“Systemic Socio-Semantic Stylistics (SSS) as appliable linguistics: the cases of literary criticism and language teaching/ learning”

Abstract for: Miller & Luporini, “Systemic Socio-Semantic Stylistics (SSS) as appliable linguistics: the cases of literary criticism and language teaching/ learning” This chapter focuses on Hasan’s Systemic Socio-Semantic Stylistics (SSS; Hasan 1985 [1989], 2007) as appliable linguistics, offering examples of its potential to be critically deployed in higher academic contexts to solve relevant problems and improve practice. These contexts for us are literary criticism and ESL teaching and learning, conflated in our teaching of stylistics. We begin by briefly reviewing the work of scholars who, in the 1960s and ‘70s, were among the first to argue the value of – and the need for – a linguistic approach to the study of literature: these include Halliday (e.g., Halliday et al., 1964) and Fowler (e.g., 1966). We then succinctly describe the SSS framework and the theory behind it, focusing on its premise that literature is a ‘special’ text-type, and on the ‘double articulation’ model proposed by Hasan for the study of verbal art, comprising a semiotic system of language, but also a distinct semiotic system of verbal art – what makes it special. Following directly from this, we offer select concrete illustrations of doing SSS, from our ongoing corpus-assisted research and pedagogic experience, discussing class activities based on J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter; J.M. Coetzee’s Foe, and Siegfried Sassoon’s Does it matter? – a 21st century acerbic social poem. Corpus-assisted analysis starts with the semiotic system of language, paying special attention to transitivity and appraisal mechanisms. It then moves on to the semiotic system of verbal art, where we systematically trace with the students the relevance of certain mechanisms – foregrounding and Jakobsonian ‘pervasive parallelism’ (cf., e.g., Miller 2016) – for the symbolic articulation of the text’s deepest message (its theme). The two-fold aim is to show how ‘double articulation’ is perfectly instrumental to both doing linguistic criticism and to further developing already appreciable ESL skills in the Italian academic setting. The permeable distinction between theory and practice (Halliday 2002 [2009]: 3) in working with SSS emerges forcefully from this section’s testimonies and shows how the practice, in a dynamic cyclical process, feeds back into the theory and the overall methodology, strengthening both. In closing, we sum up the case we’ve made for our multiple-strand thesis: i.e., that worthwhile literary criticism needs a linguistic approach; that corpus-assisted SSS is arguably the best analytical framework for the task; that its value extends to ESL and stylistics teaching/ learning, and that, in the final analysis, SSS can be seen to be a thoroughly rewarding appliable linguistics indeed. Cited References Fowler, R. (1966). Essays on Style and Language. London. Routledge & Kegan Paul, Ltd. Halliday, M.A.K. (2002 [2009]). ‘Applied linguistics as an evolving theme’. In J.J. Webster (ed.), Language and Education, vol. 9 of The Collected Works of M.A.K. Halliday. London: Continuum, 1-19. Halliday, M.A.K, MacIntosh, A. & Strevens, P. (1964). The Linguistic Sciences and Language Teaching. London: Longman. Hasan, R. (1985 [1989]). Language, Linguistics and Verbal Art. Geelong, Vic: Deakin University Press. Oxford: Oxford University Press. Hasan, R. (2007). ‘Private pleasure, public discourse: reflections on engaging with literature’. In D.R Miller & M. Turci (eds), Language and Verbal Art Revisited. Linguistic Approaches to the Study of Literature. London: Equinox, 41-67. Miller, D.R. (2016). ‘Jakobson’s place in Hasan’s Social Semiotic Stylistics: “pervasive parallelism” as symbolic articulation of theme’. In W. Boucher & J. Liang (eds), Society in Language, Language in Society: Essays in Honour of Ruqaiya Hasan. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 59-80.