The Misunderstanding Behind 'Iconisation'

Doran, Martin & Herrington (2024: 200-1):

As a popular science writer, Mukherjee does not of course leave us there. He also has the task of celebrating the achievements of the scientists involved and their discoveries. This means we need to bring interpersonal meaning into the picture – to show how value is added to knowledge via a process we refer to as iconisation (Martin 2010). 

… In general terms, the point we are making here is that specialised knowledge involves both understandings and their value.

Reviewer Comments:

[1] For the authors, 'iconisation' is ideational meaning viewed from an interpersonal perspective. That is, 'iconisation' is 'construing experience' viewed from the perspective of 'enacting social relations'. For SFL Theory, on the other hand, 'iconisation' is simply an interpersonal enactment of social relations, misunderstood as field. The interpersonal perspective taken here is on language itself, not on ideational meaning.

[2] To be clear, here the authors present Halliday's model as their own discovery. For example, Halliday (2003 [1992]: 384):

But the full creative power of an act of meaning arises from the fact that language both construes and enacts. It is not only a way of thinking about the world; it is also, at one and the same time, a way of acting on the world — which means, of course, acting on the other people in it.