The world of lexis is vast and complex and it is generally accepted in psycholinguistics
that it is represented as part of a large complex network. However, in systemic functional
linguistics (SFL) modelling lexis has remained a relatively underdeveloped area of the
theory. The ideas underpinning this paper stem from exploring the interface of context
and lexicology, asking how SFL does and could handle lexis within the theory. Here the
SFL concept of context is used to develop a similar account of lexis. The argumentation
is based on the assumption that ‘knowing about’ context and 'knowing about’ lexis is
contained and maintained within a networked cognitive system. The common view of
the relationship between context and lexis is generally one of disambiguation,
frequently through collocation. However, I argue that there is more involved than that.
In this paper, I use the SFL approach to context to establish the first steps towards an
analogous approach to lexicology. The conclusion offered here is that it is theoretically
plausible to draw on the dimension of instantiation, in a complementary way to delicacy,
in order to model lexis as most local context, where the lexeme (or lemma) is modelled
as meaning potential.

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