GRAMMARINA ROSITA ARUMSARI

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What •What is Grammar ?

Why •Why do we need to know about grammmar ?

How •How can we characterise or talk about grammar ?

1. Traditional Grammar2. Formal Grammar3. Functional Grammar

What is Grammar ?Based on Gerot and Wignell (1994: 2), “Grammar is a

theory of language, of how language is put together and how it works. More particularly, it is the study of wordings”.

Example : - Time flies like an arrow.- Flies an arrow time like. Although this passage

presents linguistic units (in this case, words) which individually convey (some) meaning, the words do not ‘hang together’.

- T-i-m-e = Time- E-i-m-t = Eimt the passage cannot be read as

sequenced language constituents functioning together to communicate meaning.

Folk Terminology

Letters/ sounds Wording Meaning

Linguistic Terminology

Orthography/ phonology Lexicogrammar Semantics

What is Grammar ?Language is semiotic system. Grammar is the

sign to organize the language.Grammar is the system of language. People

sometimes describe grammar as the “rules” of a language.

Grammar is the structural foundation of our ability to express ourselves.

The whole system and structure of a language or of languages in general, usually taken as consisting of syntax and morphology and sometimes also phonology and semantics.

Traffic Lights Language

Meaning Meaning

Words

Expression Lighting Sounds

LanguageGrammar

Meaning and Expression in traffic lights and language

Grammar

Why do we need to know about grammar ?

•We need a theory of grammar or language which helps us understand how texts work. As teachers we need to know how texts work so we can explicitly help learners learn how to understand and produce texts – spoken and written in various contexts for various purposes.

•If there are no rules, or if everybody follows their own rules, it creates problems in communication for everyone. So we can finalize grammar is an important factor to learn a new language.

How can we characterise or talk about grammar ?Theories of language or grammar are not

inherently good or bad, right or wrong, true or false. Rather, grammar are validated by their usefulness in describing and explaining the phenomenon called language.

There are three grammars which have had a major influence on schools in the western world in this century:

- Traditional Grammar- Formal Grammar- Functional Grammar

Traditional grammar aims to describe the grammar of standard English by comparing it with Latin. As such, it is prescriptive. Students learn the names of parts of speech (nouns, verbs, prepositions, adverbs, adjectives). Parts of speech tend to be defined semantically, such as a noun is the name of a person, place or thing; a verb is an action word and so on.

Traditional grammar focuses on rules for producing correct sentences.

Traditional grammar tends to focus on the individual role of words.

Traditional Grammar

FORMAL GRAMMAR Formal grammars are concerned to describe

the structure of individual sentences. It is as a set of rules which allow or disallow certain sentence structures. Knowledge of these rules is seen as being carried around inside the mind. The central question formal grammars attempt to address is: “How is this sentence structured?”.

So, formal grammar concentrates on structure, that is the way in which classes of words and phrases are combined.

Example of traditional and formal grammar :

Noun Verb (Simple Past)

Verb (infinitive)

Possessive determiner

Adjective

Noun Preposition

Determiner Noun

Verb Phrase Noun Phrase Prepositional Phrase

Annie wanted to play her new clarinet in the Band.

Noun Verb (Simple Present)

Prepositional phrase

Time flies like an arrow

Noun Verb (Simple Past) Prepositional phrase

Tim told of a tragic case

It can be used to teach the lexical density in writing.

To teach the structure of grammar namely simple present tense, simple past, etc for the intermediate or advance level of students.

To teach parts of speech in every sentence.

Pedagogical Implication of traditional and formal grammar

FUNCTIONAL GRAMMAR Functional grammars view language as a

resource for making meaning. These grammars attempt to describe language in actual use and so focus on texts and their contexts.

Systemic functional grammar, on the other hand, labels elements of the clause in terms of the function each is playing in that clause rather than by word class.

The Example of Functional Grammar in SentencesParticipant:

ActorProcess:Material

Participant Circumstance:Place

Annie wanted to play her new clarinet in the band.

Participant :Actor

Process :Material

Circumstance:Manner

Time flies like an arrow.

Participant:Sayer

Process :Verbal

Circumstance :Matter

Tim told of a tragic case.

