This document discusses the metafunctions of systemic functional linguistics (SFL) as developed by M.A.K. Halliday. It outlines that SFL identifies three metafunctions: the ideational, which deals with experiences and processes in the world; the interpersonal, which involves the interaction between participants; and the textual, concerning how text is structured through cohesion. Cohesion involves reference, substitution, ellipsis, conjunctions, and lexical ties. Lexical cohesion occurs through reiteration like synonymy and collocation of regularly co-occurring words within a context.

1. The metafunctions of SFL
By
Submitted by:Hamid Mnati Dafir
Submitted to
PH.D Adil Al Thamiry
University of Basrah/Iraq 2016

2. 1.Introduction
• 1.1 What is the SFL
• -It is an approach to language developed
mainly by M.K.A Halliday in the U.K during the
1960s and then in Australia .
• -The approach now is used worldwide
particularly in language education and for
purpose of discourse analysis.

3. 1.2 What are the metafunctions of the
SFL
• - The Systemic function grammar advocate
three types of metafunctions : Ideational ,
interpersonal and textual
• - They are interdependent , they affect each
other.
• -Halliday and Mathiesser argue that they don’t
restrict each other.

4. 2.Definitions of The Metafunctions of
SFL
• 2.1 Ideational
• -It is concerned with things existing in the
world .
• - It is concerned with actions , events and
processes
• - it is concerned with participant in those
processes

5. 2.Definitions of The Metafunctions of
SFL
• 1.3. Interpersonal functions- It is the
interaction between participant in spoken or
written texts
• -it deals with use of language related to our
listener .

6. 2.Definitions of The Metafunctions of
SFL
• 2.3 Textual functions
• -It is related to the construction of text i.e.
how it is held together.
• Cohesion
• Types of cohesion , reference , substitution ,
ellipsis , conjunctions , lexical cohesion

7. 3.1 Cohesion
• 3.1.1 Coherence : include personal pronouns
(it , he ,him , her , they , them) or relative pronouns
(who ,which …..) demonstrative pronouns (this ,
that , those …….etc) along with comparative
pronouns (more , less , most …)and the definite
article.
E.g. My father once bought a Lincoln convertible.
He did it by saving every penny he could . That car
would be worth a fortune nowadays. However he
sold it to help pay for my college education.
Sometimes I’d rather have the convertible.

8. 3.1 Cohesion
• 3.1.2 Substitution and ellipsis:
• May be nominal (one ) or verbal (do )
E.g. A. Yesterday we went to see a movie.
B. We did (= went to see a movie) too.
A. Which one(= a movie )did you see?

9. 3.1 Cohesion
• 3.1.3 Cohesive ties: They are indicated by conjunctive
elements as and (additive) ; but , however (adversative)
, because , since , (causal ) ; before , after (temporal);
and well , of course (continuative)
• e.g Ted recently graduated from law school and started
job hunting . Other classmates of his have had difficulty
finding employment ,but Ted quickly found work . Of
course , it probably helped that Ted’s father is a
successful lawyer. Because he is a fresh graduate . Ted
will still need time to gain experience before taking on
the more difficult cases.

10. 3.2 Lexical cohesion
• Halliday and Hasan identify two types of
lexical cohesion Reiteration and collocations
• 1. Reiteration includes synonymy (meaning of
X = meaning of Y e.g stop = cease );
hyponymy(meaning of X is kind of meaning of
Y e.g a car is a kind of vehicle) meronymy
(meaning of X is a part of meaning of Y e.g
steering wheel is a part of car); and antonymy
(meaning of X # meaning of Y e.g cold # hot)

11. 3.2 Lexical cohesion
• 2. collocations : involves regularly co-occurring
words in a given context .
• E.g. If the topic is about a movie , then one
might expect the text to contain words
commonly associated with the topic like .
Actor , star , director , script , sound track …etc

12. 4. References
• (The M.A.K. Halliday Library Functional Linguistics
Series) Jonathan Webster-Understanding Verbal
Art_ A Functional Linguistic Approach-Springer
(2014)
• [Suzanne. Eggins] An Introduction to Systemic
Funct(BookFi.org)
• Yule , George (The study of language)Fourth
edition Cambridge university.
• Halliday , M.K.A and Ruqaiya Hasan
(1979)Cohesion in English . London.longman