Continuing Discourse on Language - A Functional Perspective, Volumes 1 and 2 - Ruqaiya Hasan†
19. From microfunction to metaphor: learning language and learning through language
Continuing Discourse on Language - A Functional Perspective, Volumes 1 and 2 - Ruqaiya Hasan†
Clare Painter [+]
University of Sydney
Clare Painter is Honorary Associate in the Department of Linguistics at the University of Sydney.
Beverly Derewianka
University of Wollongong
Jane Torr
Macquarie University
Description
In presenting his ideas on a ‘language based theory of learning’, Halliday (1993) has both emphasised the interpersonal beginnings of the child’s new linguistic achievements and also proposed a three step model of human semiotic development. In this chapter we will draw on the major systemic functional case studies that have contributed to this theory to present an outline of language development as a process enabling a gradual progression to generalisation, through to abstraction and finally to (grammatical) metaphor.