Return to listing of notes in this Guide | Return to Appraisal Homepage
Following the work cited in the Overview Section as the source of these materials (see, for example, Iedema, Feez, and White 1994, Martin 1995 or Martin 2000), the term `Judgement' has been chosen to reference attitudinal evaluation in which human behaviour is negatively or positively assessed by reference to some set of social norms. Where Judgement is explicitly indicated (see earlier discussion) we encounter terms such as corrupt, virtuously, dishonest, murderous, tyrant, bully, hero, betray, obstinate, indefatigable, abuse, defraud, courageously, skilled, genius, dunce, stupidity, foolishly, eccentric, maverick. Here the rather general term, `Judgement' has been taken from common parlance and given a more specialised or technical meaning. In a sense, then, we have made a specialist or technical term - `Judgement' - out of a term which didn't have a particularly precise meaning in everyday, vernacular language. So that there's no confusion, I'll use capital letters when I'm using JUDGEMENT, as a technical, linguistic term. I'm doing this for convenience and clarity, so that it's clear when I'm using the term within the specific linguistic framework .
Under JUDGEMENT, we're concerned with language which criticises or praises, which condemns or applauds the behaviour - the actions, deeds, sayings, beliefs, motivations etc - of human individuals and groups.
Perhaps the most obvious examples of JUDGEMENT involve assessments by reference to systems of legality/illegality, morality/immorality or politeness/impoliteness - that is to say, there is an assessment that rules of behaviour, more or less explicitly codified in the culture, have either been upheld or breached. That is to say, such JUDGEMENTS involve an assertion that some set of religious, moral or legal rules or regulations are at issue. They involve assessments of morality or legality. Here, for example, we find such terms as immoral, virtuous, lewd, sinful, lascivious, innocent, unjust, fair-minded, law-abiding, murderous, cruel, brutal, compassionate, caring, dishonest, honest, deceptive and fraudulent. Such assessments, obviously, can carry a heavy weight socially.
Other values of JUDGEMENT involve evaluations by which the person judged will be lowered or raised in the esteem of their community, but which do not have the same legal, religious or moral implications as the first set. Here we have assessments of normality (eccentric, maverick, conventional, traditional etc), of competence (skilled, genius, knowledgeable, stupid, dunce, brilliant, incompetent, powerful, feeble) and of psychological disposition (brave, cowardly, determined, obstinate, zealous, stubborn, committed, lazy etc). These values arguably do not carry quite the same social weight as the first set - negative values of this set will see you lowered in the estimation of society but won't typically see you in trouble with the law or with your priest.
It is vital to stress JUDGEMENT, as a system of attitudinal positioning, is, by definition, shaped by the particular cultural and ideological situation in which it operates. The way people make Judgements about morality, legality, capacity, normality etc will always be determined by the culture in which they live and by their own individual experiences, expectations, assumptions and beliefs. So there's always the possibility that the same event will receive different JUDGEMENTS, according to the ideological position of the person making those JUDGEMENTS. (Are strikes necessary, sometimes heroic bids by workers to protect their rights and their families' standard of living, or irresponsible, bloody-minded attempts by workers to get more than they deserve? Was the Gulf War an entirely moral exercises in defending a weak nation (Kuwait) against the avarice of a tyrannical regime, or a cynical exercise in protecting US economic interests in the oil- rich Middle East?)
For similar reasons, the way particular words in actual texts will be interpreted may also depend on the social and ideological position of the reader. Accordingly, it's important to note that the listings of JUDGEMENT terms I supplied above were only meant to provide a rough guide to some of the core JUDGEMENT meanings. They listings were not meant to indicate that a specific word will always have the same JUDGEMENT value. The actual meaning of a word, its specific JUDGEMENT value, will often be determined by where it occurs in the text and by what other JUDGEMENTS have been made previously in the text. Take, for example, the word militant . From a left-wing, union oriented perspective, the term has obvious positive connotations - to be militant is to have a praiseworthy determination to pursue the interests of the working class. From a right-wing, management perspective, of course, militancy is a negative value, connoting a hard-line, obstinate determination to frustrate management initiatives wherever possible.
