4 - Register, situations and how to analyse, formal/informal registers and re-registration

What is register?

Refers to a variety of language defines according to its use in social situations, e.g. a register of scientific, religious formal English

In Hallidayan linguistics, what is the term seen as?

Specifically opposed to varieties of language defined according to the characteristics of the users (e.g. their regional or class dialect)

What is social meaning?

Social meaning is the attitudes, contexts or identities associate with different ways of talking and writing

It is attached to the use/lack of use of a dialect 

Different ways of saying the same thing can have different social meanings e.g. “what’s up?” compared to “how do you do?”

What is a situation made up of?

The field, the tenor and the mode

Who created the framework of a situation including the field, tenor and mode?

Halliday

A situation is made up of a field, a tenor and a mode. What is the field?

the activity associated with the language being used

• What is the subject matter, e.g. chemistry, politics, cars etc.

• What is the genre, e.g. poetry, newspaper article, email etc.

A situation is made up of a field, a tenor and a mode. What is the tenor?

The relationship between the people concerned in the speech act

• e.g. are they family, professional or strangers?

• e.g. is one person teaching, or arguing with, or trying to persuade the other person of something

• is there a power imbalance?

A situation is made up of a field, a tenor and a mode. What is the mode?

The way the text is organised in the chosen channel, speech or print/visual, or a mixture of the two, under this factor we consider features like

• in print: ‘typography, layout, use of images’

• in speech: ‘volume, speed. pauses, length of utterance’, etc.

3 things to remember about situations

• one situation can be embedded inside another

• situations can change abruptly

• situations can be ambivalent or hard to define

How can informal and formal registers be identified?

Through etymology, as in 1066, when Normans invaded Britain, they brought the French language, which had its origins in Latin. But French words were much more complex than English words, with more syllables and could be changed according to their usage in a sentence.
The French language became the language of the Royal Court, and therefore also of the ruling and business classes.
Latin was still the language of the church and English was the language of the common, uneducated man. 

What do informal registers tend to employ?

• More contractions (“I’m” for “I am”)

• More minor, simple and compound sentences and fewer complex sentences

• Simpler noun phrases

• more colloquial and clichéd idiomatic expressions (e.g. ‘out for the count’, ‘wrap it up’ 

What do formal registers tend to employ?

• Full, contracted forms: “do not” “I am”

• More complex sentences

• More complex noun phrases

• More polite formulae (e.g. ‘please may I’ , ‘Apologies if…’ etc.)

• Honorifics (‘Mrs…’ , ‘Sir’ , ‘The Right Honorable’)

What is re-registration?

• “literary works can shift registers to create particular effects. Re-registration is one such technique, supposed documents such as newspaper articles or letters are reproduced within literary contexts”

• Advertisements and social media posts sometimes do this too