CFP: Exploring the Use of Systemic Functional Linguistics for Critical Textual Awareness

Special issue call for papers from English Teaching: Practice & Critique

Deadline for Abstracts: August 1, 2017
Deadline for full manuscripts: November 15, 2017

For this upcoming special themed issue of “English Teaching: Practice & Critique”, the guest editors, Beryl Exley (Griffith University, Australia), Cynthia Brock (Wyoming University, USA), and David Caldwell (University of South Australia, Australia) call for research papers and theorised practitioner narratives that consider the application of Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) for raising Critical Textual Awareness (CTA) in L1 English Language Arts and L1 English Medium Disciplinary Studies.

This special issue hones in on Michael Halliday’s concept of SFL and this thesis that language is a social semiotic (Halliday, 1978) organised via a network of three simultaneously occurring meta-functions. These three metafunctions are the ideational metafunction which construes experience, the interpersonal metafunction which enacts social relationships and the textual metafunction which organises the text into a coherent whole (see Halliday & Matthiessen, 2004). SFL theory extends to consider the patterns of design of other modes of communication such as visual images (Kress & van Leeuwen, 2006), gestures, posture, movement (Mills, 2011), audio and/or music (Barton & Unsworth, 2014).

In this special issue, CTA considers texts to be forms of social action that construct versions of reality. Drawing on Hilary Janks’ (2006) notion of Critical Language Awareness (CLA) and its focus on the different choices available to language users and the inherent questions around power, this special issue explicitly embraces the broader term text to include multimodal texts and their intermodality (Bateman, 2014).

This call is for papers where SFL is part of the content of instruction in L1 English Language Arts and L1 English medium disciplinary studies is used by educators and learners to explore the power relations inherent in texts. The learning situation might be in either the early, primary/elementary, or secondary years of schooling, or in teacher education or higher education. The L1 English language learning situation might also take place in a community event or social situations outside formal institutional learning. The focus of this special issue is on how SFL contributes to CTA for disparate groups of L1 English language learners. Topics may include, but are not limited to, the following:

pedagogical strategies for using SFL to engage L1 English Language Arts learners of a specific age or stage of learning in CTA;
implementing a unit of work in an L1 english medium classroom in any disciplinary field (e.g. math, science, humanities, arts, etc) where SFL is used to engage learners in CTA;
evidence that using SFL to engage L1 English language learners in CTA improves inferential reading comprehension of linguistic texts;
evidence that using SFL to engage L1 English language learners in CTA improves inferential reading comprehension of multimodal texts;
evidence that using SFL to engage L1 English language learners in CTA improves writing outcomes;
evidence that using SFL to engage L1 English language learners in CTA improves the production of multi-modal texts;
evidence that using SFL to explore CTA engages L1 English language learners; or
assessment practices in classrooms that use SFL to engage L1 English language learners in CTA.

Interested scholars and practitioners whose manuscript fit the remit of this special issue on “Exploring the Use of Systemic Functional Linguistics for Critical Textual Awareness” are invited to submit a 250 word abstract to ETPCAssist@gmail.com by August 1, 2017.

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About the Author

Aptly described by the Independent newspaper as “a man of many parts”, Prof. Mahfouz A. Adedimeji is a Fulbright scholar, interdisciplinary researcher, university don, public affairs analyst, communication consultant, peace advocate, interfaith worker and public intellectual. He obtained his academic degrees from the University of Ilorin, Ilorin, where he was a Professor of English (Pragmatics and Applied Linguistics) before his appointment as Vice Chancellor as the pioneer Vice Chancellor of Ahman Patigi, Nigeria, in February 2021. He started his academic career in 2000 at Ladoke Akintola University of Technology (LAUTECH), Ogbomoso, shortly after which he joined the services of his alma mater, the University of Ilorin. A man of eclectic academic background, Prof. Adedimeji was educated in Arabic and Islamic Studies at Markaz Shabaabil Islam, Iwo, Osun State and Markaz Ta’aleemil Araby, Agege, Lagos. He obtained advanced training in Education, Political Science, Communication and Media, Research and Peace Studies at the National Universities Commission’s (NUC) Virtual Institute for Higher Education Pedagogy (VIHEP); the United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organisation’s (UNESCO) Virtual Institute for Higher Education in Africa (VIHEAF); Governors State University, University Park, Illinois, USA; University of Ghana, Accra, Ghana; and Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, Notre Dame University, South Bend, Indiana, USA. Apart from serving as a cultural ambassador to the US under the auspices of the Institute of International Education (IIE), New York, Prof. Adedimeji had won or co-won the research and conference awards/grants of the Tertiary Education Trust Fund (TETFund) of the National Research Council, Nigeria, the Council for the Development of Social Science Research in Africa (CODESRIA) and the Association of Commonwealth Universities (ACU). He has written extensively for a wide range of newspapers and periodicals including “Unilorin Bulletin”, “Unilorin Watch”, “DeLight”, “National Pilot”, “Daily Independent”, “Daily Newswatch”, “New York Parrot” and “New Telegraph”, among others. A versatile academic and award-winning scholar, Prof. Adedimeji has attended academic conferences and undertaken research in several universities across Nigeria as well as in Ghana, Cameroon, Kenya, Malaysia, Sierra Leone, Australia, France and United States of America, among others. His hundreds of academic, Islamic and general/opinion articles have been published across outlets in Nigeria and beyond. He has also facilitated and participated in seminars and workshops both nationally and internationally. A former Head of the Directorate of Corporate Affairs of the University of Ilorin, Prof. Adedimeji was the Director of the Centre for Centre for Peace and Strategic Studies, University of Ilorin, between 2013 and 2017. Apart from serving as Rapporteur-General to the Presidential Committee that organised the 2017 Federal Executive Council’s Retreat on Education in Nigeria, he has consulted for the Nigerian Supreme Council for Islamic Affairs (NSCIA), Nigeria Inter-religious Council (NIREC), the Nigerian Security and Civil Defence and Corps (NSCDC) and the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP). For years, he was a Coordinator and Facilitator of the Executive Management Course of the Nigerian Army Education Corps (NAEC) and Editor-in-Chief of the “Journal of Peace, Security and Development”, University of Ilorin. He has also served as a resource person to agencies like the Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB), National Orientation Agency (NOA), National Institute for Security Studies as well as a number of Civil Society Organisations. He is a recipient of several awards and honours including those of the International Chartered World Learned Society, American Biographical Institute, National Congress of Nigerian Students (NACONS), Union of Campus Journalists, University of Ilorin, the Nigerian Army Education Corps, Postgraduate Students Association, UNILORIN, Muslim Students Society of Nigeria (MSSN), UNILORIN, Students’ Union, UNILORIN, and National Association of Osun State Students (NAOSS), just to mention a few. A Fellow of bodies like the International Association of Research Scholars and Administrators (FIARSA), Institute of Corporate Administration, Nigeria, (FICAN), Society for Peace Studies and Practice (fspsp) and World Institute for Peace (FWIP) , Prof. Adedimeji is a former Member of the Governing Council of the International Peace Research Association (IPRA) and until recently a Member of the Executive Council of the English Scholars’ Association of Nigeria (ESAN). He is a member of the Editorial Boards of Research in Pragmatics, journal of the Pragmatics Association of Nigeria (PrAN) and ANUJAT, an international multidisciplinary journal of the All Nations University, Koforidua, Ghana. He has about 15 books to his credit as author, co-author, editor and co-editor.