Consider likewise the word mean. In most contexts this word is related semantically to cruel or unkind and would indicate a negative JUDGEMENT. Thus, we might say to a child, `Don't be mean to your little sister - let her play with the train set.' However, listening to one of those post-match post-mortems so favoured by television sports programs, I heard one of the panel of sports experts using the term in a clearly positive sense. He said, `You know, what I like so much about Abblett [a star Australian rules football player] is that he's a really mean forward - he doesn't give anything away, his opponents don't get any easy kicks.' Here the commentator's use of mean (derived from mean in the sense of stingy or parsimonious) indicated a positive assessment of the player's dependability, of his resolve to play in what the commentator saw as a laudably aggressive manner.
As one further illustration, consider the term `Top-Gun' (derived from a celebrated Hollywood move starring Tom Cruise. In the following report by the Sun of US and British missile attack on Iraq it indicates positive assessment of the competence of allied pilots.
Brit jets join Bush's blitz Allied jets bombed Iraqi capital Baghdad last night - in one of George W Bush's first acts as US President. British Tornado pilots joined in with US Top Guns to attack missile and communications HQs. (The Sun, page 1, Feb 17, 2001)
Yet it is used with a clearly negative connotation in the following report of a tragic accident in which US airforce planes, flying too low at an Italian ski resort, crashed into a ski lift, resulting in a number of fatalities as the ski car plunged to the earth.
Italian PM: Plane Was Far Too Low The U.S. Marine jet that severed a ski lift cable, plunging 20 people to their deaths, violated Italian air safety regulations with its "earth-shaving flight" across a snowy hillside, the prime minister of this angry nation said Wednesday. The defense minister said the American pilot should be prosecuted, several influential lawmakers said U.S. bases in Italy should be closed, and Italian and American investigators started looking into the accident near Trento, about 90 miles east of Milan. "This is not about a low-level flight, but a terrible act, a nearly earth-shaving flight, beyond any limit allowed by the rules and laws," Premier Romano Prodi told reporters. Witnesses said the Marine EA-6B Prowler swooped through the valley just above the treetops on Tuesday. Its tail severed two, fist-sized, steel cables, sending a gondola full of European skiers and the operator to their deaths. Startled by an unusually loud boom, 66-year-old Carla Naia looked up and saw the jet "coming at me at an incredible speed." "I've seen lots of planes and I've often cursed them," the Cavalese resident said. "But this one seemed completely out of control, far lower and faster than the others." Residents of this valley have long complained about low-flying jets out of Aviano Air Base at the foot of the Italian Alps. "We are fed up," said Mauro Gilmozi, the mayor of this picturesque town of 3,600. "This 'Top Gun' stuff has got to stop."
Here, rather than indicating a positive assessment of competence, the term negatively evaluates the pilot's behaviour as foolhardy and reckless.
To summarise then, JUDGEMENT involves positive or negative assessments of human behaviour by reference to a system of social norms. Thus for an utterance to act to indicate a JUDGEMENT value it must, either directly or indirectly, reflect on the behaviour or performance of some human individual or grouping. Negative values of Judgement typically involve a sense of guilt or of dysfunctionality.
As I indicated earlier, the analysis of JUDGEMENT is complicated by the need to distinguish between what can be termed `inscribed' (or explicit) JUDGEMENT and what we terms `tokens' of Judgement (implicit). Under the inscribed/explicit category, the evaluation is explicitly presented by means of a lexical item carrying the JUDGEMENT value, thus, skilfully, corruptly, lazily etc. It is possible, as I have already indicated, for JUDGEMENT values to be evoked rather than inscribed by what we call `tokens' of JUDGEMENT. Under these tokens, JUDGEMENT values are triggered by what can be viewed as simply 'facts', apparently unevaluated descriptions of some event or state of affairs. The point is that these apparently 'factual' or informational meanings nevertheless have the capacity in the culture to evoke JUDGEMENTAL responses (depending upon the reader's social/cultural/ideological reading position). Thus a commentator may inscribe a JUDGEMENT value of negative capacity by accusing the government of `incompetence' or, alternatively, evoke the same value by means of a token such as `the government did not lay the foundations for long term growth'. There is, of course, nothing explicitly evaluative about such an observation but it nonetheless has the potential to evoke evaluations of incompetence in readers who share a particular view of economics and the role of government. Similarly, a reporter might explicitly evaluate the behaviour of, for example, a Californian suicide cult as `bizarre' or `aberrant' or they might evoke such appraisals by means of tokens such as `They referred to themselves as "angels"' or `They filled the mansion with computers and cheap plastic furniture.' Such tokens, of course, assume shared social norms. They rely upon conventionalised connections between actions and evaluations. As such, they are highly subject to reader position - each reader will interpret a text's tokens of judgement according to their own cultural and ideological positioning. They are also subject to influence by the co-text, and an important strategy in the establishment of interpersonal positioning in a text is to stage inscribed and evoked evaluation in such a way that the reader shares the writer's interpretations of the text's tokens.
