Construing chemistry knowledge through English systematic names of organic compounds: a Systemic Functional Linguistics perspective

This paper explores how English systematic names of organic compounds (ESNOCs) construe chemistry knowledge. Drawing on types of structure and the field model in Systemic Functional Linguistics, this study analyzes the grammatical structures organizing ESNOCs and the field-specific meanings realized by these structures. The analysis reveals three types of structures underpinning the meaning-making of ESNOCs: (1) multivariate structures that construe a classification taxonomy and a composition taxonomy; (2) subjacency structures – one-layer and two-layer subjacency duplexes – that complement the multivariate structures by adding a gauged spatial property that specifies the locations of substituents or functional groups within the composition taxonomy and expanding the breadth of this taxonomy through the representation of as many identical substituents and/or functional groups as needed in an organic compound; (3) univariate structures, where the hypotactic ones complement the multivariate structures by specifying the different depths of the classification taxonomy, and the paratactic ones complement the multivariate and subjacency structures by expanding the composition taxonomy breadth for distinct substituents and enriching the sptial property, respectively. These field-specific meanings constitute the disciplinary affordance of most ESNOCs. The findings regarding the grammatical structures organizing ESNOCs reveal how these technical terms used in organic chemistry achieve their disciplinary affordances.