appraisal theory and corpus linguistics: a happy union? monika bednarek (augsburg/sydney)

Appraisal Theory and Corpus Linguistics:

A Happy Union?

Monika Bednarek (Augsburg/Sydney)

Appraisal Theory and Corpus Linguistics:

A Happy Union

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Starting point

“our maps of feeling (for affect, judgement and appreciation) have to be treated at this stage as hypotheses about the organisation of the relevant meanings – offered as a challenge to those concerned with developing appropriate reasoning” (Martin & White 2005: 46)

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Overview

• Background (corpus etc)

• Classification of Affect

• Discussion

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Background

• Post-doc project combining quantitative (corpus) studies with qualitative discourse analysis, use of appraisal theory

• Focus on terms denoting affect

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The corpus: the BRC

• Conversation (4.206.058 words)

• News reportage (2.613.399 words)

• Fiction (6.688.459 words)

• Academic discourse (5.960.933 words)

~ 19.5 million words

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Appraisal

• ENGAGEMENT

• GRADUATION

• ATTITUDE– AFFECT– APPRECIATION– JUDGEMENT

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Classification of Affect

• Three major sets: in/security (anxious/confident) – dis/satisfaction (fed up/absorbed) – un/happiness (sad/happy).

• Cultural construal: positive Affect (happy) vs. negative Affect (sad).

• The feelings relate to future states or existing ones: realis (like) vs. irrealis (want)

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Classification of Affect

• Behavioural surge (laugh, weep) vs. mental disposition (like, dislike).

• Intensity: low (like) – median (love) – high (adore)

• Reaction to other (the boy liked the teacher/the teacher pleased the boy) vs. undirected mood (the boy was happy)(Martin & White 2005: 46-49)

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Discussion

• Types of Affect

• Portraying vs. Creating Emotion

• Invoking and Provoking Emotion

• Affect and Appreciation

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Happiness Unhappiness

Cheer Misery

Affection Antipathy

Satisfaction Dissatisfaction

Interest Ennui

Pleasure Displeasure

Security Insecurity

Confidence Disquiet

Trust Surprise

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Security Insecurity

Trust Distrust

Quiet Disquiet

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Security Insecurity

Confidence Disquiet

Trust Surprise

Security Insecurity

Quiet Disquiet

Trust Distrust

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Affect types

Un/happiness

Dis/satisfaction

Affect

In/security

Surprise

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Surprise

• Surprise negative (insecurity)? • Corpus data:

– Behavioural surges associated with affect terms in fiction sub-corpus (handout)

– Emotions conjoined with surprise (N, V) & surprised in BRC) (handout)

– Surprise as a premodifying noun: ‘negative’ (attack), ‘positive’ (party, gift), ‘neutral’ (decision, move, step)

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Surprise

– Collocations of to surprise in fiction with ‘volition’ (e.g. hoping to, wanted to, urge to, it would be nice to)

I was hoping to surprise you --; a sort of unexpected wedding present, but it was no good.

"Well, I have three children of my own now and I thought it would be nice to surprise them with the sugar mice on the tree, and also the chocolate cat."

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Surprise

• Other aspects:– semantic change (amazing)– alarming vs. miraculous (Lemke 1998)– psychological experiments (Wallace & Carson

1973: 16)

• Positivity/Negativity (construal of emotion vs. implied evaluation)

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Surprise and beliefs

• Expressions of ‘surprise’ or ‘non-surprise’ as indicators of beliefs/knowledge (schemas) (handout)

• No automatic correlation between ‘positive’ emotions and positive evaluation (handout)

• Feelings construable as ‘positive’, ‘negative’, ‘neutral’

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Positive/negative construal

• Inscribed:

I was shocked [negative Surprise]

•  Contextually implied:

What a lovely [positive Appreciation] surprise [positive Surprise]

I was surprised [positive Surprise] and delighted [Happiness]

