Interview with Christian Matthiessen (Cardiff 1998)
Systemic Functional Linguistics, Part 2 - Volume 2 - Christian M.I.M. Matthiessen
Christian M.I.M. Matthiessen [+]
University of International Business and Economics (UIBE), Beijing
Christian M.I.M. Matthiessen is a Swedish-born linguist and a leading figure in the systemic functional linguistics (SFL) school, having authored or co-authored more than 160 books, refereed journal articles, and papers in refereed conference proceedings, with contributions to three television programs. He is currently Distinguished Professor in the Department of Linguistics at University of International Business and Economics,
Beijing, Distinguished Professor of Linguistics, in the School of Foreign Languages, Hunan University, Guest Professor at Beijing Science and Technology University, and Honorary Professor at the Australian National University. Before this, he was Chair Professor, Department of English, The Hong Kong Polytechnic University, and Professor in the Linguistics Department of Macquarie University. Professor Matthiessen has worked in areas as diverse as language typology, linguistics and computing, grammatical descriptions of various languages, grammar and discourse, healthcare communication studies, functional grammar for English-language teachers, text analysis and translation, multisemiotic studies, and the evolution of language. He has supervised over 40 research students.
Description
Chapter 8 features an interview held at the University of Liverpool, the U.K. in July 1998. Matthiessen’s responses to seven questions provide his views on many issues related to systemic functional linguistics’ theoretical backbones, including emphasizing its appliable strengths, nurturing the theory with various applications, affirming the importance of developing system networks, differentiating systemic functional approaches from other functional theories, listing some major areas of expansion within systemic functional linguistics, following the trinocular perspective to describe other semiotic systems, and valuing the typological work.