Genre Analysis in the Frame of Systemic Functional Linguistics

This paper reviews three major approaches to genre analysis; Rhetorical Genre Studies (RGS), English for Specific Purposes (ESP) and Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL). Based on the review, it is noted that RGS is an approach which regards genre as a form of social action involving analysis of genre through detailed accounts of the social and cultural contexts with an emphasis on how a genre fulfills its social purpose and actions. On the other hand, ESP is an approach which views genre as a communicative event characterised by their communicative purposes as well as rhetorical features where the discourse community acts as those which recognises and sanctions the acceptance of a genre. The final genre approach, which is SFL, perceives genre as the cultural purpose of texts, achieved through a genre’s structural and realisational patterns where meanings are made within the genre. Overall, the ESP and SFL approaches share fundamental view that linguistic features of texts are connected to social context and function. Thus both of the approaches take on a linguistic approach in describing genres. RGS, in contrast, investigates genres through the study of society in which genre is being used thus taking an ethnographic approach to analysis of genres. This paper concludes with a discussion on the concept of genre presented in the various approaches and the possible emergence of other approaches in the study of genre.

Gattungsgeschichte und ihr Gattungsbegriff am Beispiel der Novellen

The settlement of divorce cases for Muslims in Indonesia is carried out through syari’ah courts. This study aims to investigate the schematic structures of the talaq divorce case examination and their linguistic realizations in the syari’ah courtroom. A descriptive qualitative design was applied in this study. The data were collected through observation, interviews, and text analysis with a forensic linguistic approach using Halliday’s Systemic Functional Linguistic (SFL) theory. All participants involved in interviews provided informed consent, and participation was entirely voluntary. Measures were taken to ensure confidentiality by anonymizing participants’ identities and securely storing all collected data. A purposive sampling technique was used to select five talaq divorce case proceedings from different syari’ah courts across Indonesia, representing diverse regional backgrounds and linguistic nuances. This sample size was considered sufficient for in-depth qualitative analysis, allowing the identification of recurring schematic patterns and linguistic features. Methodologically, linguistic categorization was carried out by coding courtroom discourse into ideational, interpersonal, and textual metafunctions as proposed by SFL. Each clause was analyzed for its transitivity patterns, mood structures, and thematic progression to uncover the rhetorical and social dynamics of courtroom interaction. The findings of the study revealed that there are four types of schematic structures in talaq divorce case proceedings at the courtroom, namely T-1, T-2, T-3, and T-4 schematic structures. The findings are justified by SFL theories. However, in the context of an SFL-based study, a new finding was obtained such as the varieties of language typically used in syari’ah court.

English writing instructors' use of theories, genres, and activities: A survey of teachers’ beliefs and practices

Background: Systemic Functional (LSF) in speech discourse analysis LSF is a linguistic approach that focuses on the use of language in social contexts and the contexts in which it is used. linguistic approach that focuses on the use of language in social contexts and their social context and its functions that enable the disclosure of important meanings to the speech comprehensively, including ideational, interpersonal, and textual meanings. including ideational, interpersonal, and textual meanings. Purpose: This study analyzed Nadiem Makarim’s speech on the cancellation of the Single Tuition Fee (UKT) increase in 2024 using the Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) approach. Method: This research used a descriptive qualitative method. The data source was the video text of Nadiem Makarim’s speech in 2024. The data collection procedure was listening and note-taking. The data analysis techniques were reduction, presentation, interpretation using the SFL approach, and drawing conclusions. Results and Discussion: The results showed that Nadiem’s speech was dominated by material and mental processes that reflected the concrete actions of the government and its beliefs in overcoming the issue of rising tuition fees. The sentence modes used were mostly declarative, aiming to provide information and attract the audience’s sympathy. The dominant modalities were those of belief and certainty, which illustrated Nadiem’s optimism towards the policies taken. Conclusions and Implications: The conclusion of this study shows that the LSF approach can be applied in learning text analysis to help students understand the context, structure, and meaning of texts more deeply. in more depth. This research makes a practical contribution to the method of teaching methods of text analysis in educational settings, opens up opportunities for further research, and enriches the literature on policy speech analysis. and enriches the literature on policy speech analysis in education.