In some instances, the ethical evaluation evoked by some 'factual' description (a token) will have become so naturalised or taken-for-granted in a given cultural situation that it is likely to be regarded as explicit (inscribed) rather than as implicit (evoked). JUDGEMENT. Consider, for example,
They ordered a pizza and then shot the deliveryman in the head at point-blank range.
Now the moral evaluation associated with such an action is so firmly established in our culture as to be virtually automatic. Nevertheless, it is still useful to distinguish between token (implicit JUDGEMENT) and inscription (explicit JUDGEMENT) in these contexts. The writer always has the choice between the token, the description couched essentially in experiential or 'factual' terms (`They shot the man in the head at point-blank range') and a description couched in the explicitly evaluative terms of explicit/inscribed Judgement (`They murdered him, heinously, callously and in cold-blood.') Since the choice is always available it remains meaningful and significant and should not be overlooked in the analysis, however `automatic' the connection between the factual description and the JUDGEMENT value it implies.
It is necessary, however, to acknowledge that the distinction is not always so clear cut between the explicit and implicit Evaluation. Consider, for example, the following
In (1) one we have an unproblematically explicit inscription of a value of JUDGEMENT - through the word 'rudely' which necessarily indicates a negative assessment of those who were talking. But what about (2)?. Here there is no word or wording which, of itself, indicates a positive or negative assessment. And yet there is still something vaguely accusatory or critical about the wording - specifically the use of the wordings 'although' and perhaps 'whole room' and 'kept on'. As I've said, none of these formulations could be said, of themselves, to convey a negative or positive assessment - they are not 'attitudinal' in the sense of the term I'm using here. But they are, nevertheless, evaluative. Thus the term 'although' indicates an assessment by which the happening described in the second clause ('the whole room kept on chattering') is represented as in some way unexpected, abnormal or untoward. Similarly, 'kept on' involves an assessment that the 'talking' went on longer than was expected or was acceptable - that we might have expected it to have stopped before this. The wording, 'whole room' involves a sense of intensification, a sense of that the writer/speaker is somehow more invested or involved in the utterance than is always the case. We thus have evaluations of counter-expectation and intensity. What does this mean for our analysis of JUDGEMENT. Do we see this as inscribed (explicit) JUDGEMENT or as evoked (implicit) JUDGEMENT. Well actually, we see it as somewhere in between. Although the utterance contains no values of explicit JUDGEMENT (or of any other type of ATTITUDE), it does employ evaluative language and these wordings act to direct us towards a Judgemental response. Accordingly, we say that in such an utterance, an inference of a JUDGEMENT value is provoked in the reader/writer (as opposed to evoked.) Thus JUDGEMENT may be inscribed (explicit), provoked (implicit) or evoked (implicit).
Figure 1: modes of judgement
It is worth noting that values of AFFECT (discussed previously) often have a potential to 'provoke' Judgement in this way. This is because social assessments so often attach to values of AFFECT - emotional responses are frequently viewed as `good' or `bad', as `appropriate' or `inappropriate. Thus to state, `He hates the weak and the vulnerable' is to provoke a JUDGEMENT of (im)propriety, since the culture strongly associates such a moral evaluation with such an AFFECTUAL stance. To state, `He adores his children' is likely to provoke a positive JUDGEMENT for the same reasons.
Identify points in the text where some value of Judgement is, at least potentially, activated. Where possible indicate if the JUDGEMENT is,
The text is an newspaper commentary piece by Norman Tebbit, a former minister in Margaret Thatcher's Conservative government and now columnist for the conservative Daily Mail newspaper. (Tebbit was among those injured in an IRA attack on the Tory Party conference in 1984.) The article concerns an announcement by Corus, the former British Steel, that it is to cut-back more of its operations and to sack more workers. It is noteworthy that Tebbit is not noted for taking a pro-union or pro-worker position. While a minister in the Thatcher government, he was involved in that government's highly controversial campaign to close coal mines and to challenge the work-place power of the unions.
