This document discusses Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL), an approach to language developed by M.K.A Halliday in the 1960s. SFL considers language as a social semiotic system based on five principles: social semiotics, language as a resource, text rather than sentences, text and social context, and construing meaning. SFL analyzes language through three metafunctions - ideational meaning, interpersonal meaning, and textual meaning. It also distinguishes between speech and writing and discusses genre-based grammar and how genres are social processes that convey social power through specifiable linguistic characteristics.

1. SFL is an approach to language developed mainly by
M.K.A Halliday in the Uk during the 1960s
It considers Language as Social Semiotic System
Five basic principles:
Social Semiotics
Language as a resource
Text rather than sentences
Text and social context
Construing meaning

2. SFL
SEMIOTICS
Language always occurs as a text.
Language is used to express meaning
Language is functional
METAFUNCTIONS
Ideational meaning
Interpersonal meaning
Textual meaning

3. SPEECH Temporal
Immediate
Sequencial
WRITING An inscription
Language in spatial medium

5. GENRE-BASED-
GRAMMAR
MODEL.
Based on a
Functional Model of
Language
The aim is to
provide students
with the ability to
use the codes of
writing( genre and
grammar)
effectively and
efficiently

6. What field/
ideational
meaning
Who tenor/
interpersonal
meaning
How mode/
textual meaning
Context is seen as
a virtual force
acting on and
generating
language events
in order to get
things done.
Genre is part of
the contextual
variable of mode.
Register: to define
the individual
characteristics of a
text.

7. GENRE AS A SOCIAL PROCESS
MODEL
Genres are the result
of processes of social
production
Will attain a certain
degree of stability and
persistence over time
Different genres have
convey and give
access to different
degrees and kinds of
social power
Have specifiable
linguistic
characteristics

8.  Literacy texts to create images in reader’s
minds.
language enables readers to
engage with the text.
Novels- Epics- Poems- Dramas- Sagas.
 Factual texts Primary aim to communicating
knowledge.
Technical descriptions- Explanations-
Procedures- Essays- Reviews- Arguments.

9. Media texts
Any text that
are used in
channels of
mass
communication.
Print- Broad-
casting- Cable-
Film- Video.

11. FUNCTIONAL ASPECTS: what language is doing or being
made to do. The functional terminology tells us what we
can and cannot do with an English sentence.
FIGURAL ASPECT: how language communicates beyond
the concrete representational level.
GRAMMAR CAN REPRESENT THINGS/
ACTIONS/EVENTS.
FIGURAL CONCRETE

13. Source
Knapp P, Watkins M (2005). “Genre,Text,Grammar.”
University of New South Wales, Sidney.