This chapter explores the attitudinal resources in ancient Chinese history, based on focus texts extracted from Records of the Grand Historian. This book of history assumes historical significance in that it set the model for all subsequent official dynastic histories in China down to the seventeenth century. The study adopts a top-down perspective, approaching the focus texts from their genre and register features. Most chapters of the Records are biographical profiles of historical figures, and most of the biographies have a generic structure Orientation ^ Record ^ Evaluation. A particularly prominent feature of ancient Chinese histories represented by the Records is that they contain an explicit culminative stage of Evaluation, expressing the history writer’s attitude. The discourse analysis in relation to attitudes in this chapter is informed by the APPRAISAL systems of Martin and White (2005) . Through analysing the types and values of attitudes and their lexicogrammatical realisations in classical written Chinese, the study aims to facilitate an understanding of the genre of historical records of the Chinese imperial dynasties that prevailed for about two millennia, and an understanding of the social and cultural values in China that have been passed down from history to the present.

In this chapter, we explore how Mandarin Chinese is used to describe and taxonomise phenomena in history discourse. While Systemic Functional Linguistics has had a long tradition of studying history discourse, particularly in English and Spanish, the focus has been on historical events and their impact. We show in our study that building knowledge of history also involves reporting what things were like in the past. We analyse a pedagogic text describing the development of handicrafts during the period of the Western Han dynasty (206 BC – AD 24), a particularly prosperous period in Chinese history. We approach the identification of language resources from a ‘tri-stratal’ and ‘top-down’ perspective, taking into account threefold aspects of meaning-making, including the static knowledge structure in the subject area, the language resources organised in the unfolding of the discourse, and the grammatical resources organised in the clause. We reveal that each meaning-making level has its unique characteristics in construing description and taxonomisation.

Chapter 1 presents the purpose of the book – i.e. describing how a text-based description of three world languages can be developed. The Systemic Functional Linguistic theory informing these descpriptons is introduced, including modellng of context and discourse semantics,and the basic theoretical parameters of metafunciton, rank and stratification.The nature argumentation in relation to grammar description is outlined.

Chapter 3 explores verbal group system and structure. In doing so for English and Spanish, it concentrates on what in SFL is referred to as univariate structure. Univariate structures are structures involving a single variable, which is repeated over and over again; they thus function as the realisation of recursive systems. The unit complexes introduced above (clause complexes, group complexes, word complexes and morpheme complexes) are structures of this kind. And some languages develop more delicate clause and group systems organised along these lines. The recursive tense systems in English and Spanish which we describe in this chapter are good examples. Chinese verbal groups on the other hand do not involve recursive systems realised by iterating structures and so have to be approached from a multivariate perspective.

Chapter 2 explores nominal group system and structure. In doing so, it concentrates on what in SFL is referred to as multivariate structure. Multivariate structures are structures involving a finite number of functions, each playing a distinct role. In this chapter we concentrate on developing multivariate structures for nominal groups in English, Spanish and Chinese.

Chapter 4 explores mood systems and structures. It concentrates on paradigmatic relations – and the ways in which these can be motivated in the grammars of English, Spanish and Chinese. This chapter foregrounds questions about the nature of functional language typology, when confronted with the diverse structural realisations of mood in three different languages. It highlights the need to focus on system rather than structure, on higher ranks rather than lower ones and ultimately on discourse semantics rather than grammar by way of establishing comparable ground whenever languages are being contrasted and compared.

Chapter 6 explores theme and information systems and structures. It concentrates on the need to argue from discourse semantics as far as the interpretation of information flow is concerned. This chapter brings some phonological analysis into the picture, since information systems are realised through prosodic phonology (i.e. rhythm and intonation). This work draws on Halliday’s analysis of English intonation, as presented in Halliday (1967, 1970) and Halliday & Greaves (2008).