Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) is a theory that views language not just as a set of grammatical rules, but as a tool for creating meaning within specific social and cultural contexts. It emphasizes how language is used to achieve purposes, influenced by the situation and broader cultural norms.
Mind Map
Click to expand
Click to explore the full interactive mind map • Zoom, pan, and navigate
hi everyone
i'm jennifer and in this video i'd like
to present a brief introduction on
systemic functional linguistics or the sfl
sfl
which was a theory mainly developed by
michael halliday in the 1960s
before we start i would like to give a
little disclaimer that this video is
intended for educational purposes and i
created especially for my students
at the university so perhaps some of the
explanation will be
a little bit simplified and the terms
used in this video
may be translated into my native
language indonesian at times so but
hopefully still you will find this video
informative enough
okay so
when we talk about the systemic functional
functional
grammar those who aren't familiar with
the development of the field of
linguistics may find
this term systemic function linguistics
or yes some people actually call it
systemic functional grammar or
functional grammar
uh they may sound a little bit heavy on
the ears right and it is actually a
mouthful to say too and that is why i
always say asf rsfl instead of just
saying systematic functional linguistics but
but
actually the theory itself is not as
daunting it's not as difficult as
as
as i suggested by its name
or yeah hopefully i can make it as
simple as possible now
now
of course when we talk about systemic
functional grammar
we need to see um
um first
first
about the term grammar itself
the term grammar that we already know
the traditional one
when we talk about grammar when we hear
the word grammar i believe we would all
think about various structures and
especially in english grammar and
several other languages with
with
time marker you will think about tenses
and that's actually not wrong
you know traditional grammar as we know
it it is
it it is concerned about the internal
structure of text where the subject
should be put in a sentence what is
considered grammatical and what is not
basically all the technical stuff so
when we talk about grammar basically
we're concerned about what is in a blah
blah blah and there are elements in it
and how do each element relate to one another
another
like this so in a sentence element one
will be connected to element two or
sometimes a descriptive sentence perhaps
element one first element two comes second
second
and yeah you know
the the rest of
the connection
so here in traditional grammar we are not
not
really concerned we don't really care
about the meaning of the sentences
itself as long as they are grammatically
correct as long as they are structurally correct
correct then
then
your grammar teacher will consider it correct
correct
so for example i can create um
let's say this is not
illogical but perhaps it is um not
really correct when
when we talk about the sense of it in
the real life situation
this is
grammatically correct
this is a descriptive sentence so in english
english
uh a descriptive sentence
always starts with a subject in this
case this is the soup
and then
followed by a verb
the soup stared
usually and then followed by either adverbs
adverbs or
an object in this case the soup is the
subject staired at is the
verb and then me is the object and then
there's a
several adverbs here viciously adverb of
manners and adverse
adverse
so yeah grammatically speaking it is really
really correct
correct
but the meaning itself when we talk
about the meaning
in real life situation not in cartoonish
or narrative writing
this is somewhat illogical because the
soup is a non-living entity so it is
it cannot really stare at you
or it cannot really do what human can do right
right
but yeah again grammatically speaking
this is correct
and so when you type this into your word processor
processor
or your grammar checker
there will be no marking
marking or
or
they will sense this as a correct
sentence they will not pick up what's
wrong with the sentence
and so here is where the sfl uh comes
comes comes
comes to
to
not for our rescue i think but comes to
give a new perspective
so as of all concerns with how meaning
is created and communicated
of course by saying this i don't mean to
say that as a file has nothing to do
with structure it does well the name
itself systemic functional linguistic
systemic functional grammar it suggests
something about structure
but the main focus is describing the
language we use in the context we use it
that is
by the context of culture and situations
and yeah we are going to discuss that uh shortly
shortly
all the context things but well
basically and simply
sfl deals with the meaning we create
when using language
based on
um the purpose of our communication
based on the target audience of our communication
communication
based on the topic and the methods of
communication so
not really talking about the structure