Linguistic complexity is an important concept in language and literacy education. Despite its significant contributions to the understanding of language sciences, there are no general measures towards it, as different linguistic theories lead to different perspectives on the linguistic complexity. Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) is a theory of language that views language as a social semiotic and a meaning making resource. In other words, it looks at how people use language to construe and create meaning to fulfil their communicative purposes in social contexts. Despite the complexity of language in social contexts, SFL provides powerful principles to understand and manage complexity. Adopting SFL as the main theoretical and methodological framework, this study investigated linguistic complexity in English textbooks used in teaching English as a foreign language (TEFL) with special reference to the Vietnamese context. The purpose of this study was to examine how the level of linguistic complexity shifted across four textbook levels and within science and non-science fields in a book series. The study also examined the relationships among linguistic features characterising complexity as well as how complexity differed according to stages of text types. The study applied Halliday’s linguistic features, namely lexical density, grammatical intricacy, nominalisation, grammatical metaphor, and thematic structure to analyse 24 reading extracts in the selected textbooks on a quantitative analysis basis. Genre analysis of complexity regarding hierarchies of periodicity was conducted with four full texts. Results of the quantitative data analysis show that overall the language of textbook texts became more complex when the levels advanced in the chosen book series. Specifically, at a higher level of textbook, a greater number of nominalisations and grammatical metaphors were employed, contributing to lexically dense written texts. However, the highest level of textbook did not display the topmost complexity among the four levels. Concerning grammatical intricacy, on average, texts at higher levels were slightly more intricate. Also, various theme types were used in the selected texts across levels. In addition, the differences between descriptive statistics of linguistic features employed in the science related texts and those in the non-science ones were not significant within the same book. With regard to the complexity according to genre analysis, the analysis of four full texts reveals that both explanatory texts demonstrated higher scores of lexical density, nominalisation, grammatical metaphor, and lower intricacy in the explanation stages in comparison with the phenomenon stages. Two information reports displayed higher density values in the description stages, but lower intricacy compared with the general statement stages. Frequencies of nominalisation and grammatical metaphor were slightly higher in the description stage than in the general statement stage in the elementary text, but the figures were lower in the description stage in the intermediate text. Additionally, grammatical metaphors, which construct the textual prominence, were employed most in New in the four chosen texts. These findings not only give more insights into the nature of language, but also provide useful implications for English language teaching and learning, teacher education and training, textbook choice and writing, as well as curriculum design.

Genre analysis has become a prevalent approach in the linguistic analysis of various specialized genres. A concept of genre, emerging from literature, has received a broader dimension in the last decade, focusing on establishing recognized structures and language exponents of a specific genre in a particular discourse community. In addition, the expansion of ESP and the rise of subgenres in many rising professional vocations require users to have competence in the English language. In addition, language researchers need ‘to dig into’ the pragmatic context of genres. With this mind and resting on the concept of genre and discourse communities, the paper sheds light on how the genre analysis approach can be applied in teaching different marine electrical genres to students and future ETO officers. The marine electrical engineering discourse community is specific and relatively novel. In this paper, the focus is placed on seafarers, future electro-technical officers and the analysis of genres they utilize in their professional work on board ships. The results of the paper can be inspiring to ESP teachers involved in teaching specialized and technical genres.

Genre analysis from functional perspectives has been extensively applied to various discourses in recent decades. However, movie trailer discourse (MTD), as a crucial promotional tool, remains understudied. This research conducts a generic analysis of 20 English movie trailer transcriptions drawing on Hasan’s Generic Structure Potential (GSP) theory and Martin’s Schematic Structure framework. Adopting a descriptive and qualitative methodology, the study investigates the generic properties of MTD and explores its semantic realizations through the three metafunctions (ideational, interpersonal, and textual) within Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL).The study addresses a gap in genre research by tentatively applying SFL to MTD analysis. Findings reveal that MTD exhibits a fixed schematic structure with distinct stages for meaning realization. Furthermore, MTD serves three key functions: (1) providing a narrative preview, (2) engaging audiences, and (3) integrating seemingly fragmental elements into a cohesive unit. This study not only expands the application of SFL to MTD but also offers insights into enhancing language mechanism for language learners to express their ideas appropriately in multimodal discourse.

