the ISFC39 Proceedings - International Systemic-Functional ...

Papers from the 39th ISFCIn contrast, the heteroglossic clauses, which may explicitly or implicitly refer to othervoices, open a space for dialogue. Heteroglossic clauses are categorized into: ‘dialogicallyexpansive’ which opens up the space for alternative viewpoints to come in play in thediscourse, or ‘dialogically contractive’: in which though it opens a dialogic space in thediscourse, they act to narrow the space by directing to exclude certain dialogic alternatives, intheir intersubjective functionality (Martin & White, 2005).“Dialogically expansive” clauses include either ‘entertain’: those which indicate thattheir position is but one among a number of alternatives, such in “I assume that the storieshave something to deal with Dickens’ personal life”, or ‘attribute’: the clauses that relate theinternal authorial voice of the propositions to the external sources. Two sub-categoriesemerge in ‘attribute’: ‘acknowledge’: the locutions do not overtly stand on any externalposition, such as in “Eagleton defines literature as a fine art because it is difficult to make alimitation of it”, or ‘distance’: the locutions act an explicit detaching of the attributedpropositions as in “He thought that he was not supposed to work but study”.“Dialogically contractive” clauses include: ‘disclaim’ that acts to reject some dialogicalternative, and ‘proclaim’ that presents an authorial voice challenge or even excludedialogic alternatives. Disclaim is divided into ‘deny’ that presents negation to introducealternative positive position in the dialogue as in “The warehouse was just not a suitable forhim who had at least gotten a formal education for a short time.”, and ‘counter’ that presentan alternative position for countering the expected proposition in the dialogue such as “Nomatter how hard they tried, working people would never make their dream came true.”Conversely, proclaim is divided into ‘concur’ that refers to clauses that overtly announce theaddresser as agreeing with the view of the writer, as in “Of course, it was different in thequality if at least the two classes were involved.”; pronounce includes authorial emphases orexplicit authorial interventions or interpolations, as in “…my main reasons will not gobeyond my curiosity toward him and his works.”; while endorse means referring thepropositions to external sources that are construed by the writers’ voice as correct, valid,undeniable, as in “From the analysis above, the first description of education …”. Moreover,some forms of reported speech may be used in dialogue with others, the putative or imaginedreaders: for contracting or expanding the dialogue. However, to get to the sense of thedialogue, linguistic analysts have to consider the context of each clause, not just the reportingverbs themselves as the only sources of the ‘dialogue’ offered by a writer. For furtherdiscussion of the ENGAGEMENT system see Martin and White (2005).3 Data and Method of StudyThis study makes use of written data collected from a thesis submitted by an undergraduatestudent, Clara (a pseudonym). This thesis was randomly selected from a collection of theses.Clara writes this an at-least-sixty-page thesis as part of the requirements for the degree of“Sarjana Sastra” (Bachelor in Literature) at an Indonesian university. The thesis is anexploration of Charles Dickens’ critique of education practice during Victorian era found inDavid Copperfield, Great Expectations and Oliver Twist. The thesis follows traditionalstructure of introduction ^ review of related literature ^ method of investigation ^ dataanalysis ^ conclusion and suggestion (Paltridge, 2002). The analysis was done by dividingeach chapter into single clauses, and categorizing the clauses as per Martin and White (2005).In this stage, attention was focused on heteroglossic clauses and since context has a stronginfluence on determining the proposition/proposal of a clause, even monoglossic clauses, theanalysis was careful to consider the context surrounding each clause in interpreting theproposition/proposal conveyed.41