"The SFL Conceptualisation Of Context"

Fontaine (2017: 4):

The other part of the meaning of ‘putting lexicology into context’ concerns how lexicology can be viewed in relation to context, without restricting the notion of context to co-text or collocation. Normally SFL linguists interested in context and lexicologists generally are almost worlds apart. As suggested above, these are two perspectives that in many ways seem too distant to be merged. Certainly we do find research on context that relates to lexis and lexical analysis but this is not usually framed in lexicological terms which would be accessible to lexicologists. Similarly, it is true that lexicologists are increasingly interested in context (moving beyond co-text) but they do not generally adopt the SFL conceptualisation of context.

Blogger Comments:

[1] This misunderstands the 'SFL conceptualisation of context', which does not include either co-text or collocation. To be clear, in SFL Theory, the term 'context' refers to the culture modelled as a semiotic system. On the other hand, the terms 'co-text' and 'collocation' refer to language, not context. The term 'co-text' refers to (a complementary portion of) an instance of language, whereas 'collocation' refers to the syntagmatic dimension of lexis, analogous to structure in the grammar.

[2] Interest in context and interest in lexicology are not two different perspectives on the same phenomenon, but interests in two different phenomena: culture and words, respectively.

[3] To be clear, as already demonstrated, Fontaine, also, does not adopt the 'SFL conceptualisation of context'.