FUNCTIONAL GRAMMAR The 'experiential' in Systemic Functional Grammar (SFG) identifies

real functional building blocks of word-groups rather than the more abstract traditional concepts such as verb, noun, adjective etc.

The systemic approach to language is functional in two main feature:1. Asking FUNCTIONAL QUESTION How do people use language?2. Interpreting the LINGUISTIC SYSTEM functionally How is language structured for use?

Halliday (1994) Language : structured to make 3 main kinds of meaning simultaneously, which allows ideational, interpersonal, and textual meaning.

A basic phrase or sentence can thus be broken up into three basic types of building blocks as follows:

Participant ('Who or What' )

Process ('Does, makes or is (by something or someone)'

Circumstance ('When, where, how‘)

The Example

'who or what' , 'the doing and being words' and 'when,

where and how'

Remo Dance is a welcoming dance. It is performed by a single dancer or by a group of dancers. Remo Dance has two styles, masculine and feminine. Women dancers often perform masculin-style and men dancers perform feminine-style.

Remo Dance was originally danced at the beginning of a ludruk performance. Now, it is performed at parties, folk festivals, or the commemorations of national holidays. Remo Dance is performed to welcome guests. Therefore, it is called a welcoming dance.

Its characteristic movements are the beats of the feet. A set of small bells is tied around the right ankle. The bells tinkle when the dancer walks or beats the floor with his or her right foot.

( Bima, M; Winardi, A; and Nurmalina, S. 2005. Let’s Talk for Junior High School, Grade IX, p. 190. Bandung: Pakar Raya )

This text can still be identified the topic easily even without a title (field).

There are some clues that help indicate topical coherence: key words and lexical chain as well as the choice of processes.

There are key words in this text, namely Remo Dance which occurs 4 times, dancer which occurs 5 times, welcoming dance which occurs 2 times, and perform in 5 times.

The choice of processess doing being or having

perform is (6 times) tinkle has walks was beats areMost of the Processess are of the ‘being’ or ‘having’ type. These serve to tell what Remo Dance ‘is’ and what they, as a class ‘is like’. So, based on the key words and the choices of processess of this text, it can be seen that the purpose of this text is to tell facts about Remo Dance or to describe the Remo Dance.

SCHEMAIDEATIONAL

SCHEMA

It’s about Remo Dance

INTERPERSONAL SCHEMA

To describe Remo Dance

Pedagogical Implication of Functional GrammarIt can be used to teach both of written

(lexical density) and spoken language (negotiation, mood, etc).

To teach students how to produce the text (spoken and written) which is cohesive and coherent.

Pedagogical Implication of Grammar to aid in the teaching and learning of that

language, so pedagogical phonetics and phonology can be regarded as a description of the sound system and pronunciation of a language for the purpose of allowing teachers to teach it more effectively and learners to learn it more effectively.

The Example of Ambiguous text just cup your hand together and roll close to the outlet

It’s almost impossible to work out what this sentence means unless there is aco-text.

Evaporation is the most hygienic of the practical methods of hand drying. just cup your hand together and roll close to the outlet

• Originally, this text was found on a hand-dryer in a wash room (it’s context).• Texts not only connect internally, but they connect with their contexts of use.

The Differences

Formal (+Traditional) FunctionalPrimary Concern

How is (should) this sentence be structured ?

How are the meanings of this text realised ?

Unit of analysis

Sentence Whole texts

Language level of concern

Syntax Semantics

Language = a set of rules for sentence construction= something we know

= a resource for meaning making= something we do

Conclusion Traditional and formal grammar will more focus on the parts of

speech like noun, verbs, prepositions, adverbs, adjectives and the structure of sentence. They are set of rules for sentence construction.

functional grammars are very complex -much more complex than traditional school grammars and including many more labels than formal grammars (which are more concerned with rules). It is about the organization of context correlates with the organization of grammar. It will more focus in constructing the whole text that is cohesive and coherent.

In functional grammar we can look at the types of meaning in two ways: from the perspective of context or from the perspective of grammar.

In systemic functional grammar the organization of context correlates with the organization of grammar. This means that there is a strong association between the register variable field and ideational meaning, between tenor and interpersonal meaning and between mode and textual meaning.