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dependent layers of pragmatic, semiotic, and communicative meanings.
"Discourse processing", he continues, "is envisaged in terms of the
discourse producers' utilization of 'texts' as a means of action on the
environment and in terms of the discourse receivers' reaction to such
actions. For such pragmatic purposes to be contextually accessible,
texts take on a set of semiotic values. These establish interaction
with the environment by regulating producers' pragmatic actions and
receivers' reactions. They define the nature, form and function of the
message as a sign among signs. Pragmatic action and semiotic
interaction only materialise when a 'communicative' dimension is
introduced to set up the transaction between text users' actions and
reactions, on the one hand, and between these and the text, on the
other hand." (ibid, p298)
The text-typological focus, which is the outcome of semio-pragma-
communicative interface, is, according to Hatim, the basic determinant
of expository, argumentative, or instructional text types.
Hatim
refers to discourse as "the totality of undifferentiated linguistic
material, eg. a whole article". His distinction between discourse and
text is empirically irrelevant since discourse, in actual fact, is text
in action.
Hatim employs the theme-rheme theory, which has come to be
collectively referred to as 'Functional Sentence Perspective', in his
explanation of how texts are internally structured. The term is used
to indicate that sentence elements function within a certain
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