ENGLONESIAN: Jurnal Ilmiah Linguistik dan Sastra, Vol. 2 No. 1, Mei 2006: 1 – 11
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definition with a 3 process typically Relational
Process in between the term and definition.
The following example shows the technical
aspects of language in which a definition is
derived.
Table 4: Technicality
Atom is
refers to
points to
is defined as
indicates means…
the smallest element of an entity
Engineering the
process of harnessing or directing the
forces and materials of nature for the use and convenience
of man Barometer
a meteorological instrument used for the measurement
of atmospheric pressure
Precipitation All
forms of water which fall from the sky Token
Term Process:
Relational Verb
Values Definition
Technicality differs from acronym or
abbreviation in that technicality involves
condensation of meaning whereas acronym
covers contraction of form. A technical term
may be a common word which carries
condensed meanings whereas acronym carries
common sense in short form. For example sound
in sound is a compression of wave that can be heard
is technical term. Although one knows in
common sense the meaning of sound, as a
technical term the word carries different
meaning. On the other hand UFO is an
abbreviation of unidentified flying object. Once
the full or complete form is given the meaning is
obvious. However, it should be noted that an
acronym may sometimes serve as a technical
term. A
concrete thing is one which is identifiable
by all senses seeing, hearing, feeling,
smelling, tasting…. In other words, the more
senses can be used to identify an object, the
more concrete the object becomes. On the contrary,
the less senses are potentially used to identify
an object, the more abstract the object becomes.
In this way, water is more concrete than
air, waterless is more abstract than water and waterlessness
is more abstract than watery. Abstraction,
as Martin 1993b: 226 has observed,
deals with coding of meaning in nominal
group rather than in clause and logical relation
meaning is buried in process. To exemplify,
the text in 1 is concrete or much more
concrete than that in 2 where clauses have
been recoded in nominal group and logical relation
in verb. 2
Australia’s steel‐making capacity, and
of demands, rubber, metal goods and motor
vehicles enlarged partly because war
demanded. a.
Ali was absent because he was ill. b.
The Dutch colonized Indonesia for almost
four centuries, which caused the
people to be poor and ignorance. 3
a. The enlargement of Australia’ steel‐
making capacity, and of chemicals,
rubber, metal goods and motor
vehicles all owed something to the
demands of war.
b. Ali’s absence was due to his illness.
c. The Dutch colonization in Indonesia
resulted in poverty and ignorance.
5. 4 Practical
The practicality of scientific texts indicates
that words or linguistic resources used are
economical and unambiguous. Specifically the
coding of propositions or ideas in more than one
clause is preferred to be represented in a single
clause. Further, an idea or proposition coded in
a single clause is realized in a group or phrase
by which less linguistic resources are employed.
A relationship of constituent is formed
among the units. This is to say that a higher
unit is constituted by the lower one. Thus, a
clause is constituted by groupphrase which
made up of words and a word is comprised of
morphemes. A group experientially consists of
functional elements of Deictic Λ Numerative Λ
Epithet Λ Classifier Λ Thing Λ Qualifier where
Λ means ‘followed by’ as shown in 4 below. 4
Deictic Numerative
Epithet Classifier
Thing Qualifier
the three
young Asian
women in
the room the
three young
Asian women
who stay in the room
the actual
first three pretty young south east Asian
women who
stay in the room
Table 5: Spoken and Written Language
Medium
Spoken Language
Written Language
sounds phonemes
scriptsletters grapheme
Lexicogrammar high
GI low
LD ow
GI high
LD
Coding propositions of three clause into a
single clause has downgraded or rankshifted
representation in which a clause is coded in
elements of group as sown in more than clause
such as in 5.
5 d.
Ali arrived late, which worried us but pleased
our rival team. e.
Ali’s late arrival resulted in our worries and
our rival team’s pleasure. It
is worth noting that practicality is paradoxical
to ambiguity in the sense that the increase
of practicality i. e economizing linguistic
resources is potential to increase ambiguity.
To exemplify, the following clause in
6a is ambiguous. The ambiguity can be avoided
by specifying the case, thus resulting in impracticality
of the text, i. e using more linguistic
resources. 6
a. Flying planes can be dangerous
ambiguous. b.
Planes which are flying can b dangerous
impractical. c.
The act of flying planes can be dangerous
impractical.
5. 5 Written Language
Scientific texts are coded in the grammar of
written language. Written language differs
from spoken language not merely in terms of
medium in the sense that spoken language is
coded in or realized by sounds phonemes and
that written language is coded in scripts
grapheme but also in lexicogrammatical
aspects. Precisely, this is to say that the
lexicogrammatical representation of spoken
language differ from that of written language.
It is specified that spoken language has
high grammatical intricacy GI and low lexical
density LD whereas written language has low
GI and low LD. GI refers the number of clause
in a sentence or clause complex in LFS
terminology. The more clauses in a clause
complex the more intricate or the higher the GI
becomes. Thus, he was absent because he was ill is
more complex than his absence was caused by his
illness for in the latter clause the propositions are
coded in a single clause. LD describes number
of content words Noun, Verb, Adjective and
Adverb per clause. Thus, the clause he was
absent has one LD and he was ill is also has one.
The LD of a sentence or clause complex is the
sum of all lexical items, i. e content words
divided by the number of clauses. To
exemplify,
the clause complex of Ali arrived late,
which worried us but pleased our rival team
is constituted by 3 clauses and 7 lexical item
printed
in bold letters. The LD is 73 which
Metaphorical Representations and Scientific Texts Amrin Saragih
9
gives 2.3 or simply 2. By the same way, the
clause
Ali’s late arrival resulted in our worries
and
our rival team’s pleasure which is a single
clause has LD of 8.
Spoken language is related to general
language or the language of common sense
whereas written language is related to the
language of science and technology. The
difference of spoken language from written
language is specified as the following.
Table 6: Lexicogrammar and Medium in Language
Lexicogrammar Medium
Examples
spoken spoken
spoken in spoken: conversation
spoken written
spoken in written: dialogues in novel
written spoken
written in spoken: news on TV
written written
written in written: scientific texts
The derivation of metaphorical representation in 2b is configured as in Figure 1
People clear land
in order
to cultivate
crops which
destructs millions
forests and
devastates natural
resources land
clearing for crop cultivation results in forest destruction and natural resourse devastation
Figure 1: Derivation of Metaphorical Representation
By cross classifying lexicogrammar and
medium as features of spoken and written
language, the characteristic of a scientific text is
derived as written lexicogramar in written
medium as summarized in Table 6.
6. METAPHORICAL