but we talk about purpose the meaning we
want to create
and now we are going to talk about the
big thing
like i said
earlier sfl deals with the context of
culture and here we come the context of
culture or the
so yeah
realistically uh speaking everything
that we do is influenced by a lot of factors
factors
how our parents brought us up for instance
instance
or what's socially permissible in the
area we live in [Music]
[Music] maybe
maybe
those factors are called culture
so yeah no matter how small or big the
scope is
the things that shape your mind
the thing the things that shape your
understanding about the world around you
and how you should make meanings
they are the culture
and that is what happens with language
the way you create meaning through
communication depends on your understanding
understanding
uh on our understanding
on our environment
our culture okay
okay
to make it simpler let's take our friend john
john
for example
so john
is a
and he comes from an upper socioeconomic
class so it means that he is yeah rich
and of course coming from an upper-class family
family
rich family a british male
perhaps he also comes from a
family who honors very
very um
um
traditional values so he comes from an
uptight an uptight traditional family
and he has a
very conservative political view
and yeah as he is rich he is apparently
also smart so he has a phd in something
i'm not going to say what he
has a doctorate degrees in
you guess on your own so
so
in this example our john here will think
and say things differently
differently
uh from another john perhaps
who is a farmer
living in uh rural rural england in the
they will have a different view they
will have a different priorities they
will have a different understanding
about money for example so
so
when john
talks about money
okay our john here talks about money in
terms of
priorities perhaps he thinks that okay buying
buying
a car
is my priority and
and
buying a house is my priority
and perhaps spending
two three quids
uh for
getting a latte at the famous cafe is
fine but for
the other john who is a farmer in the
victorian era
they don't have cafes back then so
it is irrelevant to spend a few
pound pounds or pennies to buy coffee
coffee
but perhaps he has a very different
understanding about money
perhaps his priority
money is utmost important it is not for
leisure it is not for pleasure but it is for
for
him to be able to live further
further so
so
basically the way
we use language the way we think
is influenced by
the things that surround us and
when it keeps on happening around us it
becomes normalized and when something is
become normalized
it becomes a culture whether you like it
or not
so let's take another example before we
move on to
the fact that a lot of memes a lot of
pop cultures
that are that have gone viral these days
they are actually
actually
a one thing situation
situation
which then um
um becoming
becoming
viral and a lot of people watch it and a
lot of people repeat it so it becomes a
meme it becomes a culture so
so
here when we talk about
a culture we it is not
not
aside from the situation
so the context of situation eventually
when it is repeated over time
will become the context of culture
so that is how actually culture is created
created
and to talk more about how
culture is created we need to talk about
another type of context which i
mentioned before a smaller context the
context of situation
and to understand this we need to look at
at
the registers and its variable okay
okay
register variable
so register
itself in sfl is defined as a
configuration of meaning
a variety of language
corresponding to a variety of situation
these meanings are seen through three
different variables
the field
the tenant and
and mode
the field variable
discusses the
ideational meaning the topics of the
communication and the nature of social activity
activity
it is a technical topic
like using jargons and such
um technical terms or just plain
everyday topic like us commoners
discussing the weather when there's
nothing else to talk about so that is field
field and
and
tanner looks at the relations between participants
participants
the status of social power
their personal feelings whether they're
close or not the people there
communicate with and whether they like
it or not and how often
they contact each other is it always
always
a constant contact or is it
they sell them once a week twice a week or
or
never at all
so the participant
in the conversation in the communication
will decide how you create a language
and the mode lastly
lastly
is yeah well deals with it deals with
the mode of communication is it a
written communication is it a spoken
communication and you know that a spoken
and written communication will have different
things in it like
like
you express yourself using indonesian
and pauses
and loudness when you speak verbally
verbally
but when you write things you want you
can express it using capital letters
perhaps or italics
or nowadays we can utilize
emojis and
the mode also talks
about whether
this communication issues like
an action like when you when you play
uno uno carte and say
