EXPERIENCING THE 25TH SYSTEMIC-FUNCTIONAL CONGRESS
(Cardiff, Wales, 13-18 July, Robin Fawcett and Gordon
Tucker, organizers)

By Michael Cummings


Theme and strands.

The theme of the Congress this year was "Modelling language in use",
but the aggregate of strands was quite typical of any recent Congress:
syntax, literary and non-literary stylistics, genre and genres,
teaching SFL, pragmatics, forensic linguistics, semantics of the
interpersonal, computational linguistics, translation, teaching
ESL/EFL, internet discourse, textual cohesion and coherence, corpus
linguistics, information structure, theme and rheme, lexis.

Plenary addresses.

Since this was the 25th or Jubilee Congress it is not surprising that
more than one plenary made extensive reference to past interest and
accomplishments within the SFL community.  Erich Steiner led off with
a very intensive review of SFL intellectual history.  Michael Gregory
complemented that discourse very nicely with an equally historical
review of the interaction and interrelation of SFL with associated and
offshoot schools and approaches.  Peter Fries offered an analysis of
reference and information structure, with particular reference to
cognitive approaches to linguistics.  Robin Fawcett and Gordon Tucker
presented an overview of the Cardiff model of a SF grammar.  Michael
Halliday used the final plenary to summarize his perception of the
Congress and his perception of current directions for SFL.

Workshops.

A number of workshops were organized as part of the simultaneous
sessions: Susan Hunston's and Mike Day's on using corpora for grammar
studies, Radan Martinec's on the semiotics of action, Margaret Berry's
on formulating system networks, Robin Fawcett and Gordon Tucker's on
the Cardiff grammar, Martin Davies's on SFL in education, Paul Tench's
on intonation, and the many-speakered translation workshop which will
be the occasion for a published volume.

A small, random sample of papers heard.

Kristin Davidse (U. of Leuven) proposed a detailed functional grammar
of existential clauses in English based on the quantity concept.  Ron
Geluykens (U. of Muenster) analyzed cleft and pseudo-cleft
constructions.  Elissa Asp (St. Mary's U., Canada) extended the
discussion of the relations between syntagmatic and paradigmatic axes
in modelling lexico-grammar.  Joe Foley (National U. of Singapore)
contextualized the language-education policies of the Thai government.
Jim Benson and Glenn Stillar (York U. and Waterloo U., Canada) took up
the stylistics of political speaking, using a notorious text from a
former Minister of Education in Ontario.  Clare McCauley (U. of
Sheffield) spoke on SFL approaches to general metaphor, and to
grammatical metaphor.  Peter Collins (U. of New South Wales) took up
the semantics and distribution of adjuncts, relying in part on data
from corpora.  Heloisa Collins (Catholic U. of Sao Paulo) reported on
evidence from internet course work for the evaluation of EFL
attainment.  June Blair and Bob Simmons (St. Mary's U.  and York U.,
Canada) contemplated the SFL approach to the interpersonal, with
reference to the Cartesian ego.  Monique Frobert-Adamo (Centre
d'Historie des Idees, France) offered stylistic analysis of patent
texts, relating them to scientific and legal registers.  Martin Davies
(Stirling U.) dealt with unworded' themes, esp. Subjects, with
particular reference to literary texts.  Bill Greaves (York U.,
Canada) dealt with a revised and updated exposition of the SF theory
and description of intonation and grammar.  Radan Martinec (London
Institute) proposed a ground-breaking theory of rhythm in text, with
ample and convincing evidence, relating it to the textual
metafunction.  Karen Zethsen (Aerhus School of Business, Sweden) dealt
with isotopy or lexical strings in relation to themes and hyperthemes
in texts representing technical register.  Peng Wangheng (Qigdao
U. and U. of Liverpool) related relative frequency of occurrence of
lexis with distribution into clause theme within a large,
computer-analyzed corpus.  Mujib Rahman (U. of Peshawar) dealt with
the stylistics of scientific reporting, particularly regarding clause
theme elements, comparing native English text with that from Pakistani
expositors.  Bill Downes (U.  of East Anglia) analyzed the language of
mystical contemplation, with particular reference to Julian of
Norwich.

