Continuity into Phase (NL 6)

We have emphasized throughout the twin themes of discontinuity and continuity: discontinuity in the linguistic system, with the major evolutionary change that takes place when the child shifts into the three-level system of the adult language, combined with continuity at the phonetic and semantic ends of the system. With the quite startlingly sudden leap that Nigel took into Phase it is all the more to find an essential semantic continuity linking the new modes of meaning with those of Phase I. Yet the continuity is clearly there. Nigel does not throw away the meaning potential he has built up for himself in Phase I, nor does he abandon and begin again the definition of the social contexts of language use. He continues along essentially the same path as before, so that the mother tongue comes in as a natural extension of the baby language.

What Nigel does, as we have seen, is to generalize out of the Phase I functional contexts a distinction between two semiotic modes, the pragmatic and the mathetic - language as action, and language as reflection. At first, different words and structures tend to be associated with each, reflecting the two different of meaning that are involved. There is also a third, subsidiary theme of language as creation, or meaning in the imaginative mode.

Nigel expressed the systematic distinction between the two major modes by means of the opposition between falling and rising tone: pragmatic (‘response required’) as rising tone, mathetic (‘response not required’) as falling tone. The falling tone was a direct continuation of the dominant intonation pattern of Phase I, where all tones were falling except in one interactional system, that of individualized greetings (personal names), which was first high level and then systematically either mid level stepping up to high level (‘where are you?’) or high fall followed by low level (‘there you are!’). The rising tone evolved in a very strilung way in the middle of NL 7, at 19 months, by a progression from falling, through narrow falling, then level, to rising: , the whole process talung place within one week. From then on the two tones were in systemic contrast and

I N T O THE ADULT LANGUAGE

remained so for the rest of Phase and into Phase 111. In a number of instances Nigel said what was in other respects ‘the same thing’ on both tones, one the other, with consequent differences in meaning; we have cited the example of mummy it

. .

take it going to tell Mummy to take it off..

.

[running to Mother] take it The semantics of the system is made explicit by Nigel’s imposing on the communication process a formal signal that he does, or else does not, require a response. In time the response that is required comes to be more and more often a verbal one.

At first each utterance is

either

pragmatic or mathetic; but gradually, by a reinterpretation of the nature of “function” such that it becomes not just a generalized context of use but the central organizing principle of the entire semantic system, by the end of Phase a point is reached where every utterance is

both

pragmatic and mathetic. But in the process the opposition has itself disappeared, having created the effective conditions for the emergence of the broad functional components of the adult semantic system. It is largely the mathetic function, that of language as learning, that creates the conditions for the development of ideational meanings, those expres- sing the speaker’s experience of the phenomena around and inside him (processes, quality and quantity, time, etc.); and the pragmatic function, that of language as doing, that creates the conditions for the development of interpersonal meanings, those expressing the speaker’s role in and angle on the communication process (mood, modality, intensity, etc.). The third component, the text-forming or textual component, evolves during Phase in the course of the child’s construction of narrative and of dialogue. Every utterance in the Phase language, which is essentially the adult system, means, and therefore is structured, in terms of these components simultaneously.

The following section presents the details of Nigel’s progress through Phase

5 NL 6-9:

examples

5.1 Specimens 6 and 7

24 April

M. Did you tell Daddy what you had for tea? N. (to M., excitedly)

. . . . . .

(‘egg, ooh! egg, egg!’) (‘cockadoodledoo’; =

TKANSITION F R O M CHILD T O N G U E TO M O T H E R T O N G U E

cornflakes, because of picture on packet; also weathercock on church spire, so, having returned from walk, continues with inventory of things seen) (‘and sticks’) M. You didn’t have cornflakes for tea! N. (‘and holes’) M. You didn’t have sticks and holes for tea! N. (returning to the subject in hand ) (‘and toast’)

N. (touching nose) (‘nose’) M. Yes that’s my nose. Where’s your nose? N. (touching it) (‘there’)

26 April

F. What did you see yesterday? N. (‘car’) F. Yes, and you went for a ride in a car, didn’t you? and what did you see up there (pointing)? N. (‘tower’) F. Yes, you saw a tower. And what did you pick in the garden? N. g y i (‘grass’) F. And what else? N. (‘daisy’)

27 April

M. Take the toothpaste to Daddy and go and get your bib. N.

. . .

(‘Daddy

.

. . noddy (toothpaste)

.

.

.

(bib with) train

28 April

M.