uno when when you are
left with one card that is
that's um that means you use language as
an action
or but if you talk about
your friend
about your date
gone wrong the other day you are using
language as reflection
reflection so
so
when we talk about the register of
arrival uh variables and how it relates
to the way we make meaning um i'm going
to give you a brief example okay
okay
so let's talk first about the participant
participant if
if
your status of social power are equal
let's say it's your friend and you're
very close with your friend you like
them a lot you
are in constant contact with them
directly and you used to talk using
smartphones so it's text
and the topic is only gossiping you will
use more casual words
words
and you will use
because you're very close with this
person you perhaps have a certain um
um
jargons you have a lot of um
um
like secret language with them
you don't really have to spell out
everything perhaps you shorten
names into initials but you will both understand
understand
but if you talk for example
with your supervisor
supervisor
and they don't know you that well you
don't want to to
to
shorten anything you don't want to put
acronyms or abbreviation on things for
fear that they will misunderstood right
so that is how
the register variables help you
okay now
we can see this table here which summarize
summarize
the system of register
so again tanner deals with interpersonal
relation which can be analyzed through
the system of mood
field the ideational meaning is realized
uh in two types of analysis as you can
see here it's transitivity and cross complexes
complexes
and we have mode which has the
textual meta function
and is analyzed through theme
theme so
so
each of this are discussed in different videos
videos
which you can find the links to in the
description box below
but yeah as far as my students are
concerned all
these four
lexical grammar features will be
discussed throughout the semester so starting
starting
the following week we will start with
mood and going on to transitivity plus
complex and theme
theme
okay so yeah right back to the topic uh
uh
so you may wonder what's the connection
between the context of situation and the
context of culture which i have i
mentioned a little bit earlier so i'll
try to make it simple by using this
diagram over here now the smaller circle
it represents the situation in communication
communication
this is uh the register okay so
earlier example um
um
you talk with your friend
if it is one time it is the context of
situation now once that
a situation is repeated so the same
types of people talking about the same
topics and the same situations using the
same modes then
then
it becomes widely known by a certain community
community
and then when it becomes widely known
people tend to repeat it over and over
again it becomes a habit right
when it becomes a habit
then it becomes something that you think
is natural to you
and it finally
becomes the norms the culture a genre
which brings me to the last part of my
video here the term gender
gender
so genre when we hear genre a lot of
things come to our mind but mind you we
are going to talk about genre in the
perspective of sfl
so it has
slightly different meanings from the
term genre used in literature or
in pop culture that you know
so how
so first let's see the definition of
genre in the sfl uh perspective so
so
jared and victor
here define gender in the sfl's
perspective as a culturally specific
text type
okay a culturally specific text type
which results from using language written
written
or spoken to help accomplish something
okay
so a culturally specific
so it has
to be
connected with a culture what kind of culture
culture
the culture we talk about something that
it has been repeated over and over and
it is um
widely accepted
and then
that is the result of you using language
to help accomplish a certain purpose so
that is
gender in the perspective of sfl
sfl
now gendrous can be categorized as
a lot of things
but here are the things that are
associated associated with genres
in the sfl so you can
analyze the following things the purpose
particular purpose so a genre should be
should have a purpose it is a is it to
inform somebody is it to entertain
jokes is it to describe for example
you're describing your house is it to
persuade you want to buy a new iphone
and then your mom wouldn't let you so
you use
those markers in the persuading
genre to
to make her buy it for you
and then it
it goes
goes
into particular stages so it has a
beginning it has a middle and it has an n
n
and usually a gender is very very clear so
so
when you hear somebody say something or
when you hear a discourse you will know
okay this this belongs to this gender
and that belongs to that gender
and yeah i hope by the end of this
course this semester i hope that you you
will be able to understand what general
are people in when they are communicating
communicating
and the last
thing that can be associated with gender
in the sfl perspective is of course the
linguistic features we are talking about
linguistics and
gender deals with particular linguistic