(My analysis is provided below for purposes of comparison)
NORMAN TEBBIT (with dinkus of Tebbit) Mail on Sunday Feb 4 2001, p 29 Crocodile tears for the men of steel THE closures and cut-backs at steelmaker Corus are a tragedy. My heart is with the steelworkers - shopfloor and boardroom alike. Anyone who has seen white-hot liquid steel pouring out of vats or heard red-hot metal screaming as it is rolled, hammered and cut into shape, knows steelmaking is more than just a job. It has been at the heart of industry for over a century. No blame should fall on today's workforce. They have given their all as loyal, productive, flexible workers. Nor should it be heaped on the management which turned the high-cost, low-quality, old British Steel Corporation into one of the world's finest steel makers. There is too much steel being made. Changing technologies and new materials mean less steel in products like cars. Steelworks are closing all over America. They are in trouble in Europe, some surviving only on covert subsidy and the collapse of the euro. Joining the euro would only lock us into that problem - not solve it. Daft Government regulations and mad new taxes such as the Climate Control Levy, which penalises manufacturing by taxing energy, do not help. But when more of a product is being made than used something has to give. The Prime Minister is not just angry. He is scared. Labour is in trouble in Wales. Families which voted Labour for generations are deserting him. When Trade Secretary Stephen Byers says Corus should have consulted him he knows that, bound hand and foot by our masters in Brussels, he could have done nothing to help. What he wanted was a delay - of about three months until after election day. Byers' temper tantrums were more about fear of losing his job than concern about steelworkers losing theirs.
Crocodile tears for the men of steel
Explicit (inscribed) Negative JUDGEMENT. To describe someone as weeping "crocodile tears" is to accuse them of insincerity and dissembling - a false show or sympathy or grief, akin to lying.
THE closures and cut-backs at steelmaker Corus are a tragedy.
Although describing something as a "tragedy" is clearly evaluative, it's not an example of JUDGEMENT because there is no direct assessment of some human behaviour as good/bad, praiseworthy/blameworthy etc. This, as we will see later, is an example of APPRECIATION since a certain affectual property is attributed to the current situation of steelworks being closed. It isn't AFFECT, in the sense of the term which operates here, because being 'tragic' is a quality of the situation - it doesn't directly describe some emotional response on the part of some human participant, though it does, of course, suggest that emotional responses are likely.
It's important to realise that, in a sense, emotion can be seen as underlying all values of Attitude - JUDGEMENT, APPRECIATION as well as, obviously, AFFECT . Thus if I employ positive JUDGEMENT and describe someone as "performing brilliantly", at the same time I imply that I have a positive feeling/emotion towards that person and their performance. The point, however, is that I choose to say, 'She performed brilliantly' (JUDGEMENT), rather than 'I loved her performance' (AFFECT). Now, it may be felt that there isn't a great deal of difference between the meanings of those two utterances. But there is still SOME difference. There's a difference in the way the writer's Attitude is construed and the Appraisal framework is designed to be able to capture these types of relatively subtle, but nevertheless significant, nuances in the way speakers/writers position themselves interpersonally. In saying "I was very distressed by what happened" (AFFECT), I directly locate my evaluation in my own, individual emotional response. In saying "What happened was a tragedy" (APPRECIATION), I background my own emotional response (though, of course, it's still there) and choose rather to present the evaluative response as a quality which is intrinsic to what I am evaluating. Thus, AFFECT represents the evaluation as a response by, or property of, some human evaluator/emoter, while both JUDGEMENT and APPRECIATION represent the evaluation as property of the phenomenon being evaluated.
My heart is with the steelworkers - shopfloor and boardroom alike.
Positive AFFECT. An indication of a feeling of sympathy by the writer.
Anyone who has seen white-hot liquid steel pouring out of vats or heard red-hot metal screaming as it is rolled, hammered and cut into shape, knows steelmaking is more than just a job. It has been at the heart of industry for over a century.