What is it you can’t find? Is it something under there? N. under settee) (‘ball’)

A. We’re going out for a walk, and we’ll go and get some fish. N. tik” (‘sticks’) A. No, we’re not getting any sticks today. N. (plaintively) 15” (‘holes’, no holes?, what can I put in the holes?)

30 April

N. (‘what’s that?’) F. It’s a piece of wood. N. m (‘I see!’) N. (‘what’s that?’) M. That’s butter. N.

N. (‘ducks’) F. You saw some ducks. N. (‘sticks’)

F.

And you saw some sticks? N. (‘holes)’

F.

And you saw some holes. Did you put the sticks in the holes? N. (‘buses’) F. And you saw some buses. N. (?) F. You saw some toast and butter? You didn’t see any toast and butter! N. (?) F. (trying again) Two buses? N. (very distinctly and slowly) (?)

. .

.

(‘tower’) F. You saw a tower? N. . (‘tower, big’) F. You saw a big tower? N. (‘big!’) F. Was it the church? (N. is silent: wrong guess) Did you see the church? N. (‘weathercock’) F. You saw the

I N T O THE ADULT LANGUAGE

cock. N. (with music gesture) (‘sing cockadoodledoo’) F. Sing “Cockadoodledoo”? All right. (F. Sings) N. (with music gesture) (‘bridge’) F. Which is that one? “London Bridge”? Shall I sing “London Bridge”? All right.

A. What will you see when you go out for a walk? N. (‘cars, buses’)

A. What did you see on your walk? N. (‘buses, cars, trains’)

5 May

N. (‘hey! dog!’: = I want to come and draw with you

= ‘draw dogs’)) F. No I’m worlung. N. (‘you’re

playing the tabla’) F. No I’m not playing dadikeda, I’m writing. N. (‘then you must be drawing!’)

6 May

N. (‘noddy toothpaste’) (‘I want M. Can you put it (= the top of the tube) on again? N. high level, stepping up)

F. You went on a train yesterday. N.

. . .

(‘train

. . .

byebye!’; = when I got the train went away and I waved to it) F. And you said “byebye” to the train. N. (‘another!’) F. And you saw another train?

N. (long list of things seen, then:) (‘flag’) M. Oh you saw some flags? N. (holding out palm) (‘gravel’) M. And you had some gravel. N. (touching palm, lips rounded, very quiet) g:= (‘ooh!’) F. And you hurt your hand with the gravel? M. No, that was with the stick, the one with prickles on. N. (‘blood’) M. And there was blood on it, yes.

(‘I’ll

try’)

7 May

M. (pointing) Who’s that? N. (‘Anna’) M. (pointing to self) And who’s that? N. (‘Mummy’) M. (pointing to N.) And who’s that? N. ni.

8 May

F. Are you going out for a walk? N.

. . .

(‘toast: eggs’: = we’re going to buy some bread and some eggs)

TRANSITION FROM CHILD T O N G U E TO MOTHER T O N G U E

9 May

N. ('Mummy!') M. (=sonny) N. M. etc. etc. ad lib.

5.2 Development in N L 6 and 7

(NL 2) (NL 5)

'look, a picture! what is it? a ball!' (daddy toast) 'Daddy's brought some

toast'

co-ordinate strings

vocalization + gesture

E

'buses, cars and trains'

'cars, buses and a weathercock' 'cars, buses, sticks and holes' 'sticks, holes, stones, trains, balls and buses'

'cars, buses, dogs, a weather- cock, sticks and holes'

(do that! + *pick me up) 'pick me up'

(star + *negation) 'the star wasn't there any more'

"music) 'I want the record on'

general + specific element from same functional category

lbu

(I want! + book) 'I want that book'

(do that! + hole) 'make a hole' (excitement + egg) 'ooh! an others

dba

(toothbrush, noddy) 'I want my toothbrush and toothpaste' (draw, dog) 'I want to draw - a

dog'

(letter, there) 'the letters - there

they are'

(bubble, no-more) 'the bubbles have gone away'

T H E A D U L T LANGUAGE

*

=gesture

(stick, hole) ‘I’ll put my stick in the hole(?)’

1 co-ordinate strings: frequent, for example

‘sticks, holes, trains, cars, buses and dogs’

(leaf + *blowing) ‘the leaves are

blowing in the wind’ 3 general + specific element from same functional category 2 vocalization + gesture

...

.

...

In document HALLIDAY Language of Early Childhood (Page 175-180)