This document provides an introduction to lexico-grammar, which examines the interdependency of vocabulary and grammatical structures. It describes how language meets the demand of having infinite meanings from finite expression units through an intermediate level of lexico-grammar. Lexico-grammar provides means to arrange grammatical structures to make different meanings, such as extending language through coining new words or using structures atypically. Constituents in a clause take on multifunctional roles to simultaneously realize ideational, interpersonal and textual meanings.

1. Introduction to
Lexico-Grammar

2. Lexico-grammar
Lexico-grammar
Grammar
Lexis
(Vocabulary
)
the interdependency of lexis
(vocabulary) and grammatical structures
(syntactic constructions, morphological
paradigms)
It is an intermediate level of
coding, which allows the
meaning potential of a
language to expand

3. It is for language to have
an unlimited creative
potential (to make
INFINITE MEANINGS
from FINITE EXPRESSION
UNITS:
•For language to mean new things
•For language to mean anything
So, how to meet this
demand?
The answer is through
INTERMEDIATE LEVEL OF
LEXICO-GRAMMAR!
But, HOW??
by Lexico-grammar
PROVIDING MEANS to
arrange different
GRAMMATICAL
STRUCTURES to MAKE
DIFFERENT MEANINGS
Those
MEANS
include:
EXTENDING
LANGUAGE &
SIMULTANEOUS
MEANINGS
The Demand We Make
of Language?

4. Extending Language
 Techniques that can be done involve:
For Instance
coining new words
combining existing
words in novel ways to
represents the new
meaning
using the grammatical
repertoire of the
language in an
untypical, 'creatively
different' way.
The weather is really hot in a class. One of the students talk to
another student who sits the closest to the window. The
intention of conveying message is that he wants her to open the
window.
Typically, either interrogative or imperative mode is applied,
“Can you open the window?” or “Please open the window.”
“It’s getting
really hot in
here. I cant
concentrate”
Yet, it can be conveyed in untypically
declarative mode which is supposed to give
information, instead.
This pattern of using non-typical structures to
express meanings in ways that can be sensitive
to contextual constraints is known as
GRAMMATICAL METAPHOR

5. Simultaneous meanings in language
 For grammar to make more meanings, to create, and also to mean more than
one thing at a time, by:
simply arranging existing signs in different ways
or using existing structures in atypical ways
For Instance
The single lexical item ‘Nana’.
Different intonation in the actual use
of ‘Nana’ will give not only ideational
meaning of the person called ‘Nana’,
but also simultaneously an
interpersonal meaning of 'how I am
relating to Nana'.
Nana (said with a falling tone): provides an answer to the
question Who did it?'
Nana (said with a rising tone): asks the question
'Who's there? Is that you, Nana?'
Nana (said with an almost level tone): means that the
speaker had not finished giving information,
there was someone else, that Nana is part of list
Nana (said with a falling then rising tone): means ‘I’m
annoyed with you, Nana'
Nana {said with a rising then falling tone): means
‘That's outrageous, Nana'

6.  “Nana fed the cat.”
There are three kinds of meaning that can be made
simultaneously.
Another Instance
Nana Fed the cat
Participant: Actor Process: Material Participant: Goal
Subject Predicator Object
Theme Rheme
In this material
process, Nana and
cat as participants
involved and fed as
the process involved.
Ideational
meaning
The clause with
structure Nana as
Subject, fed as
Predicate and the cat
as object gives
declarative meaning
giving information.
Interpersonal
meaning
the clause attempts to
convey “this is a
message about Nana”.
Nana is the Theme or
departure point for
this message, by
putting Nana in first
Textual meaning

7. Principles of Grammatical Analysis:
Units and Constituency
 A number of different kinds of units are related to each other through constituency
— smaller units make up bigger units, and bigger units are made up of smaller
units.
 Let’s take a look at this units and criteria of graphological expression!
Units Criteria used to identify units
Paragraph
Sentence
Comma-unit
Word
Letter
Double spacing
Full-stop
Comma
Spaces
Smaller spaces
A ranked constituent analysis, or rank scale, indicates that the letter is the
ultimate constituent of writing, it is the smallest unit here.
Establishing the constituency hierarchy for the lexico-grammar is an important
first step in examining grammatical structure.
A ranked constituent analysis or
Rank Scale
for orthographic representation in
English
Constituent  units at each level are
made up of one or more of the units at
the level below.
Ranked  organized in terms of
biggest to smallest.

8. Constituent of the content plane
 In establishing rank scale of lexico-grammar, consider language as
meaning. And, another task is to find out:
what are the
largest and the
smallest units of
meaning that we
can distinguish?
Units of Meaning Ortographic signals
Text Paragraph
Sentence Capital letter/full stop
Clause Comma (often colon, semi-colon)
Group/phrase Comma
Word Spacing
Morpheme No signal (except that we tend to
break words at morpheme boundaries
when we need to hyphenate at the
end of a line)
In a passage, here are the meaningful units
ranging from largest to smallest
The text as a whole is
a semantic unit
which is constituted
of a number of
different-sized units
of meaning
Meanwhile, sentence is
the largest grammatical
unit

9. Grammatical constituent: rank scale
Clause – Clause Complex
Group/Phrase
Word
Morphemes
Since TEXT does not belong in the lexico-grammatical rank scale
and SENTENCE cannot represent both written and spoken expressions,
we need to establish again RANK SCALE at the LEXICO-GRAMMATICAL
STRATUM in SYSTEMIC APPROACH, which can be seen as follow.
Clause and Clause Complex are on the same
rank because the relationship between clauses in
clause complex is not a constituency
relationship, but logical structure, relationship of
interdependency.
Each unit on the rank scale relates to the other units
through constituency, and each carries patterns of a
different kind that requires a different structural
description