A critical review is one of the text types (i.e., genres) assigned for academic writing in Australian universities; yet, the study of this genre remains underexamined in academic discourse. This qualitative study was designed to analyse the schematic structures and lexical choices in evaluative meanings within critical review texts to provide a description of the critical analysis genre that could help to familiarise students with the characteristics of the genre. Texts used for the analysis were a tutor’s model text, provided to the students in the Introductory Academic Program (IAP) at the University of Adelaide, and the critical review writing of 2 Indonesian students in the IAP class. Using both genre analysis (Martin & Rose, 2003) and the appreciation framework (Martin & White, 2005) from systemic functional linguistics (SFL), the study applied “a genre-analytic approach” (Nodoushan & Khakbaz, 2011, p.112) to analysing and describing the structure and language use of the critical review texts. Analysis of the schematic structure identified 5 stages: Introduction, Summary of the Article, Analysis of the Article: Positive Critique, Analysis of the Article: Negative Critique, and Conclusion. The values of appreciation that contributed to the evaluative purpose of the critical review genre were categorised as valuation, composition, and reaction. Based on the analysis, this report provides suggestions for structural and lexical resources for the realisation of the purpose of a critical review text and for the expression of evaluative meanings.

The main objective of this article is to identify and describe characteristic patterns of language choices in texts written by Norwegian upper secondary school students of German as a foreign language (GFL) (age 16/17, school year 12, 5th year of FL learning). The study maps language choices in a set of 12 learner responses to a writing prompt about interpreting a film title. The aim of the study is to describe these choices in terms of how the learners use ideational meaning-making resources to arrive at meaningful content. The study takes a systemic functional linguistics (SFL) approach and analyses the responses in terms of the following lexicogrammatical and discourse semantic systems of resources: Transitivity, taxonomic and logico-semantic relations. The study finds several strategies and language choices that presented themselves as particularly relevant for meaning-making. For example, the learners reach an interpretation through clauses relating two messages to each other, and one of those two messages is typically structured in a complex way. Overall, the study provides insights into relevant patterns for expository writing in general and such that seem important to the particular context in which the response was situated. The article also points to the sophistication of the learners’ language use and the linguistic demands regarding the task at hand. In line with existing research, the current study also shows how SFL and genre theory can be successfully applied to the analysis of responses by beginner to intermediate GFL learners.

The elusive concepts underlying the word genre offer different alternative conceptions. This may produce confusions but identifying the theoretical frameworks help in understanding the possible preliminary doubts of the novice. Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL), New Rhetoric (NR), Semiolinguistics (SL), Communicative Procedural Text Linguistics (CPL), Interdisciplinary Text Linguistics (ITL), and Genre Analysis (GA), among others, are all theoretical propositions that represent options to be explored. In this paper, a discussion of the contemporary conceptions of discourse genre will be presented. My own perspective will also be a particular focus, but with special emphasis on findings from empirical data. The research is based upon the largest available on-line corpus (58 million words) of written specialized Spanish on four disciplines: Psychology, Social Work, Industrial Chemistry, and Construction Engineering. The corpus was collected in one Chilean university and the corresponding professional settings. The corpus description shows that access to disciplinary knowledge is constructed through a varying repertoire of written genres depending on disciplinary domain and on academic or professional field. Psycholinguistic and educational implications are advanced in relation to knowledge acquisition, discourse genres and reading comprehension.

