The Educational Applications of Chomskyan Transformational Grammar and Hallidayan Systemic Functional Grammar By Lea Rash May 2012

The broad question of what human language is can best be answered by considering it as a complex signaling system, which inspired the prominent linguistic theories of Noam Chomsky and Michael Halliday, among others. In turn, their theories motivated them to view second language teaching and learning in divergent and controversial ways. This essay will first reveal the way some earlier theories of language affected Chomskys innateness perspective. How these points of view spearheaded the system of transformational grammar characterized by universal grammar will then be illustratively discussed in order to demonstrate his rule-motivated approach. Likewise, the way prior theories influenced Hallidays in-context perspective leading to the conception of systemic functional grammar will then be explained and pertinent examples offered. A discussion of how each theory can successfully or unsuccessfully be applied to education will close the essay.

Definitions and descriptions of human language have been philosophically debated and re-defined throughout the ages (Bloor & Bloor, 2005). Language can be a general reference to human and animal communication, or to the human ability to communicate verbally, or to precise structures of language (Graddol, Cheshire & Swann, 2001). During the twentieth century, structuralists and anthropologists contrived their own unique definitions of the word. Ferdinand de Saussure, the father of modern linguistics (Culler, 1976, p. 80), believed that language could never be entirely clarified (Bloor & Bloor, 2005) and moreover that language is not complete in any speaker (Saussure, 1974, p. 14). A persons inherited set of signs, or concepts and their representations, was Saussures nascent structuralist realization of the language system, which he called langue; a persons use of that system was termed parole (Bloor & Bloor, 2005, p. 241). Impressed with Saussures distinctions of langue and parole, Noam Chomsky (1965) devised comparable dualities of competence and performance, which will be discussed below. More importantly, he confronted the structuralist view of what language is (whereby their only linguistic reality is a surface sentence structure) and he posed a serious question for which structuralists had no answer: Why does language 2

possess endless possibilities for conveying innovative ideas and thoughts? Chomsky felt that the only valid way to determine a languages unseen principles was by looking for clues beneath the surface (Campbell, 1982) to what CAN be said rather than what IS said. Thus, if the gist of a sentence is not clear at one level, it will be at another level.

Chomsky saw that with a narrow grammar system and a finite set of terms, human beings are quite capable of creating unlimited numbers of sentences, as well as those never before uttered (Campbell, 1982), as part of the creative aspect of language (Fromkin, Rodman & Hyams, 2003, p. 9). He somewhat paradoxically answered his question to structuralists by basing it on a theory of structurally-dependent transformational grammar that explains the ingeniousness and creativity of language in a mathematically precise way (Campbell, 1982) while explicitly ignoring pragmatics and semantics (Bloor & Bloor, 2005; Fromkin et al., 2003).

Transformational grammar contains three rule-governed elements, described below: Morphophonemic rules tell us how to articulate morphemes, which is especially helpful when there are multiple pronunciations since these hinge on a nouns end-phoneme, for example, pronunciations of end-phonemes in English plural morphemes: caps (/s/), cabs (/z/), badges (/ z/) (Fromkin et al., 2003, p. 277).

Phrase structure rules are doctrines of grammar that specifically and succinctly detail grammatical units of syntactic properties. A phrase structure tree is the mechanism used for depicting a speakers understanding of sentence structure in his language (Fromkin et al., 2003). For example: English language: The man took the canoe = NP Det N V NP (i.e. in English a Noun Phrase can contain a Determiner + Noun + Verb + Noun Phrase). Hixkaryana language: Canoe took person = NP N V N (adapted from Baker, 2001, p. 75).

A transformational rule pertains to the core phrase structure of a sentence. It acquires a fresh structure when it positions or introduces elements (Fromkin et al., 2003), as seen in the following example of a modified inverted phrase structure tree diagram (Baker, 2001, p. 76) showing the transformational insertion of elements into what could conceivably turn into an indefinite phrase. It illustrates Chomskys analysis of the unbounded, stimulus-free (Baker, 2001, p. 223) and limitless feature of language (Fromkin et al., 2003, pp. 136, 137): NP Det N P The girl with the bee in the bonnet with the honey on the crumpet Det N P Det N PP NP PP NP PP P NP Det N PP P NP Det N

(Source: My own example, adapted and modified from Fromkin et al., 2003, p. 137). Chomskys incongruous fondness for both mathematics and the creative aspect of language shows up in his algorithmic syntax (Campbell, 1982, p. 186) in the form of a phrase structure rule string for the girl with the bee sentence above. The sentence demonstrates the expandability of language, for example that a Noun Phrase can contain a Determiner followed by a Noun and a Prepositional Phrase, ad infinitum: NP Det N PP, PP P NP, NP Det N PP, PP P NP, NP Det N PP, PP P NP, NP Det N PP, PP P NP, NP Det N (adapted and modified from Fromkin et al., 2003, p. 137).

