GRAMMATICAL METAPHOR AND THE UNIVERSAL LAW OF PARTICIPANT REALIGNMENT IN VERBAL PROCESSES

Dede Ismail; Anum Dahlia

doi:10.33197/ejlutama.v10i1.323

Authors

Dede Ismail Institut Digital Ekonomi LPKIA
Anum Dahlia Institut Digital Ekonomi LPKIA

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.33197/ejlutama.v10i1.323

Keywords:

Grammatical Metaphor; Participant Realignment; Systemic Functional Linguistics; Transitivity; Verbal Process; Nominalization.

Abstract

Building upon a research trajectory established in previous studies on Material processes (Ismail, 2020) and Mental processes (Ismail & Dahlia, 2024), this paper identifies a "Universal Law" of participant realignment within the Symbolic World of Verbal processes. While previous literature has extensively mapped nominalization in other domains, systematic evidence concerning the realignment of Verbal participants during the "unpacking" of grammatical metaphors has remained insufficient. Utilizing a qualitative descriptive method, seventeen data points involving the delexicalized verbs make, give, and have were extracted from the Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA) and subjected to transitivity analysis.

The findings reveal a consistent tripartite realignment pattern: the Range restores the Verbal Process, while its qualifiers and prepositional phrases realign as Circumstances and Receivers, respectively. This demonstrates a unique transactional complexity in Verbal metaphors that distinguishes them from the Material and Mental patterns previously identified. Ultimately, this study completes a decade-long mapping of the English transitivity system, proving that participant realignment is a stable, predictable, and cognitively grounded linguistic phenomenon across all major process types.

Keyword: Grammatical Metaphor; Participant Realignment; Systemic Functional Linguistics; Transitivity; Verbal Process; Nominalization.

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