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Inclination Disinclination

Desire Fear

Miss, long for fearful, terrorised

Security Insecurity

Quiet Disquiet

Solace, comfort Uneasy, anxious, freaked out

Dis/inclination vs. In/security

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Inclination Disinclination

Desire Non-Desire

miss, long for, want

refuse, reluctant

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• Avoiding overlap

• Irrealis cuts across all emotions: grammatically vs. lexically (desire, want, fear, afraid of)

• Dis/inclination does not allow a realis Trigger

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Un/happiness

Dis/satisfaction

Emotion In/security

Dis/inclination I

Surprise

Realis

Trigger

Irrealis T

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Fuzzy system of modified Affect

Un/happiness (old)Dis/satisfaction (old)

Affect In/security (new)Dis/inclination (new)Surprise (new)

( see also handout)

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Portraying vs. creating emotion ()

• How can Emoters’ emotions be portrayed (Portraying emotion)?

vs.

• How does the text create an emotional response (in the reader) (Creating emotion: AMBIENCE)?

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How to portray Affect

• Martin & Rose (2003): – Mental disposition (fear, worry)– Behavioural surge (wept, smiled)– Unusual behaviour (very quiet, drinking too

much)

• Cognitive Linguistics/Psychology:– Emotion schemas (cognitive evaluation,

antecedent events/eliciting conditions, psycho-physiological expressions, actions) (handout)

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Invoking Affect ()

“the selection of ideational meanings is enough to invoke evaluation, even in the absence of attitudinal lexis that tells us directly how to feel” (Martin & White 2005: 62, emphases mine)

EmotionPortraying Creating

Invoking: indirectly portraying or creating?

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Provoking Affect

• Metaphor and Emotion:– Metaphorical conceptualisation of Affect (portraying):

e.g.THE EMOTION IS A FORCE (broken heart, knocked back, devastated, deeply hurt)

– Metaphors creating emotional response (ambience):e.g. Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player,

that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more; it is a tale told by an idiot, full of

sound and fury, signifying nothing. (Shakespeare, Macbeth)

Provoking: metaphorical conceptualisation or creating?

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Affect and Appreciation ()

• Overt vs. covert Affect:that’s surprisingthat’s surprising to me Appreciation:I find that surprising Reactionthat is a surprisethat is a surprise to meto my surprise, …that surprises me AffectI’m surprised

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Overt vs. Covert Affect

Somewhat to his surprise (oA), Dalgliesh found himself accepting. But then the whole encounter had been a little surprising (cA) (Fiction)

The griot is both excited (oA) by others and exciting (cA) to them: There is a double complementarity (Irvine 1990: 154)

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‘Bridging’ opinion and emotion

‘Opinion’ ‘Emotion’

Judg App CovA OvA

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Outlook

• Surprise and counter-expectation

• Affect – Ambience

• Polyphony (blends, fusing, conflation, collocation)

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Thank You

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In the aftermath, a huge fog of black smoke rose over the city, while several bodies lay in the courtyard of the hotel. (Guardian)

At a bookshop hit by the explosion a woman stood covered in blood, clutching her hand where the bones showed through. (Telegraph)

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As smoke billowed across central Baghdad and as petrol tanks in nearby cars caught fire and exploded, rescue teams carried out the wounded on stretchers or helped hastily bandaged guards to limp to ambulances. Bullets from weapons abandoned by guards in the explosion fired off occasionally as the flames engulfed them, sending rescue workers scampering. (Times)

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Soft white clouds remained motionless against an azure blue sky. Between the many breaks in the cloud the rays of a thin evening sun shafted down at an acute angle to spotlight the pastoral scene. Away to the west a flock of Canada geese was heading home to descend on one of the larger lakes in the distance. In the foreground another smaller fock was taking off from the little lake on the south side. ... They wheeled in unison into a shaft of light which held them for a second or so before they soared over the car and away. (Fiction)