Chomskys theory has proved to be part of an English users competency because it is intimately associated with the communicative role of language (Traugott & Platt, 1980). His dichotomy of competence and performance (Fromkin et al., 2003; Graddol, et al., 2001) came out of the hypothesis based on generative grammars that view language as belonging to the mind (Graddol, et al., 2001) and affecting the process of how we think (Traugott & Platt, 1980). Thus, an ideal native speaker-listeners linguistic competence is not a matter of experience (Campbell, 1982, p. 161) but involves rationalist-inspired innate knowledge, referred to as universal grammar (Fromkin et al., 2003, p. 20), which includes intuitive decisions about the suitability of grammatical structures (Graddol, et al., 2001). Grammar from Chomskys perspective is a constrained anti-chance device with no built-in allowance for freedom of choice concerning the origin of the message (Campbell, 1982, p. 165), making it as predictable as a mathematical calculation can be. Universal grammar establishes an additional type of anti-chance mechanism on this restriction in order for language to be learned naturally and effortlessly. In turn, Chomskys competence depends on that individual being completely accurate, never erring, and knowing his language flawlessly, while being removed from any situational context. The persons performance is what s/he actually does when s/he speaks or listens (Traugott & Platt, 1980). Up to this point, this essay has discussed Chomskys approach to language analysis and the definitions involved. In the next segment the essay presents the perspective of Hallidayan grammar and how, unlike Chomsky, Michael Hallidays ideas about language are based completely on in-context notions of meaning production (Graddol, et al., 2001). These ideas can be traced back to the anthropologist Bronislaw Malinowski (1935) who believed that language is an avenue for negotiating and maintaining social relationships within an actual context (p. 9). In turn, Malinowskis thinking played a large part in J.R. Firths founding work (Bloor & Bloor, 2005) at the London School of Linguistics (Graddol, et al., 2001). Firth (1957) argued that language is polysystemic and part of a social process where one weaves nurture into nature. Halliday detailed his mentor Firths 5

ideas about system into complex networks (Bloor & Bloor, 2005) that strive to be allinclusive with an extravagant (Graddol, et al., 2001, p. 89) labeling system (Martin, 2004, p. 64).

The goal of Hallidayan lexicogrammar is semantic: to reveal how people utilize (Halliday, 1985, xvii) real spoken or written (Graddol, et al., p. 90) language for creating meaning (Halliday, 1985, xvii). Describing language as a social-semiotic, Hallidays systemic functional linguistics (SFG) is systemic because language elements are presented from a set of options inside a system of meanings (Feez, 1995, p. 5; Bloor & Bloor, 2005, p. 1). It is functional because it shows us why and how people employ language (Feez, 1995, p. 7). With SFG, text (spoken or written language) is analyzed according to structural ranks: the word, the group (comparable to phrase), and the clause (not sentence) (Graddol, et al., p. 90). Halliday explains that it is the larger units that function more directly in the realization of higher-level patterns. [If] we want to explore how semantic features are represented in the grammar, we look primarily at the structure of the clause (Halliday, 1985, p. 21). To convey ideas and social relationships between people, labels are used. The ideational (a.k.a. experiential) function of meaning has an accompanying contextual aspect called field, and both refer to the subject matter or activity type. The interpersonal function has a contextual aspect called tenor, and both refer to those involved in the spoken or written exchange. The textual function and its contextual aspect mode take care of the cohesiveness of a text as well as the ideational and interpersonal functions of meaning (Graddol, et al., p. 90), which are meshed within the clause to signal that communication has taken place (Bloor & Bloor, 2005, p. 10). One can evaluate the textual element of meaning once the theme and rheme have been recognized (Graddol, et al., 2001, p. 91). Usually the first constituent in Hallidays clause in English is the theme (Graddol, et al., 2001, p. 91), which stretches from a point up to and embracing the first ideational component (i.e. the participant (subject), process (verb) or circumstance 6

(prepositional phrase) (Halliday, 1994, p. 144). The clauses remaining part is the rheme (Graddol, et al., 2001, p. 91).

