Categorization From Perspective Of Systemic Functional Linguistics: Experience Construal Model Of The Ideation Base

Survival in this world demands an unceasing effort to construe the diversity ofphenomena, which could be classified into three major types in light of complexity:individual experience, processes that individual phenomena participate in, and experiencechain made up of processes. In the research area of the first case, the two major paradigmsare Classical Theory and the Prototype Theory of category, whose findings complementeach other. However, the complicatedness of the world dictates the limitedness of theresearch that is confined to only individual phenomena. By the end of last century, a"cognitive turn" took place in SFL, in which it intends to explain how people construeexperience with language as the interpretative base, the result of which is the establishmentof the model of construing experience through meaning (CETM model). This model takesphenomena of higher complexity——process and experience chain into consideration.This paper intends to conduct a systematic exploration into the most essential aspectsof the CETM model with a view to finding out the problems and providing our solutionsfrom five aspects: the theoretical foundation; the main framework; the ideation base;functional category structure, and the application of the theory. The theoretical foundationrefers to the language philosophy of SFL, i.e., the viewpoints of experiential language,which is constituted by experience, language and meaning. It argues that the reality isconstrued in language, and language is the encoding of experiential categories; usinglanguage is construing experience. Experience is meaning and potential. Understandingsomething is to transform it into meaning; meaning comes into being in the interaction ofhuman consciousness and environment. Experience, meaning and grammar are knit into awhole. This theoretical foundation underlies the whole CETM model.The ideation base, a theory concerning how people construe their daily experience, isthe focus of the CETM model. It is the locus as well as the powerhouse that drives theoperation of experience construal in lexicogrammar, which is represented through element,figure and sequence. As part of the metalanguage, element, figure and sequence arestratified as language is. That is, they are across two strata in the content plane: semanticsand lexicogrammar. To us, construing a variety of experience into corresponding. grammatical structures is not only the fundamental goal but also the nature of experienceconstrual of the CETM model.The interaction among the major dimensions——scale of delicacy and cline ofinstantiation, syntagmatic and paradigmatic construal in the ideation base provides powerfor experience construal. Categories of higher delicacy are realized as concreteinstantiations, while those of lower delicacy as meaning potential which may beinstantiated in texts. Experience may be construed from two orientations: syntagmatic andparadigmatic. Syntagmatic structures are the concrete realization of categories fromparadigmatic systems, while paradigmatic systems supply a great number of alternativecategories for selection. To construe a specific category is to locate it in a specific networkof relations, namely, taxonomic elaboration, meronymic extension and eco-functional.Although the ideation base interprets the essentiality of language in experienceconstrual, several problems remain unsolved. Firstly, in what way is experience construedin the ideation base? Or, how are element, figure and sequence realized in lexicogrammaras specific structures? Secondly, why the great power of the ideation base cannot drive thec0nstrual of all human experience, rather, an inequality in amount between infinite humanexperience and limited lexicogrammar is an evident fact. Thirdly, category structure maybe approached in terms of social contextual factors, but this is not paid adequate attentionby either the Prototype Theory or the scale of delicacy of SFL.To these problems, we propose the following solutions. Firstly, in light of themetaphorical simulation of human brain, we roughly identify four sub-bases in the ideationbase: sub-base of experience, meaning, grammar and pragmatics. Besides, we design a setof construal procedure through which experience is processed in the ideation base. Thus, acomparatively concise and convincing model to explain how experience of element, figureand sequence are construed as corresponding lexicogrammatical structures is provided.However, this model is not powerful enough as to explain convincingly how experience isconstrued as grammar. So we propose further that there is an implicit psycholinguisticmechanism, namely, the information processing model operating behind the operatingprocedure of the ideation base. It could serve as a complement to the CETM model of theideation base.Secondly, for the quantity inequality between phenomena and lexicogrammar, we put forward an experience filtering model of the ideation base, arguing that all phenomena arenot processed and construed. Instead, only those most relevant ones to the construer areprocessed and construed as grammatical forms, while irrelevant ones are filtered.Experience filtering mechanism of the ideation base promotes the effectiveness oflanguage, i.e., the flexibility and multiple uses of a particular lexicogrammar item satisfyhuman communication. This model explains how the ideation base construes thecomplicated numerous world information. Thirdly, on this basis, we put forward a principleof complexity iconicity which posits that the experiential phenomena of the objectiveworld map the corresponding lexicogrammatical structures in complexity. Fourthly, withthe theories of the scale of delicacy and the like as the foundation, we propose a new modelof functional category structure, a new account in this area. Fifthly, by describing howelement, figure and sequence are realized in child language, our study reveals that thechild's ability of experience construal develops longitudinally in parallel with the former.In addition, we discussed the misleading Chinese versions of "construe/ construal", "figure/sequence"——key words in the CETM model resulting from misinterpretationbefore giving our own versions.However, although the CETM model is not influential as a cognitive theory and isbeset with problems, it is successful in the sense that it is a positive endeavor made in thedirection of interpreting experience construal based on its own theoretical framework, forthere is no perfect linguistic theory. As is revealed by the immaturity principium oflinguistic theory proposed by Xu Shenghuan, there is no so called mature linguistic theoryno matter how mature it may appear. Any theory needs to resort to other theories forreinforcement. Likewise, the findings of the CETM model needs complement from othertheories especially those of psycholinguistics and Cognitive Linguistics; and the CETMmodel of SFL may well serve as a beneficial complement to cognitive approach.Philosophically, the CETM model is a reinterpretation of the venerable thesis of"things are not there unless they are named" in modern linguistic discourse. That is, if wecannot express the world, we know nothing about this world. The world beyond cognitionis the world of wilderness, for "No thing is where the word breaks off" (Heidegger 1982).