Tuesday, 25 June 2013

Cohesion: A Lexicogrammatical Resource Of The Textual Metafunction


Halliday & Matthiessen (2004: 532):
… there is a set of lexicogrammatical systems that have evolved specifically as a resource for making it possible to transcend the boundaries of the clause — that is, the domain of the highest-ranking grammatical unit.  These lexicogrammatical systems originate in the textual metafunction and are collectively known as the system of cohesion. … There are four ways by which cohesion is created in English: by
(i) conjunction,
(ii) reference,
(iii) ellipsis [and substitution] and
(iv) lexical organisation.