Clause As Exchange

4.1 The nature of dialogue

The most fundamental types of speech role, which lie behind all the more specific types
that we may eventually be able to recognize, are just two: (i) giving, and (ii) demanding. Either
the speaker is giving something to the listener (a piece of information, for example, as in Boof
keeps scaring me) or he is demanding something from him Even these elementary categories
already involve complex notions: giving means ‘inviting to receive’, and demanding means
‘inviting to give’. The speaker is not only doing something himself; he is also requiring
something of the listener. Typically, therefore, an ‘act’ of speaking is something that might more
appropriately be called an interact: it is an exchange, in which giving implies receiving and
demanding implies giving in response. These two variables, when taken together, define the four
primary speech functions of offer, command, statement and question. These, in turn, are
matched by a set of desired responses: accepting an offer, carrying out a command,
acknowledging a statement and answering a question.
Please see the table bellow
Commodity exchanged
Role in exchange (a)goods & services (b)information
1. Giving ‘offer’ ‘statement’
Would you like this teapot He’s giving her the teapot
2. demanding ‘command’ ‘question’
Give me that teapot What is he giving her?
When language is used to exchange information, the clause takes on the form of a
proposition. It becomes something that can be argued about – something that can be affirmed or
denied, and also doubted, contradicted, insisted on, accepted with reservation, qualified,
tempered, regretted, and so on. But we cannot use the term ‘proposition’ to refer to all the
functions of the clause as an interactive event, because this would exclude the exchange of
goods-&-services, the entire range of offers and commands.
4.2 The Mood Element
4.2.1 Structure of the Mood
The Mood element consists of two parts: (1) the Subject, which is a nominal group, and
(2) the Finite operator, which is part of a verbal group. The Subject, when it first appears, may
be any nominal group. If it is a personal pronoun, like he in the rhyme, it is simply repeated each
time. The Finite element is one of a small number of verbal operators expressing tense (e.g. is,
has) or modality. Note, however, that in some instances the Finite element and the lexical verb
are ‘fused’ into a single word, e.g. loves. This happens when the verb is in simple past or simple
present (tense), active (voice), positive (polarity) and neutral (contrast).
Here is finite elements in simple present and past tense
Tense Other categories In body of clause In tag
Simple present Negative (polarity) (he) doesn’t have Does (he)?
Contrastive (contrast) (he) does love Doesn’t (he)?
Passive (voice) (she) is loved Isn’t (she)?
None of above (he) loves Doesn’t (he)?
Simple past Negative (polarity) (he) didn’t give Did (he)?
Contrastive (contrast) (he) did gave Didn’t (he)?
Passive (voice) (it) was given Wasn’t (it)
None of above (he) gave Didn’t (he)?
4.2.2 Meaning of Subject and Finite
The Finite element, as its name implies, has the function of making the proposition finite.
That is to say, it circumscribes it; it brings the proposition down to earth, so that it is something
that can be argued about. A good way to make something arguable is to give it a point of
reference in the here and now; and this is what the Finite does. It relates the proposition to its
context in the speech event. And also because of the Subject.

The Subject supplies the rest of what it takes to form a proposition: namely, something by
reference to which the proposition can be affirmed or denied (cf. Chapter 2, Section 2.6, and
Halliday, 1984b, on the interpretation of the category of subject). For example, in the duke has
given away that teapot, hasn’t he?, the Finite has specifies reference to positive polarity and
present time, while the Subject the duke specifies the entity in respect of which the assertion is
claimed to have validity.
4.2.3 Function of the Mood element
 Hence the Mood element has a clearly defined semantic function: it carries the burden of the
clause as an interactive event. So it remains constant, as the nub of the proposition, unless some
positive step is taken to change it, as in The duke has given your aunt a new teapot, hasn’t he? –
No, he hasn’t. But (a) the duchess has. (b) he’s going to. Here the proposition is first disposed of,
by being rejected, in (i); this then allows for a new proposition, with change of Subject, as in (a),
or change of Finite, as in (b). Each of these two constituents, the Subject and the Finite, plays its
own specific and meaningful role in the propositional structure.