10. Techniques in Describing Structures
which are Made up of Grammatical Constituents
 involves taking the largest grammatical constituent then dividing it into
the units which make it up at each rank.
 graphical presentations in the form of brackets or tree diagrams
 To simply put it simply, the steps of minimal bracketing analysis are as
follow.
BRACKETING
First, the clause is bracketed into the
phrases/groups which make it up
Then, each group/phrase is
bracketed into the words that
it up

11.  ANALYSIS:
The clause in bracket:
((the)(little)(girl)) ((has)(spent)) ((so)(much)(time)) (in)((other’s)(shoes))
For Instance
The little girl has spent so much time in others’ shoes.
The little girl has spent so much time in others’ shoes

12.  a way of boosting the content of a clause, by exploiting the clause's potential to
recycle through the ranks.
 sometimes a clause constituent seems to be a complex structure in itself, so this
technique deals with bracketing of clause complex including embedded clauses
EMBEDDING
Or RANK SHIFT
 ANALYSIS:
The initial bracket for the clause:
For Instance The little girl who is reading the poetry book has been sitting on the bench for hours.
(The little girl who is reading the poetry book)(has been sitting)(on the bench)(for hours).
It reveals that it contains another clause within the nominal the
nominal group.
Here we have a unit of one rank (phrase/group) being made up
of a unit of the rank above (clause).
Thus, we deal with this by simply working through the minimal
bracketing of the embedded clause.
(The little girl who is reading the poetry book)

13.  ANALYSIS:
(the)(girl)((who)((is)(reading))((the)(poetry)(book)))
The girl who is reading the poetry book
Another Instance
To be empathetic means to have experienced various emotions.
 ANALYSIS:
(((to)(be))(empathetic))(means)(((to)(have)(experienced))((various)(emotions)))
To be empathetic means to have experienced various emotions

14.  more powerful technique in describing grammatical structures than the previous
technique
 by attaching labels to the nodes of our structural trees so that the bracketing
becomes very much more useful
 There are kinds of labelling we need to know:
LABELLING
Formal
• classifying item in
terms of class
membership
• at word rank,
sometimes referred
to as the parts of
speech.
Functional
• classifying item in
terms of its role
• function labels tell
what grammatical
function an item is
performing relative
Rank Form/Class Labels
clause
group
word
finite, non-finite,
dependent clause,
subordinate clause,
relative clause
prepositional phrase,
adverbial phrase, nominal
group . . . etc.
noun, adjective, article,
adverb . . . etc.
Rank Function Labels
Clause
Group
Word
Main clause, Qualifying clause,
Projected clause, etc.
Subject, Finite, Object, Agent,
Actor . . . etc.
Deictic, Classifier, Thing, Head,
Modifier . . . etc.

15.  The lexico-grammar enables us to mean more than one thing at a time.
 In nearly all cases the constituents of the clause are playing more than one
functional role at a time.
 The systemic approach that seeks to describe these distinct levels of
functional organization, is considered as MULTIFUNCTIONAL approach to
language.
MULTIFUNCTIONALITY OF CLAUSE
CONSTITUENTS
As a result, in clause analysis, there are
THREE SETS OF FUNCTIONAL LABELS to
describe clause structure,
to reveal how the clause is a simultaneous
realization of ideational, interpersonal and
textual meaning.

16.  In analyzing Subject, there is a fusion of three different functional roles, as
explained before
The psychological subject:
'the concern of the message'
the information that is the
'point of departure' for the
message.
the term used is THEME
The grammatical subject:
'of which something is
predicated’
the term used is SUBJECT
The logical subject:
'doer of the action'
the constituent that actually
carries out the process.
the term used is ACTOR
(Participant)
An unmarked case
is when there is a fusion or conflation of
roles: the constituent which plays the role of
Subject also plays the role of Theme and of
Actor
Nana fed the cat
(i)Theme Rheme
(ii) Subject Predicate Object
(iii)Participant: Actor Process: Material Participant: Goal
Example of
unmarked case

17.  Example: A heartfelt letter her homeroom was sent by the valedictorian
Three different 'subjects’ played by different
constituents within the clause
A heartfelt letter her homeroom teacher was sent by the valedictorian?
(i)Complement Subject Finite Predicator Adjunct
(ii) Beneficiary Material Actor
(iii)Theme Rheme
each kind of subject is from different constituent: the point of departure
for the message is a heartfelt letter, while the grammatical subject is her
homeroom teacher, with the valedictorian as the doer of the action.
In Interrogative Mode “Did the valedictorian send her homeroom teacher a
heartfelt letter?”
Did the valedictorian send her homeroom teacher a heartfelt letter?
(i)Finite Subject Predicator Complement Complement
(ii) Actor Material Beneficiary Range
(iii)Theme Rheme

18. Three types of configurations of functions
• Explore how different Mood structures allow clauses to realize different
interpersonal meanings in text.
How is language structured to enable interpersonal meanings
to be made?
• describe how different Transitivity structures allow clauses to realize different
experiential meanings in text.
How is language structured to enable ideational meanings to
be made?
• examine how different Theme structures allow clauses to realize different textual
meanings in text.
How is language structured to enable textual meanings to be
made?

19. Descriptive Grammar and
the Notion of ‘Appropriacy’
What does Descriptive
Grammar mean?
 an objective, nonjudgmental description of the
grammatical constructions in a language
 an examination of how a language is actually
being used, in writing and in speech.
What does descriptive
grammar do with
language?
It examines the principles and patterns that
underlie the use of words, phrases, clauses,
and sentences.
How?
by making statement and
assessment about appropriacy
or inappropriacy
Degree of appropriaricy is not in terms of arbitrary statements about
inflexible grammatical ‘rules’, but as statement about grammar as a set of
CHOICES for USE in CONTEXT.