Books by Shoshana Dreyfus
This volume represents a state of the art collection of work in multimodal discourse studies from... more This volume represents a state of the art collection of work in multimodal discourse studies from a social semiotic perspective, drawing in particular on what can be referred to as systemic functional semiotics. As the terms 'semiotic' and 'margins' in the title suggest, the studies represent explorations of meaning making resources that are often considered to lie on the borders or peripheries of semiosis, and which have tended to receive less attention from the field of semiotics. The contributions present analyses of the meaning making potential of modalities including body language, colour and ambience, laughter, architectural spaces, music, diagramming and image-verbiage relations. Chapters engage with a second interpretation of semiotic margins, one to do with the relationship of other modalities to language, the question of what mode is marginal to what, and the ways in which different modes co-articulate, or co-pattern to create meaning.
Papers by Shoshana Dreyfus
Mental Handicap Research, Jun 21, 2023
BackgroundAdults with severe/profound intellectual disability typically face poor communication o... more BackgroundAdults with severe/profound intellectual disability typically face poor communication outcomes as they are often nonverbal and need their supporters to provide for their communication needs. This review aimed to identify studies focused on the communication resources people with severe/profound intellectual disability use for functional communication, and the enablers and barriers to functional communication.MethodsNine databases were systematically reviewed with keywords pertaining to the functional communication of adults with severe/profound intellectual disability. Out of 3427 identified articles, 12 met the inclusion criteria. Hand searches and ancestral searches identified another 4 articles. Out of the 16 articles, two did not meet the quality assessment criteria and were excluded. Thus, 14 articles were included in this review.ResultsThe findings revealed that picture exchange communication systems is the most common communication system used to support the development of functional communication. The most common functions enabled by the communication systems were choice‐making and making requests. Several barriers (e.g., individual factors related to adults with severe/profound intellectual disability, others' attitudes, behaviour and knowledge) to and enablers (e.g., accessibility and availability of the communication system, training for those supporting adults with severe/profound intellectual disability) of functional communication were identified.ConclusionsRemoving the barriers and enabling functional communication is essential to developing the functional communication of adults with severe/profound intellectual disability.
Palgrave Macmillan UK eBooks, 2016
This chapter examines the SLATE project’s implementation of the joint construction step of the Te... more This chapter examines the SLATE project’s implementation of the joint construction step of the Teaching Learning Cycle (TLC), which was carried out in an online context. As introduced in Chapter 5, the TLC is a curriculum macro-genre designed to support the literacy development of student writers. Following the deconstruction step, which focuses on pulling apart and exploring key stages and linguistic features of model texts, joint construction involves teacher-led collaborative writing. In this step the teacher interactively guides students to produce a text or part of a text in the genre they have been focusing on in deconstruction but on a different topic. The aim of joint construction is to provide students with first-hand experience of the craft of writing in a supported environment. It thus forms a bridge from the deconstruction step to the independent construction step, where students need to write an instance of the target genre on their own, transferring the understandings about language and text that have been developed in deconstruction.
Research in Applied Linguistics, Aug 3, 2021
This study reports on the development of the interpersonal discourse semantic system of involveme... more This study reports on the development of the interpersonal discourse semantic system of involvement based on the analysis of evaluative meanings in 3 different data sets of Chinese digitally mediated communication. It builds on prior work developed within tenor and interpersonal meanings. Within the proposed system, 3 kinds of interpersonal meaning dimensions are posited. The first relates to the relative status between interlocutors and participants within a social hierarchy and is, thus, named social hierarchy. The second relates to the positioning of the person posting and others in relation to how close their relationship is and is, thus, named social distance. The third relates to who is being positioned within the other 2 dimensions and is called involvement type. Within the 3 data sets of digitally mediated Chinese communication (i.e., forum posts, SMS, and chat room messages), we found that the Chinese interlocutors frequently positioned themselves and others in relationships both within a social hierarchy as well as in relationships concerning their relative social distance. Results show there are a number of linguistic realisations of these 3 involvement systems which Chinese interlocutors use to negotiate their relative social positions in digitally mediated communication.
Bloomsbury Academic eBooks, Oct 30, 2014
Journal of Australian Studies
Language, Context and Text
This paper reports on the adaptation of Sydney School genre pedagogy’s Teaching Learning Cycle fo... more This paper reports on the adaptation of Sydney School genre pedagogy’s Teaching Learning Cycle for the design of a workshop that aims to encourage disability support workers and their managers to think more expansively about the people with intellectual disabilities they work with and support. The paper introduces the pedagogy and its theoretical underpinnings as well as the two fields of knowledge that are drawn on in the workshop: person-centred care and positive behaviour support. It then details the design and implementation of the workshops and finishes with some evidence of the workshop’s initial impact on workers and the disability organisation’s support of people living with disability.
Bloomsbury Academic eBooks, Oct 30, 2014
Language, Context and Text
This paper explores how emotion is conveyed in spoken language based on a sample of three stories... more This paper explores how emotion is conveyed in spoken language based on a sample of three stories for children read aloud by a trained storyteller. It draws on both Martin & White’s appraisal framework (2005) and a systematic account of vocal features. Interpreting and profiling emotion is a challenge both for researchers interested in spoken language and for English-as-an-additional-language teachers, when working to improve students’ spoken expression of emotion. Underpinning this challenge is the absence of a unified theoretical stance and a consequent lack of shared analytical tools for describing how speakers use semiotic resources to convey emotion in their speech. A systemic functional semiotic approach can make visible the co-patterning of wordings and vocalisations that express emotion.
