. Further discussion on this phenomenon can be found in the next section.


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CHAPTER 2: THE NOTION OF GRAMMATICAL METAPHOR
2.1. Introduction
As we know metaphor is a very important feature in human language. There is no
exaggeration when we say that language itself is a metaphor. So metaphor is one of the most
popular and widespread figures of speech with a great variety of definitions given. This
chapter will deal with the discussion on metaphor, the two levels of metaphor: lexical and
grammatical metaphors. And of course further discussion and focus will be put on
grammatical metaphor.
2.2. Definitions of Metaphor
We now start with the definitions of metaphors. Aristotle is considered to be the first one that
builds a theory of metaphor. He defines metaphor as a “transfer of a name belonging
elsewhere” (cited in Michiel Leezenberg, 2001:33). However, this definition is merely at the
level of words.
Two cognitive linguists who have had a great contribution to the study on metaphor are Lakoff
and Johnson with a very well-known book “Metaphor We live By”. In this book, they defined

metaphor as a process by which we conceive “one thing in terms of another, and its primary
function is understanding” (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980: 36). They have also revealed that
metaphors are not just found in poetic or literary language, but also play an important role in
colloquial language and everyday use.
A simplified definition is that metaphor is a “mapping of the structure of a source model onto
a target model” (Ungerer and Schmid 1999: 120). Metaphor is also defined in “A Handbook of
Literature” by William Harmon and Hugh Homan (1996) as “an analogy identifying one
object with another and ascribing to the first object one or more of the qualities of the second”.
In this definition, metaphor is viewed as the process of expressing one thing through another
due to the similarities of two objects.


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We can see that, most of the definitions discussed so far pay much attention to the
metaphorical movement at lexical level, the changes happen to words, and this is called lexical
metaphor.
Michael Halliday, one of the representatives for Systemic Functional Linguistics, suggests that
metaphor does not necessarily happen at the lexical level but often at the grammatical
level, which is called grammatical metaphor. And this interesting linguistic phenomenon
will be discussed thoroughly in the next session.
2.3. Grammatical Metaphor
Grammatical metaphor is one of the most interesting theoretical notions developed by
Halliday (1985/1994) within systemic-functional Grammar. In this research paradigm,
language is regarded as a semiotic system which comprises four different strata (context,
semantics, lexicogrammar, and phonology) related to each other by means of subsequent
realizations. Each realization involves making meaningful choices within the different systems
which make up each stratum. Thus, semantics is realized through the lexicogrammar, which is
in turn realized phonologically. With this general framework, grammatical metaphor may be
defined. Broadly speaking, a variation in the grammatical forms through which a semantic

choices typically realized in the lexicogrammar. At each of these two strata, there exist
different components which can map onto each other in one way or another, as shown in the
following figure (Halliday & Matthiessen, 1999).
Semantic stratum

sequence

Lexicogrammar stratum

clause complex

figure

clause

element

participant

Figure 4 : Mapping of components
In the figure, the solid lines indicate the usual mapping between the components in the
two strata. The discourse thus results is referred to as the “congruent” form (Halliday &
Matthiessen, 1999: 227). The dotted lines, on the other hand, indicate the unusual mapping


22

between the components and the resulting discourse is referred to as the “metaphorical” form.
In other words, when a sequence is mapped onto, and thus realized as, a clause complex, a
figure mapped onto and realized as a clause, an element mapped onto and realized as a

participant, the resulting clause complex, clause or participant is congruent. However, when a
sequence is mapped onto and realized as a clause or even an element, a figure is mapped onto
and realized as a participant, and an element is mapped onto a participant other than the usual
one, the resulting clause or participant is metaphorical.
2.4. Grammatical metaphor vs. Lexical Metaphor
Halliday (1985) suggests that metaphor does not necessarily happen at the lexical level but
often at the grammatical level, which is called grammatical metaphor. “We are looking
at metaphor not ‘from below’, as variation in the meaning of a given expression, but
rather ‘from above’, as variation in the expression of a given meaning” (1994: 342)
Halliday considered grammatical metaphor as a phenomenon “beyond the clause”. Metaphor
can be viewed from two different perspectives: traditional and new. Traditionally, metaphor is
viewed as variation in the use of words, i.e. variation in meaning: “a word is said to be used
with a transferred meaning” (Halliday: 1985). In this sense, a lexeme with a certain literal
meaning can have metaphorical, transferred uses or meanings. This is called a view “from
below”, taking the words as starting point, and then saying something about the meaning these
words realize. The other perspective introduced by Halliday is one “from above”. In this point
of view, the starting point is a meaning and metaphor is defined as “variation in the expression
of meanings”. These two perspectives can be seen clearly in Figure 5 below.
seen “from below”
literally
‘a moving mass

seen ‘from above’

metaphorically

‘many people (protested)’