Implicit (provoked) positive JUDGEMENT. Here there is plenty of language which could be seen as evaluative. It's mostly intensifying - eg white-hot, pouring, screaming, at the heart of. The point of all this does seem to be to indicate a positive regard for (a) the steel industry and/or (b), possibly steel workers. The closest the writer gets to making this evaluation explicit is with the phrase, "more than a job". But nowhere does the writer actually declare that the steel-making industry was 'vital' to the British economy (implied in "at the heart of industry") or that working in a steel plant requires strength and courage or that steel workers are committed, resilient or loyal (some or all of which may be implied by 'more than a job"). Accordingly, from my reading position, I see this as provoking a positive Judgement.
No blame should fall on today's workforce.
Explicit positive JUDGEMENT. Indicates that the 'workforce' are blameless.
They have given their all as loyal, productive, flexible workers.
Explicit (inscribed) positive JUDGEMENT.
Nor should it [blame] be heaped on the management which turned the high-cost, low-quality, old British Steel Corporation into one of the world's finest steel makers.
"Nor should blame be heaped" = explicit JUDGEMENT.
"high-cost, low-quality, old British Steel Corporation"
This is an interesting case where the evaluation is complicated by the use of the somewhat abstract "British Steel Corporation" as the primary social actor. If the author had written something like, "In the old days, they produced high-cost, low-quality steel", this would have been a straightforward example of APPRECIATION - a negative assessment of a non-human phenomenon, steel, as "high-cost" and "low quality". But here it is not the steel, but the old Corporation which is said to be "high-cost" and "low-quality". Now, we might interpret this as suggesting that the people who worked for the old company were incompetent in that they produced a low-quality product - which would, of course, entail a value of negative JUDGEMENT. But this, however, is only the implication, an inference likely to be drawn. What is the direct, explicit evaluation at work here? On the face of it, it is not of human behaviour, at least not directly, but of this impersonalised or depersonalised entity, the old British Steel Corporation. Accordingly, I would analyse this as, in the first instance, explicit APPRECIATION, but might also record this as an instance of implicit (provoked) negative JUDGEMENT. (There is no reason why double codings of this type should not be made, where appropriate.)
"one of the world's finest steel makers" = explicit positive JUDGEMENT.
This is somewhat similar to the last case, at least to the extent that it is a company rather than individual or grouped that are being evaluated. But I believe the human element is still sufficiently present to treat this as explicit positive JUDGEMENT. The behaviour of the people who make up the company is being evaluated - these people are highly competent in what they do.
'The people who work the management turned the high-cost, low-quality, old British Steel Corporation into one of the world's finest steel makers" = implicit (provoked by "finest") JUDGEMENT.
Here there is another layer of evaluation by which it is the management of the new company, rather than its workers, for example, which is singled out for a positive assessment. I see this JUDGEMENT as implicit (provoked), since it's an inference which is drawn from the observation that the management has changed the company from one which produced low-quality steel to one which produces high-quality steel. The distinction here, however, between implicit and explicit realisation is a fine one indeed and may depend on whether or not we see "the management" as being the same entity as 'the finest steel maker".
There is too much steel being made. Changing technologies and new materials mean less steel in products like cars. Steelworks are closing all over America. They are in trouble in Europe, some surviving only on covert subsidy and the collapse of the euro.
This is all largely "factual", description, though there are a number of elements which do convey some evaluation. Hence the amount of steel making going on is assessed negatively as being excessive/too much, and the situation for steel makers in Europe is negatively assessed as 'trouble'. There would seem to be some potential for this "excessive" amount of steel making to be taken as an implicit indication of incompetence by the steel makers - they might be seen as having blundered in setting the wrong production targets. Yet interestingly this potential inference is not strongly supported by the text which follows. In fact, evidence is provided which could be taken as suggesting the production over-runs were unavoidable or at least couldn't have been forseen by even the most competent managers. Thus we are informed that the problem is with "changing technologies" and a resultant need for less steel in cars. As well, we are told this is a world-wide problem - it's happening in the US and Europe - so it certainly would be unreasonable to single out the British company and its managers for blame.
"Covert subsidies". The term "covert" carries with it strong negative connotations - to act covertly is to is in some way to be dishonest or to dissemble, thus the following from the Cobuild Bank of English,
Nationalist street demonstrations and deepening Unionist suspicions are intensifying the need for talks all round with everybody if the peace process is to continue. But the cause of lasting peace will not be helped if ministers fan hostility and suspicion with covert meetings followed by double talk.
