style and pseudonymity in pauline scholarship 125
quantifiable linguistic categories for the analysis of style.39 the primary
mechanism for doing this is through the notion of register:
the social functions of language clearly determine the pattern of language
varieties,... or ‘registers’; the register range, or linguistic repertoire, of a com-
munity or of an individual is derived from the range of uses that language is
put to in that particular culture or sub-culture.40
this socio-functional component of language operates in tandem with the
lexicogrammatical system of the speaker/writer in order to provide the
available linguistic options that can be accessed within a particular social
situation or register.41 it is this process that specifies a range of meaning
potential or, in other words, register: “the semantic configuration that is
typically associated with the situation type in question.”42 thus, as regis-
ters or social contexts for linguistic activity change, the repertoire of avail-
able linguistic options also change. this naturally results in the selection
of different lexicogrammatical elements from one situation to the next.
halliday’s systemic functional model of language is built around three
contextual constraints on the semiotic environment in which meanings
are exchanged: (1) field of discourse, (2) tenor of discourse and (3) mode of
discourse.43 he also outlines three semantic metafunctions of language—
experiential meaning, interpersonal meaning, and textual meaning—
which are woven together to make up the meaning of a discourse, each
of which realizes a specific aspect of the context of situation. the field
of discourse is realized by the experiential metafunction. the tenor of a
39 See m. a. K. halliday, “linguistic function and literary Style: an inquiry into the
language of William golding’s The Inheritor’s,” in Jonathan J. Webster (ed.), Linguistic
Studies of Text and Discourse (london: continuum, 2005), 97–98, first printed in Seymour
Benjamin chatman (ed.), Literary Style: A Symposium (london: oxford university Press,
1971), 330–68.
40 m. a. K. halliday, Explorations in the Function of Language (new york: edward arnold,
1973), 14. register is distinguished from dialect. the latter relates to who the speaker is,
socially, while the former has to do with the impact that the use of language in society has
had upon its evolution. Suzanne romaine, Language in Society: An Introduction to Sociolin-
guistics (oxford: oxford university Press, 1996), 21, summarizes it helpfully when she says
that dialects are varieties of users while registers are varieties of use.
41 See m. a. K. halliday, Language as Social Semiotic: The Social Interpretation of Lan-
guage and Meaning (Baltimore: university Park, 1978), 123.
42 halliday, Language, 123.
43 m. a. K. halliday, “context of Situation,” in m. a. K. halliday and ruqaiya hasan,
Language, Context, and Text: Aspects of Language in a Social-Semiotic Perspective (oxford:
oxford university Press, 1989), 12–14.