Transitivity Analysis Of Hemingway's Short Story

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Transitivity Analysis of Hemingway’s Short Story -----A Clean, Well-lighted Place Abstract: This article uses Functional Grammar to analyze the mental processes of Hemingway’s short story, A Clean, well-lighted place. Interpretation of the characters and the theme is made based on the analysis which proves quite novel and reasonable. Key words: SFG; transitivity analysis; characterization; theme; nothingness; nada; 1. Introduction The systemic-Functional Grammar (SFG), first presented by M.A.K Halliday, provides a new perspective to analyze language while offering a new method to see into its meaning based on its function. IN SFG, language use is considered functional and the function is to make meanings. Meanings are influenced by the social and cultural context in which they are exchanged. The process of using language is a semiotic process, a process of making meanings by choosing. According to Halliday, the ways in which human beings use language are classified into three broad categories, which are referred to as three metafunctions. They are respectively: ideational, interpersonal and textual metafunction. The three metafunctions of language inter-relate to one another, and are equally important in the studies of SFG. According to Thompson, the ideational function of language is realized by the transitivity analysis which can be further realized by several processes. They are: material processes, mental processes, and relational processes, verbal processes, behavioral processes and existential processes, with the last three being not so typical. In this paper, transitivity analysis of Hemingway’s short story A Clean, Well-lighted Place is made to interpret the characters and theme of it. 2. Transitivity analysis of A Clean, Well-lighted Place 2.1 Analysis of material processes in the story |Participants

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