4.3 Other elements of Mood structure

4.3.1 Structure of the Residue
The Residue consists of functional elements of three kinds: Predicator, Complement and
Adjunct. There can be only one Predicator, one or two Complements, and an indefinite number
of Adjuncts up to, in principle, about seven.
4.3.2 types of Adjunct
There are two special types that do not follow the same principles of ordering, and do not
fall within the Residue at all. These are the modal Adjuncts and the conjunctive Adjunct.
4.3.3 Conjunctive Adjuncts
With conjunctive Adjuncts, we come to the limits of the concept of the clause as
exchange. Strictly speaking, they do not belong in this chapter at all; unlike modal Adjuncts,
which are interpersonal in function, conjunctive Adjuncts are textual – they set up a
contextualizing relationship obtaining between the clause as a message and some other (typically
preceding) portion of text.
4.3.4 Vocative and Expletives
This also is fairly mobile, occurring (a) thematically; (b) at the boundary between Theme and
Rheme (not usually between Mood and Residue), or (c) clausefinally; and with the same
intonation patterns as the comment Adjuncts. The Vocative can accompany a clause of any
mood, but it is relatively more frequent in ‘demanding’ clauses (interrogatives and imperatives)
than in ‘giving’ ones (declaratives).
4.4 Mood as System; further options
4.4.1 WH – Interrogative
 The WH- element is a distinct element in the interpersonal structure of the clause. Its
function is to specify the entity that the questioner wishes to have supplied. The WH- element is
always conflated with one or another of the three functions Subject, Complement or Adjunct. If
it is conflated with the Subject, it is part of the Mood element, and the order within the Mood
element must therefore be Subject
4.4.2 Exclamatives
Exclamative clauses of the kind just described have a distinctive grammar; but other
mood types may also realize exclamations; this includes yes/no interrogative clauses that are
negative in polarity.
4.4.3 Imperatives
The imperative has a different system of PERSON from the indicative. Since the
imperative is the mood for exchanging goods-&-services, its Subject is ‘you’ or ‘me’ or ‘you and
me’. If we take the ‘second person’, ‘you’, as the base form.
4.4.4 Mood and Tone
Here what is significant is the choice of tone, the melodic contour of the tone group:
whether the pitch is falling or rising, or neither, or some combination of the two.
4.4.5 Freedom
Far we have been concerned with ‘free’ clauses; the term ‘free’ is the entry condition to
the system of MOOD TYPE. Semantically, this means that ‘free’ clauses realize either
propositions or proposals, serving to develop exchanges in dialogue either by initiating new
exchanges or by responding to ones that have already been initiated. In contrast, ‘bound’ clauses
are not presented by the speaker as being open for negotiation. For instance, in Text 4-1, Jana
presents her mother with a problem in the form of a proposition realized by a ‘free’ clause, and
she backs this up with a reason realized by a ‘bound’ clause.

4.5 Polarity and modal assessment

POLARITY as the opposition between positive (It is. Do that!) and negative (It isn’t.
Don’t do that!); MODALITY as the speaker’s judgement, or request of the judgement of the
listener, on the status of what is being said (It could be. Couldn’t it be? You mustn’t do that.
Must you do that?). Both POLARITY and MODALITY are realized through the Mood element,
either through the Finite element (It is/It isn’t; It is/It must be) or through a separate mood
Adjunct (It is/It is not; It is/It certainly is). But interpersonal judgements, or assessments, extend
beyond the ‘core’ grammatical system of modality to include assessments of temporality and
intensity realized like modality through mood Adjuncts (e.g. It is/It already is/It almost is), and
also other types of assessments beyond the mood itself that relate either to the proposition being
exchanged (e.g. Fortunately it is: ‘it is, which is fortunate’) or to the act of exchanging it (e.g.
Frankly it is: ‘I’m telling you frankly it is’).
The positive/negative opposition is one that is fairly certain to be grammaticalized in
every language, in association with the clause as proposition or proposal. Typically the positive
clause is formally unmarked, while the negative is realized by some additional element: in
English, by the word not located in the neighbourhood of the verb Polarity is thus a choice
between yes and no. But these are not the only possibilities; there are intermediate degrees,
various kinds of indeterminacy that fall in between like ‘sometimes’ or ‘maybe’. These
intermediate degrees, between the positive and negative poles, are known collectively as
MODALITY. What the modality system does is to construe the region of uncertainty that lies
between ‘yes’ and ‘no’.

4.6 Absence of elements of the modal structure

Here are some kinds of this :
1. Ellipsis
2. Minor clauses

Exclamations are the limiting case of an exchange; they are verbal gestures of the speaker
addressed to no one in particular, although they may, of course, call for empathy on the part of
the addressee. Calls are the speaker calling to attention another person, or other entity treated as
capable of being addressed: deity, spirit, animal or inanimate object. Greetings include
salutations, e.g. Hullo!, Good morning!, Welcome!, Hi!, and valedictions, such as Goodbye!, See
you!; together with their responses, largely the same set of forms. Alarms bear some
resemblance to exclamatives, if only in voice quality; but they are addressed to another party,
and they are in general derivable from the grammar of the clause – they are intermediate between
major and minor clauses.

4.7 Clause as Subject

 In many instances an embedded clause functioning as Subject appears at the end of the
clause in which it is embedded, with an anticipatory it occurring in the normal Subject position,
as in it’s no use crying over spilt milk. In such cases there will be a marked variant with the
clause Subject at the beginning: crying over spilt milk is no use.
Please see the table bellow

To argue with the captain Was Asking for trouble

Subject Finite Complement
Mood Residue
Nominal group : clause as head Verbal group Nominal group : clause as head

4.8 Texts
By looking at the mood structure, clause by clause, we can see the way the dialogue
proceeds as a series of exchanges. It begins with a discussion of a proposition, initiated by Nigel,
that something is not possible (you can’t), interspersed with general assertions about mermaids;
these are followed by general assertions about stonefishes, which move from unmodalized (does)
to modalized (will, might), and then by assertions about a particular stonefish (was), and about
the current holdings of the Shedd Aquarium.
Unlike the Theme, which – while it is itself a property of the clause – carries forward the
development of the text as a whole, the Mood element has little significance beyond the
immediate sequence of clauses in which it occurs. It tends to be the overall organization of the
text that determines the choice of Theme in any particular clause, or that determines at least the
general pattern of thematic choices; whereas there may be no general pattern in the choice of
Subject, but only a specific propositional basis for each exchange. In thisparticular text, all the
Themes are unmarked, which means that in every declarative clause the Theme is also the
Subject. Naturally when this happens the overall sequence of Subjectswill also be patterned; but
the pattern displayed is first and foremost a thematic one – it depends on the status of each of the
items as a Theme.