Systemic Functional Insights on Language and Linguistics

This book features a collection of 10 interviews with Christian M.I.M. Matthiessen, who is a key figure in Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) and has collaborated closely with M.A.K. Halliday since the 1980s. As noted by Professor Chang Chenguang, Editor of the M.A.K. Halliday Library Functional Linguistics Series, “this collection of interviews serves as an important reference for scholars and students of SFL. It provides a unique perspective on the theoretical development and future outlooks of SFL, as well as Matthiessen’s own interpretations of the theory. It also enriches our understanding of SFL and is a very useful addition to the series.” Written in an engaging dialogic format, the book paints a vivid picture of SFL thriving among the landscape of general linguistics and of SFL as an important tool now being applied in various areas.

Christian M.I.M. Matthiessen is Distinguished Professor of Linguistics, School of Foreign Languages, Hunan University, Honorary Professor at the Australian National University and Guest Professor at the Beijing Science and Technology University. His research has covered a wide range of areas (all informed by Systemic Functional Linguistics), including analysis of many kinds of discourse, corpus compilation and corpus-based studies, register analysis and context-based text typology, the development of Rhetorical Structure Theory (jointly with Bill Mann and Sandy Thompson), the description of English and other languages spoken around the world, multilingual studies (language typology and comparison, translation studies), multisemiotic studies, healthcare communication studies, institutional linguistics, computational linguistics, the evolution of language, and systemic functional theory. Matthiessen has authored and co-authored over 150 book chapters and journal articles. His books include Systemic Linguistics and Text Generation: Experiences from Japanese and English (with John Bateman, 1991), Lexicogrammatical Cartography: English Systems (1995), Working with Functional Grammar (with J.R. Martin and Clare Painter, 1997), Construing Experience: A Language-based Approach to Cognition (with M.A.K. Halliday, 1999/ 2006), Halliday’s Introduction to Functional Grammar (revised version of Halliday’s book, with M.A.K. Halliday, 2014), Language Typology: A Functional Perspective (edited, with Alice Caffarel & J.R. Martin, 2004), Continuing Discourse on Language (edited, with Ruqaiya Hasan and Jonathan Webster, 2005 and 2007), Systemic Functional Grammar: A First Step into the Theory (with M.A.K. Halliday, 2009), Key Terms in Systemic Functional Linguistics (with Kazuhiro Teruya and Marvin Lam, 2010), Deploying Functional Grammar (with J.R. Martin and Clare Painter, 2010), Systemic Functional Linguistics, Part I (2021), Volume 1 of The Collected Works of Christian M.I.M. Matthiessen (in 8 volumes with Equinox, edited by Kazuhiro Teruya and his team) and System in Systemic Functional Linguistics: a system-based theory of language (in press).

Bo Wang received his doctoral degree from the Hong Kong Polytechnic University. He is currently Lecturer of the School of Translation Studies, Jinan University, China. His research interests include Systemic Functional Linguistics, translation studies, discourse analysis and language description. He is co-author of Lao She’s Teahouse and Its Two English Translations (Routledge, 2020), Systemic Functional Translation Studies (Equinox, 2021), Translating Tagore’s Stray Birds into Chinese (Routledge, 2021) and Introducing M.A.K. Halliday (Routledge, 2022). He is also co-editor of Key Themes and New Directions in Systemic Functional Translation Studies (Routledge, 2022) and Theorizing and Applying Systemic Functional Linguistics (Routledge, forthcoming).

Yuanyi Ma received her doctoral degree from the Hong Kong Polytechnic University. She is Lecturer of the School of International Cooperation, Guangdong Polytechnic of Science and Technology, China. Her research interests include Systemic Functional Linguistics, translation studies, discourse analysis and language teaching. She is co-author of Lao She’s Teahouse and Its Two English Translations (Routledge, 2020), Systemic Functional Translation Studies (Equinox, 2021), Translating Tagore’s Stray Birds into Chinese (Routledge, 2021) and Introducing M.A.K. Halliday (Routledge, 2022). She is also co-editor of Key Themes and New Directions in Systemic Functional Translation Studies (Routledge, 2022) and Theorizing and Applying Systemic Functional Linguistics (Routledge, forthcoming).

Isaac N. Mwinlaaru completed his PhD at the Hong Kong Polytechnic University and is Senior Lecturer at the University of Cape Coast, Ghana. His research areas include systemic functional theory (and the meta-theory of language in general), language description and typology, grammaticalization, literary stylistics, English for specific/academic purposes, and (critical) discourse studies. His research focuses on English and Niger-Congo languages, particularly Akan (Kwa) and Dagaare (Gur), which he has produced the first systemic-functional description of, based on a corpus of registerially varied texts. He has published over 20 book chapters and journal articles in internationally recognized journals, such as Functions of Language, Functional Linguistics, Research in African Literatures, Sociolinguistic Studies, and Power & Education. Together with Lin Ling and Dennis Tay, he has published an edited book with Routledge, Approaches to specialized genres.