‘a moving mass of feeling

of water

or rhetoric
a large number
flood

(of protests)
congruent

a flood
(of protests)
metaphorical


23

Figure 5. Two perspectives on metaphor
(Halliday 1994: 342)
Taking the view ‘from above’, it is recognized that “lexical selection is just one aspect of
lexicogrammatical

selection,

or

‘wording’;

and

that

metaphorical

variation

is

lexicogrammatical rather than simply lexical” (Halliday, 1994). This brings Halliday to
grammatical metaphor: There is a strong grammatical element in rhetorical transference; and
one we have recognized this we find that there is also such a thing as grammatical metaphor,
where the variation is essentially in the grammatical forms although often entailing some
lexical variation as well. (ibid)
In the area of grammatical metaphor, Halliday claims that the term ‘literal’ is no longer
appropriate. The variation between the different expressions of the same meaning is defined in
terms of markedness: a certain forms can be recognized as unmarked expressions of the given
meaning, conforming to the ‘typical ways of saying things’ – these forms are the nonmetaphorical variants, which are called ‘congruent’ realizations.
It is useful to point out some general aspects of the shift in the perspective: from a focus on
lexical variation (traditional view) to a focus on grammatical variation (new view).
The recognition of grammatical metaphor is a consequence of the ‘view from above’.
According to Halliday, the main feature of the view ‘from above’ is that it defines metaphor as
variation in the expression of a given meaning, rather than variation in the meaning of a given
expression. The main differences between the two perspectives can be summarized in Figure 5
Traditional view: ‘from below’
focus on lexical metaphor
metaphor as variation in the meaning of a

New view: from above
focus on grammatical metaphor
metaphor as variation in the expression of a

given expression
comparison of the meaning of one lexeme

given meaning
comparison of various grammatical

(in different collocational contexts)

configurations as expressions of the same

literal versus metaphorical meanings of a

meaning
degrees of (in)congruency: congruent and

given lexeme

less congruent expression of a given


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the concept of realization is not used in the

meaning
the feature of congruency applies to

traditional view on metaphor

realizations of the same meaning

Figure 6. Two perspectives on metaphorical variation
2.5. Classification of Grammatical Metaphor
Halliday makes a distinction between two main types of grammatical metaphor: There are two
main types of grammatical metaphor in the clause: metaphors of mood (including modality)
and metaphor of transitivity. In terms of the model of semantic functions, there are
respectively, interpersonal metaphors and ideational metaphors. (Halliday, 1994:343). Some
details of these two types will be discussed in the next part.
2.5.1. Ideational Grammatical Metaphors
Ideational Grammatical Metaphors are called metaphor of transitivity. The grammatical
variation between congruent and incongruent forms here applies to transitivity configurations,
and can be analyzed in terms of the functional structure of these configurations (Miriam
Taverniers, 2002). In other words, the ideational function, with which we are concerned here,
is closely tied to the transitivity system, which enables us to construe the world of our
experience into a limited set of process types (material, mental, relational, behavioural,
verbal,

and existential). Processes

are

realized

as a configuration of

transitivity

functions which represent the process, the participants in the situation, the attributes
assigned to participants, and the circumstances associated with the process. Processes are
typically realized by verbal groups; participants (Actor, Senser, Phenomenon, Carrier,

etc.) are usually worded as nominal groups;
adjectives;

participants’ attributes are represented by

and circumstances (of time, place, manner, etc.) are generally associated with

the process. Processes are typically realized

by verbal groups; participants (Actor,

Senser, Phenomenon, Carrier, etc.) are usually worded as nominal groups;
attributes are represented by adjectives;

participants’

and circumstances (of time, place, manner,

etc.) are generally associated with adverbial groups or prepositional phrases. These are
typical patterns of lexicogrammatical realization (what Halliday calls congruent forms),


25

but other less typical encodings are also potentially available to the language user (i.e.
metaphorical forms). By way of illustration, consider these two examples
(a) We walked in the evening along the river to Henley.
(b) Our evening walk along the river took us to Henley.
It may be easily observed that both clauses (a) and (b) allow us to describe the same
situation. However, the process constituents in (a) have been realized in a congruent fashion,

whereas (b) evidences a preference for metaphorical modes of expression. Thus, the material
Process walk, realized by a verb in (a), is encoded in (b) as a participant (Actor) which attains
lexical expression by means of a noun. The two circumstantial elements of time (in the
evening) and place (along the river) become in (b) respectively, a classifier and a qualifier of
the new Actor; the circumstance of time is now realized as a noun, whereas the place element
remains a prepositional phrase (although at a different rank within the clause). The Actor of (a)
is split into two parts; the first part functions as a possessor of the entity (our evening walk
along the river), the other as Affected (us) of a new material process expressed by the verb
took. Halliday (1994: 346) argues that a combined analysis should match the constituents of
the congruent and metaphorical versions as much as possible so that it may be easier to grasp
contrasts in grammatical function; this may also help us to show the simultaneous occurrence
of lexical metaphor and, most importantly, to draw justified conclusions as to the possible
functional motivation for the choice of a metaphorical variant:
‘on the fifth day’
circumstance:

‘they’
participant:

‘at the summit’ ‘arrived’
circumstance:
process:

Time

Actor

Place

Material

prep.phrase

n.group

prep.phrase

verbal group

the fifth day
participant:

saw
process

them
participant

at the summit
circumstance

Senser

Mental

Phenomenon

Place

n.group

perception

n.group

prep.phrase

verbal group
It is possible to indicate a “chain of metaphorical interpretations” (Halliday, 1994) as steps in
between the metaphorical form under analysis and a completely congruent expression. An