This negatively does not, however, always apply (also from the Bank of English),
PC Seymour, 31, called for all policemen to be given covert body armour. They use body protection in the States," he said. `You need it all the time, not just for certain calls. You have to be prepared."
From my reading position, however, the connotation of "subterfuge" and "deceit" is so strongly fixed that I would interpret this as indicating that the European's have been acting dishonourably/deceitfully in their use of such devices. I would therefore analysis this as explicit negative JUDGEMENT, though once again the dividing line between an explicit and an implicit realisation is a fine one. (That is to say, I take "covert" here to be inscribing the negative Judgement rather than to simply implying it.)
Joining the euro would only lock us into that problem - not solve it.
There's a vague potential here for a token of negative JUDGEMENT. If we were "locked into that problem", the we would be incapacitated, hence a potential negative assessment can arise. Similarly, anyone advocating joining the euro might, thus, by implication be guilty of recklessness or stupidity. There is, however, nothing explicitly JUDGEMENTAL here.
Daft Government regulations and mad new taxes such as the Climate Control Levy, which penalises manufacturing by taxing energy, do not help. But when more of a product is being made than used something has to give.
There is an interesting evaluative ambiguity here. Is it possible for regulations, of themselves, to be "daft", or for taxes to be "mad"? Or is it a matter of the formulation of those regulations and taxes by some human agent which is "daft" or "mad"? This sort of ambiguity will be discussed in more detail later. For now, I'll take it that here it is the Government itself which is the most obvious target for the accusation of daftness and madness and hence classify both these intances as explicit inscribed negative Judgement.
"Penalises manufacturing". The process of "penalising" can be a perfectly legitimate exercise - "You have been penalised for driving while dangerously under the influence of alcohol." However here, of course, there is an implication of illegitimacy - the ideology informing the text and its evaluations is one in which constraints on manufacturing are generally seen as "a bad thing". Accordingly "penalising manufacturing" can be seen as a token, as an implicit negative Judgement of those who do the penalising - the government.
The Prime Minister is not just angry. He is scared.
"Angry"/ "Scared" = AFFECT & implicit (provoked) JUDGEMENT. "Angry" and "scared" are obvious examples of AFFECT, but here, however, there is an additional "provocation" going on. For a national leader to be "scared" reflects badly on his ability to perform well. That the Prime Minister is "scared" provokes the JUDGEMENT that he is either incapacitated or even that he is cowardly.
Labour is in trouble in Wales. Families which voted Labour for generations are deserting him.
Implicit negative JUDGEMENT. By implication suggests that Labour is performing badly or even that it has been behaving dishonourable - why else would long-standing supporters desert.
When Trade Secretary Stephen Byers says Corus should have consulted him he knows that, bound hand and foot by our masters in Brussels, he could have done nothing to help.
"bound hand an foot" = explicit negative JUDGEMENT (incapacity).
"masters" = almost explicit JUDGEMENT - those in Brussels are construed as powerful, as in control. There is, of course, a potential token of negative JUDGEMENT here. Presumably it is not right that people in Brussels should have such a capacity to control the people in the UK.
"he could have done nothing to help" = implicit negative Judgement (incapacity)
What he wanted was a delay - of about three months until after election day. Byers' temper tantrums were more about fear of losing his job than concern about steelworkers losing theirs.
"temper tantrum" = explicit negative JUDGEMENT. To give way in this way to excess emotion is necessarily wrong in the culture.
"fear" = AFFECT, possible provocation of negative JUDGEMENT - fear may be a sign of weakness or, here, a sign of an unsavoury self-preoccupation
"more fear of losing his job than concern about steelworkers of losing theirs" = implicit (token) Judgement. Here the account gives rise to the inference that the minister is selfishly concerned for his own future and is uncaring of, or at least not sufficiently concerned about, the plight of the workers
As previously, my purpose here is not to offer a detailed account of the text just analysed. My point, rather, is just to indicate the sorts of insights and lines of further investigation that this type of Appraisal analysis might give rise to.
