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Encyclopedia > Systemic functional grammar

Systemic functional grammar (SFG) is a grammar model developed by Michael Halliday — the most well-known component of a broad social semiotic approach to language called systemic-functional linguistics, originally articulated by Halliday in the 1960s. Image File history File links This is a lossless scalable vector image. ... Michael Alexander Kirkwood Halliday (born 1925) is a linguist who developed an internationally influential grammar model, the systemic functional grammar (which also goes by the name of systemic functional linguistics [SFL]). In addition to English, the model has been applied to other languages, both Indo-European and non-Indo-European. ... Semiotics, semiotic studies, or semiology is the study of signs and symbols, both individually and grouped into sign systems. ...


Systemic-functional grammar is concerned primarily with the choices that are made available to speakers of a language by their grammatical systems. These choices are assumed to be meaningful and relate speakers' intentions to the concrete forms of a language. The introduction to this article provides insufficient context for those unfamiliar with the subject matter. ...


Meanings are in systemic functional grammar divided into three broad areas, called metafunctions: the ideational, the interpersonal and the textual.


The ideational is grammar for representing the world, the interpersonal is grammar for enacting social relationships (asking, asserting, ordering), and the textual is grammar for binding linguistic elements together into broader texts (via pronominalizations, grammatical topicalization, thematization, expressing the newsworthiness of information, etc.).


Systemic-functional grammar is still unusual in its commitment to dealing with all of these areas of meaning equally and within the grammatical system itself.


Relation to other branches of grammar

The theory sets out to explain how the continuous emission of sounds or the continuous concatenation of characters (wordings) construes meanings. This is a radically different approach to language from Noam Chomsky's and it is not intended to answer his question of "what is the finite rule system which generates all and only the grammatical sentences in a language?". In SFG, adult human language is not viewed as a finite rule system, but rather as a system realized by instantiations which is back-feeded by the very instantiations that realize it. Avram Noam Chomsky (Hebrew :אברם נועם חומסקי Yiddish: אברם נועם כאמסקי) (born December 7, 1928) is an American linguist, philosopher, political activist, author, and lecturer. ...


Another way to understand the difference in concerns between functional and generative grammars is through Chomsky's claim that "linguistics is a sub-branch of psychology." Halliday investigates linguistics as it were a sub-branch of sociology. SFG therefore pays much more attention to pragmatics and discourse semantics, at the expense of an easily computable formalism. Psychology (from Greek: ψυχή, psukhē, spirit, soul; and λόγος, logos, knowledge) is both an academic and applied discipline involving the scientific study of mental processes and behavior. ... Sociology (from Latin: socius, companion; and the suffix -ology, the study of, from Greek λόγος, lógos, knowledge) is an academic and applied discipline that studies society and human social interaction. ... The ability to understand another speakers intended meaning is called pragmatic competence. ... The introduction to this article provides insufficient context for those unfamiliar with the subject matter. ... The term formalism describes an emphasis on form over content or meaning in the arts, literature, or philosophy. ...


Systemic functional grammar has been used to derive further grammatical accounts —for example, the model has been used by Richard Hudson to develop word grammar. Richard Hudson (usually known as Dick Hudson) is a British linguist. ... Word grammar is a grammar model developed by Richard Hudson in the 1980s. ...


See also

Other significant systemic-functional grammarians: Functional grammar is the name given to any of a range of functionally-based approaches to the scientific study of language. ... Systemic linguistics is an approach to linguistics that considers language as a system. ...

  • Christian M.I.M. Matthiessen
  • Robin Fawcett
  • James R. Martin
  • Geoff Thompson
  • Kristin Davidse
  • Ángela Downing
  • Philip Locke

Linguists also involved with the early development of the approach:

Randolph Quirk (b. ...

External links

  • For more information on all aspects of systemic-functional grammar and systemic-functional linguistics, see the SFL web site at: Systemic functional grammar
  • For a large bibliography containing the vast majority of systemic functional writings, see the bibliography site at: [1]
  • Word grammar

  Results from FactBites:
 
Background (1267 words)
does not teach the metalanguage of systemic linguistics to students; it uses systemic linguistics to organise and present the systems of language and organisation with which the software program is designed.
Functional linguists begin from a data base of samples of the kinds of language which are used in different situations (registers).
Meaning is defined by the context in which specific bits of language are used (the surrounding language or situation in all its complexity: systemic functional linguistics determines the register of a piece of language by defining its domain, tenor and mode).
AcademicDB - A Short Introduction to Functional Grammar. (264 words)
While the systemic grammar contains a functional one, and while the theory behind functional grammar is systemic, this paper is focused on the functional part of this grammar, that is, the interpretation of the grammatical patterns in terms of configurations of functions.
Besides, as the functions are particularly relevant to the analysis of text, cohesion, which is an important part in text analysis, will also be discussed.
General Introduction -------------------- Functional grammar is based on the spoken language, or spoken discourse.
  More results at FactBites »


 

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