Micro-lectures have become a prevailing resource for teaching Chinese grammar in International Chinese Language Education (ICLE). One crucial feature of these lectures is that they are inherently multimodal and the design of multimodal pedagogic discourse in these lectures is vital for the teaching of Chinese grammar. Based on this background, this paper investigates teaching Chinese grammar through multimodal pedagogic discourse in ICLE micro-lectures, focusing on the organization of complexity and abstraction of meaning for knowledge-building. Drawing on Systemic Functional Linguistics’ genre theory and ideational mass and presence, this paper views the organization as a dynamic negotiation of mass and presence across generic stages. Analyzing a representative ICLE micro-lecture on grammar, it scrutinizes the distribution of mass and presence across stages, along with multimodal pedagogic discourse features. The findings show that Presenting Scenarios, Example Extraction, and Grammar Explanation are pivotal stages for grammar instruction, each characterized by distinct mass and presence. Presenting Scenarios, featuring relatively weak mass and strong presence, employs non-technical and concrete multimodal texts to depict everyday scenarios, while Example Extraction with similar mass but weaker presence recontextualizes these scenarios into linguistic phenomena through non-technical linguistic text. Grammar Explanation characterized by relatively strong mass and weak presence distills grammatical knowledge from example sentences through technical and abstract linguistic text. Overall, the weakening of presence across the stages allows for recontextualizing scenario-based sentences as linguistic phenomena and generalizing these sentences into abstract grammatical concepts, while the strengthening of mass enables distilling meaning from example sentences and builds the complexity of grammatical concepts. The findings hold potential implications for the design of ICLE micro-lectures on Chinese grammar, which aims to facilitate the teaching of Chinese grammar through multimodal pedagogical discourse.

Recent educational standards have refocused the goals of foreign language (FL) instruction on “the purpose of communication” (ACTFL, 2012, p. 1) across the three modes of communication (interpersonal, interpretive, and presentational). To this end, this article considers a linguistically based genre theory as a means of enhancing instruction of presentational (writing) communication that is linked to authentic model texts. The genre theory considers all language as texts (genres) that are realized in contexts (registers) through knowledge and use of a functional grammar for making meaning called Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) (Halliday & Matthiessen, 2004, 2013). Key research from English as a second language (ESL) and FL education in the United States establishes empirical evidence of the effectiveness of instructional approaches based in this genre theory. To articulate a genre‐based model of instruction for FL education linked to the National Standards (2006), the genre theory is incorporated into the Interactive Model for Integrating the Three Modes of Communication (Shrum & Glisan, 2010). Finally, implications of genre theory are discussed and recommendations are made for next steps to meet the goals articulated for FL education in the era of the Common Core State Standards (ACTFL, 2012; National Governors Association Center for Best Practices, Council of Chief State School Officers, 2010).

This introduction presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in the subsequent chapters of this book. The book explores systemic functional linguistics (SFL) in its functional and systemic backgrounds by considering the historical place of SFL among functional theories of language and by evaluating 'system' vs 'systemicity' in terms of a theory of systemics. It examines the theoretical place of the context of culture within SFL by considering the complex interactions of language and society. The book also explores the interface between SFL and other theories, but it concerns cognitive science. It addresses two main SFL applications in educational settings, namely models of register and register variation and models of functional grammar. The book addresses the challenges that Tunisian learners face in the translation of nominal groups from English to Arabic, hypothesizing that these difficulties are mainly due to the lack of equivalence in experiential classification and patterns of modification across the two languages.

Purpose– The purpose of this paper is to discuss the usefulness of Halliday’s linguistic theory known as Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) in analysing qualitative data. In order to do this, it initially presents an overview of SFL, and then explains how and why four linguistic features namely, nominalisation, grammatical metaphor, thematic structure and lexical density are useful in examining qualitative data. The paper also discusses three social metafunctions of language known as the ideational, the interpersonal and the textual metafunctions which are significant for understanding and interpreting texts.Design/methodology/approach– This paper employs SFL as the main theoretical framework to discussing the usefulness of this linguistics theory in qualitative data analysis.Findings– SFL can be seen as a paradigm shift in linguistic theory moving away from the traditional focus on syntax to the inclusion of the interface between language and pragmatics. The focus of SFL is language in use. It deals with texts in social contexts, which is the main focus in qualitative data analysis. Thus, SFL provides both research tools and theoretical insights for understanding and interpreting texts.Originality/value– This paper provides significant insights into language which are crucial for understanding and interpreting texts in social contexts.