My improvised example, below, shows how SFG analyzes the context of text: Thomas James read newspapers slowly while at the Chedi Club. But he had learned to read people quickly.

Thomas James (actor participant) read (material process) newspapers (goal participant) slowly (circumstance) while at (adjunct) the Chedi Club (actor participant). But (adjunct) he (actor participant) had learned (material process) to read (mental process) people (goal participant) quickly (circumstance). [Note the difference of processes for the word read.]

Interpersonal Theme: Thomas James Rheme: read newspapers slowly while at the Chedi Club. Textual Theme: But Interpersonal Theme: he Rheme: had learned to read people quickly.

Field (subject matter): newspapers, the Chedi Club Field (activity type/transitivity): read, had learned, to read Tenor (social roles and relationships): Thomas James, he, people Mode (cohesiveness of text): slowly, while at, but, quickly (Terms: Graddol et al., 2001, pp. 90, 92; Mangubhai, 1991, pp. 16-21. Example: My own, 2010).

So far this essay has discussed the Chomskyan and Hallidayan descriptions of what language is and how to best analyze it from their perspectives. The next part of the essay will consider the feasibility of using Chomskys approach in the teaching and learning of English as a second language.

While Chomskys principles of transformational grammar are directly attuned with the thinking of modern psychology, it is Chomskys universal grammar that has helped educators recognize how children acquire language, what language ability is, and how the mind seems to discern more than it is taught (Campbell, 1982). Because a child possesses an innate language template and because the phases of language growth are consistent for all languages, a youngster learns his native language with little effort and understands features of his languages grammar that he has no knowledge of (Fromkin et al., 2003, pp. 348-349, 390). Chomsky thus contends in his poverty of the stimulus theory that there is a chasm between the impoverished linguistic stimuli a child receives and the abundant linguistic knowledge that he acquires (Fromkin et al., 2003, p. 348; Campbell, 1982, p. 168), with universal grammar being the hidden link connecting them.

Based on this, Chomsky believes that knowledge eclipses experience (Campbell, 1982). He may talk of the need for language learning to occur in a suitably nourishing and motivating environment (Chomsky, 1988), but this falls short of specifically stating that there is a need for practice and the nourishing experience of talking. By downgrading experience, Chomsky underrates the intricacy of language, and, in turn, underrates the intricacy of the mind (Campbell, 1982, pp. 173, 184).

It is by studying language separately from its use in context that enables predictions about language structure to emerge easily and illuminatingly (Campbell, 1982). Nevertheless, it is doubtful that Chomskys universal grammar (Bourke, 2005), based on the innateness principles of grammars in all languages (Fromkin et al., 2003) could ever be commonly employed as a teaching method (Bourke, 2005) because competence cannot be generated by analyzing sentences removed from their communicative context (Graddol, et al., 2001). It is exactly because language does not wear meaning on its sleeve that situational context is so important. It is not enough to simply throw in the dictionary when interpreting language as Campbell suggests we do in his support of Chomsky. Even the communicative noise Chomsky disparages, particularly in the ideal native speaker (e.g. slips of the tongue, ers, uhs and ahs, etc.), conveys individual 8