APPLIABLE LINGUISTICS AND SOCIAL SEMIOTICS
Appliable Linguistics, Aug 26, 2010
Over the past 20 years, Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL), especially its genre theory, has i... more Over the past 20 years, Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL), especially its genre theory, has informed the development of an influential suite of literacy pedagogies within and beyond Australia. In higher education, linguists and educators have drawn on these perspectives to scaffold students' academic reading (Rose, 2005); to describe the verbal and visual demands ofa range of disciplines (Chen and Foley, 2004; Hood, 2006; 2008; Jones, 2007; Lee, 2009; Ravelli, 2004; Wignell, 2007); and to support students in gaining control ...
Discourse, Context & Media
The Discussion Paper on Responding to Behaviour Support Needs in the Disability Services Future p... more The Discussion Paper on Responding to Behaviour Support Needs in the Disability Services Future provides a summary of information gathered by the Intellectual Disability Behaviour Support Program (IDBS). It is designed to inform and provide an opportunity for reflection on the provision of behaviour support for people with intellectual and cognitive disability in the disability services future in Australia. The paper: 1. Introduces a conceptualisation that encourages person-centred holistic understanding of behaviour support needs and behaviour support practices, 2. Identifies issues relevant to the provision of behaviour support in an individualised and marketised disability service future, and 3. Proposes the foundational building blocks for a sustained sector-wide approach to enhancing quality, efficacy, and accountability in behaviour support practice as a support for people with disability and complex support needs
Over the past 20 years, Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL), especially its genre theory, has i... more Over the past 20 years, Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL), especially its genre theory, has informed the development of an in uential suite of literacy pedagogies within and beyond Australia. In higher education, linguists and educators have drawn on these perspectives to scaffold students’ academic reading (Rose, 2005); to describe the verbal and visual demands of a range of disciplines (Chen and Foley, 2004; Hood, 2006; 2008; Jones, 2007; Lee, 2009; Ravelli, 2004; Wignell, 2007); and to support students in gaining control of the genres valued in these disciplines (Bonanno and Jones, 2007; Ellis, 2004; Cof n and Hewings, 2004; Mahboob, Dreyfus, Humphrey and Martin, this volume; Taylor and Drury, 2007; Woodward-Kron, 2005). The development of SFL-informed academic literacy pedagogies is hardly surprising, given the extended coverage of SFL systems and the long history of this ‘appliable’ linguistics in successfully addressing tasks and problems related to literacy learning and teaching (Halliday and Hasan, 2006; Halliday, 2007)
Journal of English for Academic Purposes, 2019
Abstract This paper reflects on the influence of Halliday's work in the way three educators c... more Abstract This paper reflects on the influence of Halliday's work in the way three educators conceive and conduct their teaching of English for academic purposes in various degree courses at the same university in Australia. Several ‘big ideas’ from Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) are considered within the general aim of helping students master the specific forms of writing used to assess their learning. Each vignette of teaching practice focuses on an aspect of literacy and language that has proven difficult for the students. Each also draws on SFL to identify the nature of the problem and design a teaching intervention, to enable students to improve their academic writing and learning. The point of departure in each case is a specific assignment that students need to write, which is described as a genre, as defined through careful linguistic analysis. Attention to linguistic detail in specific forms of communication is presented as an effective form of learning support in tertiary education, especially for students making a major transition into new ways of working in specific disciplinary contexts. The fundamental value of SFL is recognised for its capacity to define both what and how to teach, whenever there is need to pay close attention to students' language development.
Discourse & Society, 2017
This article explores how we take responsibility for our past actions in language, using an ideat... more This article explores how we take responsibility for our past actions in language, using an ideational perspective. It focuses on the way we construe actions in transitive and ergative language patterns and from this develop a cline of responsibility, which has maximum responsibility at the one end and minimum responsibility at the other. The article examines a number of instances of language use from different genres and registers with this cline to determine the extent to which language users take responsibility (or not) for their actions through language.
Women in Sport and Physical Activity Journal, 1998
The notion of the body as “a medium of culture” (Bordo, 1990, p. 13), and specifically the female... more The notion of the body as “a medium of culture” (Bordo, 1990, p. 13), and specifically the female body as a site on which the oppression of patriarchy is inscribed or played out has been discussed by many feminist theorists (Bartky, 1988; Bordo, 1990; Dimen, 1989). More recently there has been increasing interest in the material body as a source of kinesthetic pleasure rather than, or simultaneously as, a site of inscription and oppression. In searching for new ways to think and talk about the body, there is a recognition that it cannot be seen simply as either a site of oppression or pleasure, but rather as a site where many apparently contradictory and opposing discourses can coexist and where interesting and complex mixes of pleasure and oppression can occur simultaneously (Shilling, 1993).In this paper we attempt to explore these complexities through a study of belly dancing. This is a form of physical activity with an increasingly large following. On one hand, it seems possible...
Meaning Making in Text, 2015
This chapter explores classroom interaction enacted within ‘Sydney School’ genre pedagogy. Specif... more This chapter explores classroom interaction enacted within ‘Sydney School’ genre pedagogy. Specifically, it explores the step of Joint Construction in the Teaching Learning Cycle (Rothery and Stenglin 1994, Humphrey 1996). Joint Construction involves a teacher leading a class in writing a text of the kind they have been exploring in earlier stages of the Teaching Learning Cycle. This chapter addresses the nature of interaction in Joint Construction from the perspective of discourse semantics systems, and proposes an additional rank to more fully describe the interaction in this designed institutionalized genre. The aim here is to create a principled system of analysis from classroom dialogue, and thereby bridge the gap between top-down genre approaches and bottom-up exchange structure approaches with the aim of creating a more comprehensive set of analyses for the description of classroom discourse.
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Books by Shoshana Dreyfus
Papers by Shoshana Dreyfus