Appliable Linguistics

Description

This collection of research offers an initial step in the pursuit of an appliable linguistics. Appliable Linguistics takes everyday real-life language-related problems - both theoretical and practical - in diverse social, professional and academic contexts as its starting point. It then uses and contributes to a theoretical model of language that can respond to and is appliable in the context. The concept of appliable linguistics used in this volume is informed by the work of M.A.K. Halliday, who believes that "the value of a theory lies in the use that can be made of it." The chapters in this volume thus use and contribute to an appliable linguistics that engages with a range of issues including: translation, education, language teaching/learning, multimodality, media, social policy and action, and positive discourse analysis. This collection of research is offered as an initial step in the pursuit of Appliable Linguistics, which we hope will serve as a foundation for future work across the discipline.

Ahmar Mahboob is a Senior Lecturer in the Department of Linguistics at the University of Sydney, Australia Naomi K. Knight is a PhD candidate at University of Sydney, Australia.

This volume brings together a varied collection of papers exemplifying an 'appliable linguistics': one that illuminates the many ways language is used. Language, as Halliday has frequently asserted, has evolved in the human species as a fundamental resource with which we build and negotiate relationships, shape experience and deal with the many issues and challenges of life. Though other linguistic theories might be used, it is systemic functional linguistic theory that is shown in this volume to best meet the requirement for being an appliable linguistics. This volume demonstrates what can be done in the field and its considerable potential. -- Frances Christie, Emeritus Professor of Language and Literacy Education at the University of Melbourne, Australia and Honorary Professor at the University of Sydney, Australia [The chapters] pose interesting questions that could be food for thought for textbook writers because they challenge current articulations of SFL to incorporate the dynamic nature of images and image interpretation...The book is also recommended for those who are conducting research on genre studies or sociolinguistics. -- Alan Juff and Benjamin E. Friedline, University of Pittsburgh * The Modern Language Journal *