• Since construal and the recognition of construal are matters of degree, the boundary between themes
and nonthemes is often a fuzzy one in practice. Because of that, it is often useful to speak of concepts as being themes to varying degrees, or stronger or weaker themes, according to available evidence.
One further consideration is mentioned here briefly, the difference between oral and written processing in regard to comprehension and memory. While all that is said in this treatment applies to both
listeners and readers, from experimental evidence “it appears that readers and listeners do adopt somewhat different strategies in comprehending narrative discourse. The listeners pay primary attention
to the theme of the story, building a coherent representation of what was meant. The readers, on the other hand, are able to pay closer attention to the meaning of the sentences per se, recalling more incidental but
mentioned details and being more accurate in their judgments of what was in fact stated in the text” Hildyard and Olson 1982:31f.. I mention two observations:
• Whereas readers and listeners alike can be expected to use both
BOTTOM
-
UP
and
TOP
-
DOWN PROCESSING
,
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the fact that reading gives more time for careful bottom-up processing could account for some of the difference noted.
• The subjects for these experiments were from a society with a long tradition of written materials,
hence were accustomed to using primarily written materials for detailed comprehension and recall. It would be interesting to perform the experiment in a society without a long tradition of literacy or in
which people were more accustomed to using oral materials for detailed comprehension and recall.
2.2.6 Macropredications
If it is possible to make a brief propositional summary of what a particular discourse unit says or seeks to establish, that summary can be called its
MACROPREDICATION
. According to Tomlin et al. 1997:89, “we must distinguish between the centrality or significance of a referent globally [a discourse
topic; RAD] and the aggregate propositional goal of a discourse or some major component of a discourse [its macropredication; RAD].” One could make that kind of distinction by saying that, if a theme is
something the discourse unit is about, a macropredication is what the unit says about the theme. A macropredication about a discourse topic may be a description of it, a statement of what happened to it or
what it did, etc. The macropredication about a situational theme could be that the situation is true or not, or good or bad. The macropredication about a goal theme might tell how that goal is or is not met, and
so forth. In each of these cases, the macropredication is what the discourse unit states about a theme. A macropredication may only be implicit in a discourse unit, hence is a conceptual property of the unit
which is not necessarily derivable from its sentences.
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A macropredication satisfies the definition of theme, a propositional theme. It is more inclusive than the theme about which it makes a statement. In fact, it appears that whenever a discourse unit has a
macropredication, it is the most inclusive theme, hence the head of the discourse unit’s schema see §§2.2.5, 3.4.5. In §2.2.4 we saw one example of this in Matthew 27:57–61 Example text 6, with schema
presented as Figure 5. This is a narrative paragraph that has both a discourse topic, Joseph of Arimathea, and a macropredication “Joseph buried the body of Jesus.” The macropredication is about the topic
Joseph and also functions as the head of the narrative schema.
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Adams and Collins 1979:5 describe “two basic modes of information processing. The first mode, bottom-up processing, is evoked by the incoming data. The features of the data enter the system through the best-fitting,
bottom-level schemata. As these schemata converge into higher-level schemata, they too are activated. In this way, the information is propagated upward through the hierarchy, through increasing comprehensive levels of
interpretation. The other mode, top-down processing, works in the opposite direction. Top-down processing occurs as the system searches for information to fit into partially satisfied, higher-order schemata. …top-down and bottom-
up processing should be occurring at all levels of analysis simultaneously…. The data that are needed to instantiate or fill out the schemata become available through bottom-up processing; top-down processing facilitates their
assimilation if they are anticipated or are consistent with the reader’s conceptual set.” See also Kintsch 2005.
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A macropredication is thus different from van Dijk’s macroproposition, which is “a proposition that is derived from the sententially expressed propositions of a discourse” van Dijk and Kintsch 1983:190.
A similar example, but of the argumentational rather than the narrative genre, is an excerpt from an interview with a barber Appendix F about his profession. He had been talking about experiences he had
had in cutting women’s hair in decades past. Line 01 Most of your new barbers today, actually there isn’t too many taking it up, introduces a contrastive referent, “most of your new barbers today.” As the
first thing mentioned, this referent can be taken as a potential paragraph topic, as for the poor man in “Stone soup” see discussion in §2.2.5. However, here the speaker does not pursue what he was going to
say about most of these new barbers; his comment about them is actually there isn’t too many taking it up, which makes no use of the quantifier most of. Nevertheless, NEW BARBERS TODAY remains as a
potential discourse topic, and his comment is a potential macropredication, which can be paraphrased as TODAY NEW BARBERS ARE FEWER. Both the topic NEW BARBERS TODAY and this
macropredication remain valid throughout the example passage. Line 02, Take these barber colleges, however, presents the potential for a complete change of structure, but addressees soon hear that the
barber colleges have many fewer students lines 03–05 and much higher tuition lines 06–08 than they did before. These two facts, connected by the simple additive expression Not only that, can be seen as
furnishing support for the macropredication: one gives grounds for believing it, the other a reason why it is true. So in the schema, the steps about barber colleges are seen as supporting the macropredication. The
subsequent material, lines 09–13, contains a complication in regard to hierarachical structure see discussion in §2.6.1, but in the global schema it simply furnishes additional reasons in support of the
macropredication. The schema can be illustrated as shown in Figure 8:
¶ head macropredication: 01 Today new barbers are fewer Step 1: grounds:
02–05 Barber colleges have fewer students Step 2: reason: 06–08 Barber colleges have higher tuition possible subpoint to
Step 1 ¶
Step 3: reason: 09 Barbers today don’t get enough pay Step 4: reason: 10–13 Apprentices give up because of long period and low pay
Figure 8: Schema for the interview with the barber excerpt Appendix F
In summary, we note that: •
The macropredication TODAY NEW BARBERS ARE FEWER makes a statement about the topic NEW BARBERS TODAY.
• This macropredication also heads the schema: it is what the speaker aims to establish and the concept
for which the steps of the schema furnish support. •
The macropredication is also a theme: it is a point of integration for the schema having intrinsic interest for the speaker. It is a propositional theme, whereas NEW BARBERS TODAY is a discourse
topic. •
This proposition, as a theme, includes the topic. It is, in fact, the most inclusive theme. The new paragraph at line 09 is discussed in §2.6.5, and the internal structure of the steps in §2.6.2.
Since a macropredication is a theme, it can be cited in answer to the question, “What is the discourse unit about?” van Dijk 1997:10. The excerpt from the barber interview could be said to be about both its
topic NEW BARBERS TODAY and its propositional theme that TODAY NEW BARBERS ARE FEWER.
There seems to be no reason to assume that all discourse units, even common and coherent ones, have a macropredication. Churchill’s speech Appendix A, for example, does not seem to have simple overall
macropredication. It could be analyzed as being about a referential topic “the new government I have been asked to form”, with two main points in its schema, of two distinct genres: declarative “I have been
forming it,” lines 03–13 and hortatory “Support it,” lines 14–35. Since declarative and hortatory expressions are not easy to combine into a single statement, this text does not have an obvious overall
macropredication. A paragraph that gives description of a participant, such as Luke 2:36–37 see Example text 11, may also not have an overall macropredication. The encyclopedia article about England
mentioned above does not have a global macropredication. In general, narrative schemas that lack a goal theme §3.4.2 commonly appear to lack a macropredication as well. For such reasons, a text’s coherence
does not seem to depend on its having a macropredication any more than it depends on its having any other particular kind of theme. Its coherence depends on having some theme and a head for its schema,
whether it be propositional a macropredication, referential a topic, a situation, or a goal.
2.2.7 Provisional schemas, heads, and themes