messages of importance. Chomsky, however, is more concerned with the message in its entirety (Campbell, 1982, pp. 96, 161, 162, 169, 185). An account of language that entails using the native speakers intuition as information may be questionable to linguists (Lyons, 1981, p. 44), such as Michael Halliday. Halliday affirms that a principle using intuition as its premise cannot come to grips with the grammatical complexity of spoken language. This manifests itself when compiling data, as Halliday himself realized when he witnessed an unplanned classroom discussion among some fairly fluent foreign students, which he describes here: I was struck by a curious fact. Not only were people unconscious of what they themselves were saying; they would often deny, not just that they HAD said something I had observed them to say, but also that they ever COULD say it. For example, I noticed the utterance itllve been going tove being tested every day for the past fortnight soon where the verbal group will have been going to have been being tested makes 5 serial tense choices: present in past in future in past in future, and is also passive (Halliday, 2002, p. 325). Ultimately, it is Chomskys own disclosures that speak loudest it is quite apparent that a speakers self-reports and viewpoints about his behavior and his competence may be in error (Chomsky, 1965, p. 8). Years later, he also refuted that his generative transformational grammar was applicable to schools teaching the English language (Christie, 1994; Bourke, 2005). Despite this, some linguists still implement Chomskys phrase structure rules and tree diagrams even though the metalanguage is considered uncommon (Bourke, 2005). If Chomskys transformational grammar is ever widely implemented, it could make what is already complicated even more so (Bourke, 2005), although it does lend itself well to demonstrating language systems (Hudson, 2004). Its tasks aimed at students tend to be so rule-driven (Christie, 1994, pp. 105, 110) and focused on written sentence structure that they exclude authentic language, the meaning, the overall text, and any distinctions 9

between written and spoken language. This is particularly significant for lagging students who struggle with written language skills, especially the academically-esteemed narrative genre (Feez, 1995). Up to now, this part of the essay has discussed the practicability of using Chomskys approach in the teaching and learning of English as a second language. The essay will turn now to the viability of using Hallidays approach, which recognizes the human social reality (Christie, 1994, p. 109) involved in language use, and also helps learners perceive how characteristics of their day-to-day grammar shape their thinking (Halliday, 2002). Sustained by advancements in psychological doctrine (Christie, 1994), an exceptionally vital feature of SFG is the way communicative information is enhanced (Bloor & Bloor, 2005). It thus not only offers a frame of reference for the scholastic examination of language and potential construction and deconstruction of text and meaning, but it can also supply paradigms of learning and needed skills while unifying the approach to curriculum design and pedagogy. SFG facilitates clear and precise information about language for an instructor (e.g. with its curriculum genre or teaching-learning cycle methodology (Feez, 1995, p. 9; Christie, 1994, p. 118)), while assisting the guidance of students and the direction of a students literary performance (Christie, 1994) in putting together experience and meaning. A learner can dynamically demonstrate his or her language ability not only through the language but also in relation to it (Feez, 1995), thereby establishing an individuals cognition of the world (Halliday, 1981). Only later on in a childs life and in the teenage years does the skill to compress information materialize (Christie, 1994) by using techniques of nominalization or what Halliday calls grammatical metaphor (Bloor & Bloor, 2005, p. 213). This skill allows the student improved rhetorical organization and increased lexical density by forming nouns from verbs, adverbs, adjectives, and conjunctions (Eggins, 2004, p. 95). Nevertheless, a teacher may still find it difficult to identify specific dissimilarities between coherent and poorly written texts. The result is that when a teacher leaves a

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comment to write more clearly, no useful knowledge is imparted to the learner (Bloor & Bloor, 2005, p. 227). From this standpoint, Hallidays aim is to broaden a childs language and the languages functional possibilities (Hudson, 2004). Since it is the use of intricate clause structures that assist the clarity of text (Bloor & Bloor, 2005), Halliday draws on theme analysis to demonstrate a clauses informational conspicuousness (Martin, 2004, p. 68). In this way, the divergent writing abilities of learners may be spotted. For instance, a sixteenyear-old would usually employ extended themes (Bloor & Bloor, 2005) and metaphors (Campbell, 1982) to convey information, while a child half that age would normally be unskilled as a writer and use short, simple themes (Bloor & Bloor, 2005) that are more speech-like (Christie, 1994). Meanwhile, in spoken English, non-native English speakers tend to use separate independent clause structures and less than half the number of relative clauses that native speakers do, which makes the information they impart in their delivery less understood (Bloor & Bloor, 2005). A yardstick for measuring improvement in these types of students then is greatly assisted by using systemic-functional grammar (Bloor & Bloor, 2005).

In addition, by teaching learners a new register in Standard English, they will be able to make fresh manipulations of the language (Hudson, 2004), characterized by aspects of the situational context: field, tenor, and mode (Feez, 1995). Even young children are capable of differentiating between registers (Biber & Conrad, 2004) and genres (Christie, 1994). Examples of registers include conversation, academic, fiction and news (Biber & Conrad, 2004). Examples of genres include essays, business letters, reports, stories (Bloor & Bloor, 2005) poetry, plays, letters, diaries, etc. Hallidays genre analysis supports language skills instruction, especially writing (Bloor & Bloor, 2005), notably because genres are structured in predictable ways to create particular meanings and to help with understanding and remembrance (Graddol, et al., 2001).

