The Study Of Garden Path Phenomenon From The Perspective Of Systemic Functional Linguistics

Garden Path Phenomenon is a special phenomenon existing in grammar and is a special temporary ambiguity in language processing. It has been widely studied and discussed by a large number of linguists(Bever, 1970; Kimball, 1973; Frazier and Ford, 1978; Pritchett, 1988, 1992; Frazier and Clifton, 1996; Sturt and Crocker, 1996) throughout the world. Those studies have achieved a great deal of findings and results from aspects of semantics, pragmatics, psycholinguistics and cognitive linguistics, etc. Garden Path Phenomenon was first put forward by Bever(1970), who was a famous psycholinguist. Bever created his first classic example of GPP which has aroused immense attention among scholars and led to one of the hottest topics in psycholinguistics, namely the GPP. The process of such types of sentences is much like walking in the garden. When the sightseers walk down the usual path, they suddenly find that they are walking in a wrong way and have to come back to the place where they have started to walk(Liu & Shi, 2005).The term “garden path” has been thus vividly explained and described.After years of study by scholars, GPP has been well analyzed and illustrated on the basis of theories in various linguistic fields. Those traditional studies have achieved a great deal of findings and contributions that paved the way to the further study in this field. However, no studies have been made from the perspective of systemic functional linguistics. It is believed that this thesis will contribute a great deal to the study of Garden Path Phenomenon from the perspective of systemic functional linguistics.The significance of such research is clear both in theory and practice. Theoretically, the research will prove that GPP can be analyzed and illustrated through SFL. Through the study of GPP from SFL, the relevant theory of SFL will be applied fully into the analysis and a new method to explain GPP will be put forward. Practically, a good command of three metafunctions performed by GPP is supposed to be of much benefit to the use of language and to the understanding of ambiguous sentences. The aforementioned miscellaneous functions performed by GPP evidently throw light on the dynamic and flexible characteristics of language and signify that GPP possesses communicative and practical significance in language use.The explorations on the study of GPP via systemic functional linguistics are tentative and to some extent innovative. The researches on interpersonal function, ideational function and textual function of GPP are the major innovative points in this thesis. The analyses from the perspectives of transitivity, mood structure, thematic structure, and logical-semantic structure are more innovative than some previous ones from other perspectives. And the explanation of GPP from the perspective of meaning potential is another innovative point in this thesis.There are altogether three main questions needed to be answered through the research:(1) How can GPP be analyzed from transitivity, mood structure & thematic structure?(2) How can GPP be analyzed from logical-semantic structure?(3) How can GPP be explained from SFL? In order to answer the above three questions, a great deal of work has to be done for preparation. The thesis will choose a certain number of clauses of GPP as data for analysis. Further more, this kind of clauses will be analyzed and studied ftom the perspectives mentioned above. For the thesis, there are three basic research methods: documental research, qualitative research and deductive research. These three research methods are combined in the process of analyses. Documental research will be used to collect enough relevant materials, including some journals and papers,etc., and then relevant materials will be chosen for the study. Qualitative research and deductive research will be used to analyze GPP from the perspective of three metafunctions. One clause of GPP may present more than one metafunctions and different ones may present the same function. The thesis will compare the analyses and make a conclusion by analyzing that from different aspects.This thesis consists of five chapters. Chapter one is the introduction to the study, including the background, aims,significance of the study, research questions as well as the organization of the study. Chapter two serves as the literature review. This chapter is made up of an overview of GPP which includes the definition and classification of GPP, definition of ambiguity and the distinction between GPP and ambiguity, as well as studies abroad and at home on GPP. Chapter three deals with theoretical framework of the study. This chapter talks about introduction to SFL, including the three metafunctions: ideational function, interpersonal function and textual function and meaning potential. Chapter four is regarded as the main chapter in this thesis. It is about the study of Garden Path Phenomenon from the perspective of systemic functional linguistics. The analyses of GPP from perspectives of transitivity, mood structure, thematic structure, logical-semantic structure and meaning potential will be dealt with in detail in this chapter. Furthermore, GPP will be illustrated from the perspective of SFL and the summary of this chapter will be included as well. Chapter five is the conclusion part of the whole thesis. This chapter contains the major findings, limitations of the study and suggestions for further study.The research indicates that three metafunctions play an important role in analyzing and understanding GPP from the perspective of SFL. For instance, through the analysis of GPP from the perspective of transitivity in ideational function, it is easy to see that if differnert participants are chosen, then the clause may have different structures and meanings, in addition, because of the different choice of structures, a clause of GPP may have different processes of transitivity. If a clause of GPP is analyzed in the correct process, its real meaning will be readily understood. Through the analysis of GPP from the view of mood structue in interpersonal function, it can be found that the different choices of subject will lead to different meanings of the clause and the divisions of finite element will also be different. If the right element as the subject of a clause of GPP can be chosen, GPP can be easily decoded. As for the analysis of GPP from the aspect of thematic structure in textual function, it can be seen that it is important to mark out the right theme in a clause of GPP and the right theme can enhance the illustration of GPP. Through the analyses of GPP from SFL, it is obvious to see that SFL can help readers analyze and understand GPP better, which can improve further communication in language processing. What’s more, the study can pave way to further study on GPP and also can provide some relevant suggestions.