Webcast sponsored by the Irving K. Barber Learning Centre, and hosted by the Department of Language and Literacy Education and the Faculty of Education as part of the plenary session at the 37th International Systemic Functional Congress, Matthiessen poses the theme that is “language evolving”. This can be interpreted either very generally or more technically. (1) Taken very generally, this could mean language changing in any of the three time-frames that have been explored in systemic functional linguistics phylogenetic change (language changing in the human species, or in human societies, over a long period of time ranging from generations to history of the human species), ontogenetic change (language changing in human individuals [seen as organisms or as persons] in the course of a lifetime, or logogenetic change (language changing in the course of the unfolding of text). (2) Taken more technically (i.e. with “evolution” in the technical sense introduced by Darwin), this means language changing phylogenetically language evolving as part of the evolution of the human species (in biological terms) and as part of the evolution of human groups (in social terms), these two being complementary aspects of human evolution. However, Matthiessen focuses on the narrower, technical sense of “language evolving”. More specifically, he explores the “big history” of humans – a deep time view of human evolution in linguistic, or more generally in semiotic terms, starting with the emergence of the human line and moving up to the present.
Biography of Speaker
Christian Matthiessen is a Swedish-born linguist and a leading figure in the systemic functional linguistcs (SFL) school, having authored or co-authored more than 100 books, refereed journal articles, and papers in refereed conference proceedings, with contributions to three television programs. A major work is his Lexicogrammatical cartography, published in 1995—a 700-page study of the grammatical systems of English from the perspective of SFL. As of 2008, he is Professor in the Department of English at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University.
Select Books Available at UBC Library
Halliday, M. A., & Matthiessen, C. M. (2004). An introduction to functional grammar. London: Arnold. [Link]
Halliday, M. A., & Matthiessen, C. M. (1999). Construing experience through meaning: A language-based approach to cognition. New York: Cassell. [Link]
Caffarel, A., Martin, J. R., & Matthiessen, C.M. (2004). Language typology: A functional perspective. Philadelphia: John Benjamins Publishing Company. [Link]
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