System in Systemic Functional Linguistics - A System-based Theory of Language - Christian M.I.M. Matthiessen

System in Systemic Functional Linguistics - A System-based Theory of Language - Christian M.I.M. Matthiessen

The System in Semogenesis: Emergence of Complexity

System in Systemic Functional Linguistics - A System-based Theory of Language - Christian M.I.M. Matthiessen

Christian M.I.M. Matthiessen [+-]
University of International Business and Economics (UIBE), Beijing
Christian M.I.M. Matthiessen is a Swedish-born linguist and a leading figure in the systemic functional linguistics (SFL) school, having authored or co-authored more than 160 books, refereed journal articles, and papers in refereed conference proceedings, with contributions to three television programs. He is currently Distinguished Professor in the Department of Linguistics at University of International Business and Economics, Beijing, Distinguished Professor of Linguistics, in the School of Foreign Languages, Hunan University, Guest Professor at Beijing Science and Technology University, and Honorary Professor at the Australian National University. Before this, he was Chair Professor, Department of English, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, and Professor in the Linguistics Department of Macquarie University. Professor Matthiessen has worked in areas as diverse as language typology, linguistics and computing, grammatical descriptions of various languages, grammar and discourse, healthcare communication studies, functional grammar for English-language teachers, text analysis and translation, multisemiotic studies, and the evolution of language. He has supervised over 40 research students.

Description

An excellent way of understanding ‘system’ as it has been used in SFL and the phenomena that it was developed to capture is to observe how its manifestations emerge in the course of ontogenesis, from the early phase of young children learning how to mean to the later phase when they have begun to master the mother tongue(s) spoken by members of their immediate meaning group and the wider community that it is part of. In this chapter, I review the systemic functional account of how children learn how to mean from the point of view of the development of the system, beginning with emergence of protolanguage and its separate microfunctional meaning potentials. I use it to illuminate the gradual separation of the two semiotic dimensions of axis and stratification, and introduce the basics of systems forming system networks.

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Citation

Matthiessen, Christian. The System in Semogenesis: Emergence of Complexity. System in Systemic Functional Linguistics - A System-based Theory of Language. Equinox eBooks Publishing, United Kingdom. p. 15-30 Dec 2023. ISBN 9781781799024. https://www.equinoxpub.com/home/view-chapter/?id=38382. Date accessed: 07 Oct 2024 doi: 10.1558/equinox.38382. Dec 2023

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