Although Bourke claims that there is no apparent division involving systemic functional grammars approach to speech or writing (Bourke, 2005), Christie and Feez disagree, stating that SFG makes a clear distinction between them by supplying two very different 11

grammars and discourse structures (Christie, 1994; Feez, 1995). In fact, SFG makes possible a meticulous examination of the two forms that can be effectively constructed with other learners or be centered on an individuallearner. Bourke goes on to point out that Hallidays SFG metalanguage may be too ambiguous with confusing overlaps of process meanings, and too full and too rich to be successfully utilized in the classroom by instructors and students. In addition, teachers themselves have called it complex, messy and lacking simplicity (Bourke, 2005, pp. 93, 94).

Despite these various criticisms of Hallidayan lexicogrammar, Bourke feels that SFG not only offers the required foundational basis for teaching the language but that it also promotes a sensitization of processes that aids the learner in out-performing his innate grammar (Bourke, 2005, p. 91). Whats more, SFG is a versatile means of assisting language learners to read, write, hear and speak more successfully in all the diverse registers and genres (Martin 2004) that educational systems require knowledge of.

In the final analysis, the choice of language method is a matter of personal discretion. A teachers inclination will reveal itself in the preference for either a cognitional or a contextual approach to language. Accordingly, this means selecting the intuitional or experiential, the mathematical or the representational, the constructural or the communicational, the plain or prolific, the ideal or the real. This essay has argued that the question of what human language is and how it can be better understood and applied to education can be answered by looking critically at the debatable but relevant theories of Noam Chomsky and Michael Halliday and carefully weighing the many pros and cons of each system.

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Biber, D. & Conrad, S. (2004). Corpus-based comparisons of registers. In C. Coffin, Hewings, A. & K. OHalloran (Eds.), Applying English grammar: Functional and corpus approaches (pp. 40-56). London: Arnold/Hodder Headline Group.

Bloor, T. & Bloor, M. (2005). The Functional Analysis of English: A Hallidayan Approach. London, UK: Hodder Arnold/Hodder Headline Group.

Bourke, J.M. (2005). The Grammar we teach. Reflections on English Language Teaching 4(2005), 85-97. Retrieved from: www.nus.edu.sg/celc/publications/BourkeVol4.pdf

Campbell, J. (1982). Grammatical Man: Information, Entropy, Language, and Life. New York: Simon & Schuster.

Chomsky, N. (1965). Aspects of the theory of syntax. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

Chomsky, N. (1988). Language and the problem of knowledge: The Managua lectures. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.

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Culler, J.D. (1976). Saussure. Sussex: Harvester Press. Eggins, S. (2004). An introduction to systemic functional linguistics (2nd ed.). London: Continuum. 13

Feez, S. (1995). Systemic functional linguistics and its applications in Australian language education: A short history. Interchange, 27(28), 5-10.

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Halliday, M.A.K. (1994). Some grammatical problems in scientific English. In C. Coffin, A. Hewings, & K. OHalloran (Eds.) (2004), Applying English grammar: Functional and corpus approaches (pp. 77-99). London: Arnold/Hodder Headline Group.

Halliday, M.A.K. (2002/2005). On grammar. N.Y.: Continuum.

Hudson, R. (2004). Why education needs linguistics (and vice versa). Journal of Linguistics, 40(1), 105-130.

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Lyons, J. (1981). Language and linguistics: An Introduction. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Malinowski, B. (1935). The language and magic of gardening. London: George Allen & Unwin. Mangubhai, F. (1991). An introduction to Hallidays functional grammar. Unpublished paper.

Martin, J.R. (2004). Grammatical structure: What do we mean? In C. Coffin, H. Hewings, & K. OHalloran (Eds.), Applying English grammar: Functional and corpus approaches (pp. 57-76). London: Hodder Arnold/Hodder Headline Group.

Saussure, F. de (1974). Course in general linguistics. London: Fontana-Collins.

Traugott, E. & Pratt, M. (1980). Linguistics for Students of Literature. New York: Harcourt, Brace, Jovanovich, Inc.

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