Such texts are often interesting from the perspective of (a) what sort of textual persona such commentators construct for themselves (b) the axiological or ideological perspective informing the text and which the author typically takes as "natural" and (c) the ideal reader which the text constructs for itself - that is to say, the particular set of assumptions, beliefs, values and expectations which the text assumes of its readers. The just completed analysis offers some interesting insights into these type of questions.
This was a commentary piece written in response to news reports in which that the British Labour Government, and the industry minister in particular, had expressed outrage at the announcement of closures by Corus, and distress and concern for the workers likely to lose their jobs. Tebbit, famous or notorious (depending on your reading position) for his arch-conservative views and previous opposition to the unions, here addresses himself to the announcement of closures and job losses and particularly to the government's reported anger. In order to do this, he employs values of ATTITUDE to construct for himself a particular persona and to position his readers in ways which I explore below
THE closures and cut-backs at steelmaker Corus are a tragedy. My heart is with [authorial Affect] the steelworkers - shopfloor and boardroom alike.
1. The opening value of explicit AFFECT: Potential rhetorical effects (depending on reader positioning) -> This is a man of feeling and empathy; he indicates an inclination towards solidarity with management, and perhaps surprisingly, with workers. Tellingly, by beginning the account in this way, he construes his own, individual emotional response as having some substantial degree of significance in the wider community.
Anyone who has seen white-hot liquid steel pouring out of vats or heard red-hot metal screaming as it is rolled, hammered and cut into shape, knows steelmaking is more than just a job. [Implicit/token of Judgement] It has been at the heart of industry for over a century.
2. Second step, a "factual' token of JUDGEMENT in favour of the workers. Potential rhetorical effects -> The positive view taken of the workers is not self-evident or given in that some evidence for, or explanation of, it needs to be provided. (Contrast this with the negative view of the Government.) The descriptive terms of the various tokens of JUDGEMENT are somewhat intriguing - a strange sort of heroism which, by implication, derives from working in what are depicted as dramatic and demanding working conditions.
No blame should fall on today's workforce. [Explicit Judgement]
3. Once the evidential basis for the positive evaluation of workers (via the previous token) has been established, an explicit positive evaluation is provided; the author absolves the workers of blame. Possible rhetorical effects -> the author constructs himself as (or at least makes a bid to be seen as) possessed of substantial moral authority in the speech community in which he operates - he bids to oblige society (or at least his readers) to absolve the workers of blame. Tellingly, of course, his use of the negative, 'no blame should fall', invokes the positive, that 'blame SHOULD fall'. Hence the notion that the workers would be seen as blameworthy is referenced - that they are blameworthy is constructed as a viewpoint which could be held by some readers, but which is, nevertheless, rejected.
They have given their all as loyal, productive, flexible workers. [Explicit Judgement]
The workers behaviour is evaluated positively by means of a list of positive Judgements. Possible rhetorical effects -> The author assumes a particular moral framework of interconnect requirements by which workers may be evaluated positively and absolved of blame. (a) They should be emotionally and psychologically committed to their job - they must 'give their all" and be 'loyal". (b) They must be "productive", which, on the face of it, is a curious requirement since all workers do produce things, at least to some degree. Underlying it, of course, is the assumption that some workers are not 'productive enough' with the implication that here, at Corus, is a 'reformed' group of workers who produce more than other "less productive" and hence more blameworthy workers. (c) They must be "flexible". Meaning ambiguous/unclear - perhaps workers must be happy to have their working conditions and terms of employed changed, or perhaps they must be prepared and able to rapidly change what they do according, presumably, to the demands of their managers, the vagaries of international markets etc.
Nor should it [blame] be heaped [Explicit Judgement]on the management which turned the high-cost, low-quality, old British Steel Corporation into one of the world's finest [Explicit Judgement] steel makers.
Author absolves management of blame, praises them. Possible rhetorical effects -> As previously, the author claims considerable moral authority. Interestingly, less work has gone into providing evidential support for the positive JUDGEMENT of management than was the case with workers. We are told only that, in the past the British Steel corporation produced "high-cost" and "low-quality" steel, while now it is a "fine" steel maker. We are not advised as to the precise terms from which its 'fineness" derives, nor provided with any evidence for this assessment. As a consequence, the positive assessment of the management is represented as more of a given, as more concensual among readers than the positive assessment of the workers.
