SYSTEMIC FUNCTIONAL GRAMMAR
SFG focuses on contextual meaning, language in use “grammar is a system of human
communication and allows speakers (and writers) to make and exchange meanings”.
HALLIDAY SFG’s founder. He has a social view of language. First of all, there’s MEANING
(semantics), then WORDING (phonology and lexicogrammar) and then LETTERS/SOUNDS
(phonetics).
The 3 VARIABLES (that give us 3 simultaneous views of the clause) that we take into
consideration are:
•FIELD IDEATIONAL meaning (metafunction) TRANSITIVITY (<<what’s going on?>>)
•TENOR INTERPERSONAL meaning (metafunction) MOOD (<<who’s taking part?>>)
•MODE TEXTUAL meaning (metafunction) THEMATIC STRUCTURE (<<how does the
text hold together?>>)
The model of the clause could be considered as:
•PROCESS (verbal groups)
•PARTICIPANTS (nominal groups)
•CIRCUMSTANCES (prepositional phrases, adverbial groups etc..)
The units of meaning are (in order): caluse complex(es), clause(s), group(s), word(s), morpheme(s).
The 3 main groups are: noun groups (which include the HEAD, numeratives, deictics, epithets,
classifiers, qualifiers), verbal groups [finite (that show tense) or non-finite (that do not show tense)],
adverbial/prepositional groups:
the head is the main noun in the noun group
numeratives include numbers and expressions that quantify (a lot, some…)
deictics are elements that point at sth (this/these, that/those, a(n)/the..)
PREMODIFIERS
epithets express a quality of the thing and can only be adjectives
classifiers talk about the type of thing
qualifiers include defining relative clauses* or prepositional phrases
POSTMODIFIERS
YOU CAN’T MOVE A QUALIFIER TO ANOTHER POSITION IN THE CLAUSE
*defining relative cluases are also called embedded relative clauses (they can’t be removed).
EMBEDDING when two concepts are so closely connected that they’re enclosed into one another,
firmly fixed to each other.
