Hitler’s Final Solution

After the outbreak of the Second World War the Nazis changed their policy towards the Jews. They wanted to get rid of as many Jews as possible, and began to make plans for how to deal effectively with what they called the ‘Jewish problem’. In 1941 they came up with a plan which was known as the Final Solution. The Jews would be dealt with in two ways: they would either be worked to death or executed. Extermination and labour camps were therefore set up throughout Europe in order to exterminate the estimated eleven million European Jews. (Beechener et al., 2004, p. 138)

In sum, some aspects of language (namely what are referred to in SFL as the Participants, Processes and Circumstances²) will be determined by the con-textual variable of field – that is to say, the subject matter or the aspect of human experience referred to (for example, law enforcement, news report-ing, medicine and public health, or history). We have seen, however, that field is not simply a matter of ‘subject matter’ but also includes the way in which the field is made sense of, or interpreted i.e. the degree to which

specialist knowledge extends common-sense understanding of phenomena.

As you proceed through the book you will see that this is particularly pertin-ent in a study of school history where, as studpertin-ents move from the earlier to later years, they learn to see the past through increasingly specialized eyes – the eyes of a historian.

The relationship between users of language: tenor

Tenor refers to the nature of the relationship between users of language in a particular social context. Language will vary according to factors such as:

• how often the interlocutors have contact;

• how well they know each other;

• their social roles (e.g. teacher/student);

• their relative social status (e.g. expert/novice);

• the degree to which their values are perceived to be aligned (i.e. the degree of solidarity).

Thus, just by looking at a piece of dialogue and its linguistic patterns, we can deduce a great deal of information about the interlocutors. In the following piece of dialogue, for example, it would not take long to figure out the social roles and relative status of the interlocutors.

Peter: Ok, everybody, now everybody if you can have a look at the overhead that’s up there now [pause] Ali? [pause]. We can see that, um, we have some of, what we have here, are aspects of warfare. In other words, the ‘input’. So, for instance, first of all, we have an unavailability of goods here. That means that people couldn’t get certain things at the end of the war. Now, how do you think that might have affected Australian society at that time? What would the consequences be of that? Katina?

Katina: They had to produce their own?

Peter: Very good. They had to produce their own goods.

In conventional history classrooms, patterns in dialogue between teacher and students often resemble those illustrated above. Frequently, they indicate:

• the roles of assessor and appraised (in addition to those of teacher and student);

• unequal status – the teacher is in a more powerful institutional position both as subject expert and arbiter of classroom behaviour;

• regular contact – students and teachers meet regularly each week during school term;

• alignment – students may often align their values with those of the authori-tative teacher (though this does, of course, depend on the nature of the pedagogic task and type of interaction).

In the dialogue, where the history teacher, Peter, addressed his whole class (Year 10) on the topic of the effects of the Second World War on Australian society, we can see how the teacher’s status and authority are construed through his asymmetrical use of commands and questions (underlined below) and his lengthier turns. The role of teacher/assessor is constructed through his use of evaluative language (very good) and the degree of align-ment is indicated by the student’s compliance in answering his question and providing the expected/historically valued answer.

Teacher: Ok, everybody, now everybody if you can have a look at the overhead that’s up there now [pause] Ali? [pause]. We can see that, um, we have some of, what we have here, are aspects of warfare. In other words, the ‘input’. So, for instance, first of all, we have an unavailability of goods here. That means that people couldn’t get certain things at the end of the war. Now, how do you think that might have affected Australian society at that time? What would the consequences be of that? Katina?

Katina: They had to produce their own?

Teacher: Very good. They had to produce their own goods.

(Data recorded during a Year 10 history lesson in a Sydney school – as part of the WIR project) Tenor in history textbooks may sometimes be more difficult to identify and describe, since, although authors often adopt an overall authoritative tone thus creating an unequal status relationship between textbook writer and student reader, there may be shifts from a more authoritative impersonal style to a more casual, friendly one in which the writer directly engages with the reader. This is illustrated in the following textbook extract where the writer, Walsh, uses the pronoun you and the interrogative (underlined) to create a friendly relationship with his audience. However, at the end of the extract, Walsh resumes his teacher role by telling the student what they will do next – To find out, you are going to look back at the final stages of the war.

2.7 The impact of the First World War

In 1914 the Germans were a proud people. Their Kaiser – virtually a dictator – was celebrated for his achievements. Their army was probably the finest in the world. A journey through the streets of Berlin in 1914 would have revealed prospering busi-nesses and a well-educated and well-fed force. There was a great deal of optimism about the power and strength of Germany.

Four years later a similar journey would have revealed a very different picture. Although little fighting had taken place in Germany itself, the war had still destroyed much of the old Germany. The proud German army was defeated. The German people were surviving on turnips and bread, and even the flour for the bread was mixed with sawdust to make it go further. A flu epidemic was sweeping the country, killing thousands of people already weakened by rations.

This may not surprise you, given the suffering of the First World War. What might surprise you is that five years later the situation for many people in Germany was still very grim indeed.

Whatever had gone wrong in Germany? To find out, you are going to look back at the final stages of the First World War. (Walsh, 2001, p. 137)

In history textbooks there is a wide array of tenor relationships other than those that hold between textbook writer and student, since many books are made up of a range of primary sources in which social status varies immensely, as does the degree of distance/closeness between interlocutors.

For example, a politician addressing the general public entails a very differ-ent tenor to that of a soldier writing home to his wife. The following two primary sources illustrate the sorts of differences that can hold between writer and reader. Text 2.8 is a diary entry and therefore, presumably, the writer, Doreen Ellis, did not have a wider audience in mind. For this reason there is no need for her to signal or negotiate status and roles. Consequently, there is no use of the you pronoun and no questions or commands. In other words, there is no explicit dialogic engagement.

Text 2.8 Doreen Ellis, writing in her diary about life during the Second