There is too much steel being made. Changing technologies and new materials mean less steel in products like cars. Steelworks are closing all over America.
Rhetorical effects -> The action of the global economy is represented as something which is remote from the actions of individual economies. No-one is to blame for the negative affects which follow from, for example, "changing technologies"
They are in trouble in Europe, some surviving only on covert [Explicit Judgement] subsidy and the collapse of the euro.
Explicit JUDGEMENT of European industry policy. Rhetorical effects -> That European industry policies are to be viewed negatively, that they amount to some form of subterfuge,
Joining the euro would only lock us into that problem - not solve it. [potential token of negative Judgement]
Similar rhetorical effects to previous - similar assumptions about negative evaluation of Europe.
Daft Government [Explicit Judgement] regulations and mad [Explicit Judgement] new taxes such as the Climate Control Levy1, which penalises manufacturing by taxing energy, do not help. But when more of a product is being made than used something has to give.
"
Explicit negative JUDGEMENT of the Government for introducing regulations by which manufacturers pay according to the amount of energy they use in a bid to lower emissions of green-house gasses. Rhetorical effects -> The pro-business, anti-environmental ideology underlying such an evaluation is construed as commonsensical and a given, since the proposition that such regulations are "daft" and "mad" is presupposed. The reader is thereby construed as holding these views. The author also assumes considerable social standing by dint of being able to offer such negative assessments of the Government in such a bald, unsubstantiated manner.
The Prime Minister is not just angry. [non-authorial Affect] He is scared. [non-authorial Affect]
Non-authorial Affect. Rhetorical consequences -> The authorial represents himself as being in the privileged position of having access to the Prime Minister's "true" feelings, without needing to supply substantiation - part of his bid for "prophetic" status in the speech community.
When Trade Secretary Stephen Byers says Corus should have consulted him he knows that, bound hand and foot [Explicit Judgement] by our masters [implicit Judgement] in Brussels, he could have done nothing to help. [Implicit Judgement]
Similar to previous. The author claims access to privileged knowledge - he knows the "true" thoughts of the Trade Secretary who, interestingly, is represented as knowing that he is 'bound hand and foot". The writer assumes that the reader views the current arrangement vis-à-vis the EU as one of domination by "them" over us (hence "masters in Brussels)
What he wanted was a delay - of about three months until after election day. Byers' temper tantrums [Explicit Judgement] were more about fear of losing his job than concern about steelworkers losing theirs.[Implicit Judgement]
Explicit negative JUDGEMENT directed against the Minister; presupposition that the Minister's anger is a "temper tantrum"; negative AFFECT attributed to Minister. Potential Rhetorical effects -> Once again the author claims the authority to see into the heart of the Minister; once again a negative view of the government is assumed of the reader in that negative JUDGEMENTS provides without substantiation or qualification.. Potential
The notes to this point have outlined the system of JUDGEMENT in relatively broad outline. The Appraisal framework provides for an analysis of this set of meanings in greater detail and with a greater delicacy of analysis. That is to say, it provides a more fine-grained set of sub-categories of types of JUDGEMENT to enable more detailed analysis of JUDGEMENT choices. Sections exploring this more delicate level of analysis will be added here later. For now you may like to look at the summary of these categories provided in the Appraisal Outline on the appraisal web site at (www.languageofevaluation.info/appraisal) or you may like to consult Iedema et al, Martin 1997 or Martin 2000 where a full discussion is provided.
Halliday, M.A.K. & Hasan, R. 1985. Language, Context and Text: Aspects of Language in a Socio-Semiotic Perspective, Geelong, Victoria Australia, Deakin University Press.
Iedema, R., S. Feez, and P.R.R. White. 1994. Media Literacy, Sydney, Disadvantaged Schools Program, NSW Department of School Education.
Martin, J.R. 1995. 'Reading Positions/Positioning Readers: JUDGEMENT in English', Prospect: a Journal of Australian TESOL 10 (2): 27-37.
--- 2000. 'Beyond Exchange: APPRAISAL Systems in English', in Evaluattion in Text, Hunston, S. & Thompson, G. (eds), Oxford, Oxford University Press.
1 The name of this tax is, in fact, the "Climate Change Levy".
Return to listing of notes in this Guide | Return to Appraisal Homepage