La comedie humaine

Arrived at Heathrow airport Saturday, 6:00 am local time, groggy.
Thought I might have time to catch the 7:15 coach to Cardiff, but the
shuttle bus to the Central Coach Station drives all around the
perimeter of the airport.  Finally confronted the ticket clerk at
precisely 7:15 and asked if there was a chance to catch it -- to my
amazement this British clerk literally ran from the ticket office to
flag down the coach before it could leave, then came back and let me
oblige her further with a credit card transaction and a negotiation
for a return reservation.  The driver took my bag and shooed me
aboard, the last before leaving ten minutes late.  In the modern
coach, a uniformed lady moves up and down the aisle taking orders for
and bringing drinks and sandwiches; the motorways are much rougher
than the stratosphere so this flight attendant of the earth bounces
and reels her way up and down, servicing one order at a time.  The
price of the goods must include the entertainment.

It began to rain the instant we crossed into Monmouthshire, but I
remembered the taxi stand in front of Cardiff Central Railway Station.
Alas, I was to find the taxi stand replaced with new construction.  A
kindly ticket clerk in the station misdirected me utterly about the
nearest stand, but back at the bus station I was steered to the right
place.  4 pounds to the Aberconway Bldg. didn't seem too high.

The chap at the Congress office couldn't be more helpful -- carried my
bag up to the third floor of the dormitory, and pointed me to the bus
stop on Colum Road.  The digs were just fine, what with hot water in
the tub at almost any time of day, sachets of coffee, cocoa and tea to
boil with in the kitchenette down the hallway, and a window of complex
technology which when figured out would let in or shut out the whole
atmosphere at a time.  My most constant neighbours proved to be the
gulls.  In fact the family domicile was atop a chimney or two on the
other side of the courtyard, but various cousins and uncles dropped by
my window on a regular basis to call.  The favourite time for such
socializing was about 4 am., or just after the beginning of this
northern summer dawn.

A Congress run with seven simultaneous sessions, no coffee breaks, and
no lunch break, from 9 in the morning until 5 in the afternoon, is the
most humane conference procedure I have yet to witness.  It is utterly
relaxed.  No one could be morally bound to be any particular place at
any particular time in the course of all this, with the obvious
exception of the plenaries, which were unusually well-attended.  If
Snodgrass was disappointed you weren't there to hear him, you had had
no other time to take coffee or lunch.  The Welshcakes were superb.
There is the inevitable problem of scheduling the paper by the
graduate student from Bahrain at the same time as the panel discussion
featuring Halliday, Chomsky, Derrida and Eco, but you find that
everywhere.  I came late into one paper and doubled the audience.  A
third auditor showed up half-way through.  We had a wonderful time.
After a while the presenter started dialoguing with both the audience,
and the discussion at the end was totally engaging. When the opposite
problem occurred, with people sitting on the floor filling up the
whole aisle to the front of the room, the sense of distance from the
speaker was immense.

Snapshots.

Michael Halliday walking alone up the Colum Drive about
7:30 am., looking very cheerful.

Christian Matthiessen trying to eat some breakfast in the
Aberconway Refectory, with a queue of people at the end
of the table, lined up to talk to him.

Various nationalities hurrying through the corridors of the
Aberconway, trying to find a sign to direct them to C43.

Mick O'Donnell at lunchtime, showing me his laptop
computer, with the presentation software.

Talking with Eija Ventola during the afternoon coffee
break -- her phone in her tote bag rings -- she gets it out
and
it's family calling from Finland.

Standing, sipping, talking with the Welsh landlord in the
Red Cow, in a little village somewhere north of Merthyr
Tydfil.  

Robin Fawcett and Gordon Tucker back from graduation
ceremonies, resplendent in luminous gowns. 

An Australian, a Brit and a Canadian in the back of a
minivan with Martin Davies, talking about the Lakes poets.

Showing other guests the view of Castell Coch from the
bottom of Robin Fawcett's garden.

Michael Gregory sitting outside under a broad hat,
surrounded by young Canadian professors.