features believe me or not
so past tenses repetition rhetorical
question epithets and other things that are
are
the features of linguistics so for
example if you tell a person a story or
if you tell your friend about what
happened to you in the past
if you're using english
you will
use past tenses and that is the gender
of the account
so that is one of the features you can
find in the general recount using past tenses
tenses okay
okay now
now
so for example
the gender of a classroom
i'm going to give you a gender of your classroom
classroom
and you may think that okay this person
doesn't know what they're talking about but
but
bear with me i do
so again i'm going to have to remind you
that in linguistics the term text
doesn't only uh
uh
doesn't only apply to things you write
okay so our situation the situation
around us can also be considered a
general when it is repeated and when it
has the same pattern so yeah remember
the key word here about genre is pattern
the context of culture
deals a lot
with pattern okay
okay
so for example
here we talk about um
um
classroom situation earlier
earlier so
so
the gender of a classroom
it has we have to talk about the
registers first
so yeah the gender of the classroom in
the in terms of the
participants in terms of tenner we have
certain participants involved always teachers
teachers
at least one teacher and one
one
student right
and then based on field we have a
particular topic here
for example a mathematic class
or a grammar class or history class
and in this genre we also have a certain purpose
purpose
yeah i know some of you will say to
socialize well that is uh
the i think that is the second purpose
of the
of a classroom genre but the main
purpose of you going to classrooms are
to give
information and receive information from
other people right
right
and usually
um a classroom situation also has
a certain mode
back then before
the pandemic pre-covet
our classroom situation will be the mode
is offline so on-site you come to
classroom your physical self but
nowadays all you need to do is open your
laptop or
make several clicks on your phone and
there you go you are in a class
okay so that those things are the registers
registers
of the gender
of the classroom gender and
and
that is the first step
now stages
yes classroom is a gender why it has a
particular stage it has a clear stage
the beginning of a class
so you will begin
in a class whether it is online or
offline you will begin by entering the classroom
classroom
either virtual classroom or physical
classroom right
and then perhaps there will be greeting
some schools
because i live in indonesia some schools
will start with prayers or
or
taking attendance and
and then
then the
the
next step the middle part will consist of
of
explanations of the new material
review of the previous material
and then there will be a question and
answer sessions and
perhaps some quizzes or assignments right
right
and then
yeah the teacher will end the question
by usually reviewing the material again
and then perhaps giving the students
some more assignments to do at home and
and
the class will disband it the class will dismiss
dismiss
right so there are particular stages
which you can associate with
a certain culture
culture
so that is
when you
can think of something as a genre
right and of course classroom genre
includes some linguistic features too
they repeat words
they repeat sentences
in different ways to ensure that
students understand
and they use a lot of imperative
and interrogative sentences right so
when teacher asks you to do something
they will say
do this open page four open page nine
and then uh
uh
would somebody please
uh read this page it is not actually a
question it is actually a command right
right
so yeah it has particular linguistic
features which you can associate with classroom
classroom
uh genre for example so
so yeah
yeah
that is how
something become a culture
become a general and
and
with that
so that was it my simplified version of
the very
comprehensive theory that is the sfl so
this is only a brief explanation
introducing you to sfl before
we go into other videos
videos
so here are the
list of my references i know it's not
many only three of them but they are
very useful in the making of this video
and i believe if you are starting to
learn about systemic functional
linguistics especially
against and
jared and rick whitnell's
books they're very very useful and
they're very very simple to understand by
by
your students
okay so yeah thank you all for uh watching
watching
so i'll see you in the next video
and meanwhile stay safe and healthy so
Click on any text or timestamp to jump to that moment in the video
Share:
Most transcripts ready in under 5 seconds
One-Click Copy125+ LanguagesSearch ContentJump to Timestamps
Paste YouTube URL
Enter any YouTube video link to get the full transcript
Transcript Extraction Form
Most transcripts ready in under 5 seconds
Get Our Chrome Extension
Get transcripts instantly without leaving YouTube. Install our Chrome extension for one-click access to any video's transcript directly on the watch page.
