Name: Angel Anne Lorraine A.

Carranza
Course: BSA-1A

JAKOBSON'S MODEL OF COMMUNICATION IDENTIFIES SIX FUNCTIONS OF LANGUAGE, WHICH

ARE AS FOLLOWS:

Informative Function: This function is used to convey factual information, news, or data.
Example: "The temperature today is 25 degrees Celsius."

Expressive Function: This function is used to express emotions, feelings, and personal opinions.
Example: "I am so excited to see you after such a long time!"

Conative Function: This function is used to influence, persuade, or convince others to take a
specific action or adopt a particular attitude.
Example: "Please recycle to help save our planet."

Phatic Function: This function is used to establish, maintain, or terminate social relations through
casual conversations and small talk.
Example: "Hello, how are you today?"

Metalingual Function: This function is used to clarify the meaning of a message or to discuss the
rules and conventions of language itself.
Example: "Can you explain the meaning of this word in another way, please?"

Poetic Function: This function is used to create aesthetic value, beauty, or artistic expression in
language.
Example: "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more
temperate." (From William Shakespeare's Sonnet 18)

IN SYSTEMIC FUNCTIONAL LINGUISTICS, DEVELOPED BY MICHAEL HALLIDAY, THE

FUNCTIONS OF LANGUAGE ARE CATEGORIZED INTO THREE MAIN METAFUNCTIONS:
IDEATIONAL, INTERPERSONAL, AND TEXTUAL.

Ideational Function: This function is used to represent reality, including experiences, events, and
processes. It helps to convey information about the world and how it works.
Example: "The sun rises in the east and sets in the west."

Interpersonal Function: This function is used to establish, maintain, or negotiate social

relationships and interactions. It helps to express attitudes, emotions, and intentions, as well as to
influence others.
Example: "I would like to invite you to my birthday party next weekend."

Textual Function: This function is used to organize and connect language elements within a text or
discourse, creating coherence and cohesion. It helps to signal the relationships between ideas and
to guide the reader or listener through the text.
Example: "On the other hand, some people prefer dogs as pets." (Using "on the other hand" to
contrast with a previous statement)
FUNCTIONS OF LANGUAGE

LANGUAGE IS A TOOL WHICH IS USED BY ITS SPEAKERS TO PERFORM VARIOUS TASKS. THESE
TASKS ARE CALLED FUNCTIONS OF LANGUAGE.

COMMON FORMS AND FUNCTIONS OF LANGUAGE

I. Three Basic Functions are generally noted: there is perhaps nothing subtler than language is, and
nothing has as many different uses.
A. Without a doubt, identifying just these three basic functions is an oversimplification, but
an awareness of these functions is a good introduction to the complexity of language.
B. The Functions of Language (i.e., its purpose; what it does; its uses)

1. Informative language function: essentially, the communication of information.

a. The informative function affirms or denies propositions, as in science or the statement of
a fact.
b. This function is used to describe the world or reason about it (e.g.., whether a state of
affairs has occurred or not or what might have led to it).
c. These sentences have a truth value; that is, the sentences are either true or false
(recognizing, of course, that we might not know what that truth value is). Hence, they are important
for logic.

2. Expressive language function: reports feelings or attitudes of the writer (orspeaker), or of the
subject, or evokes feelings in the reader (or listener).
a. Poetry and literature are among the best examples, but much of, perhaps most of,
ordinary language discourse is the expression of emotions, feelings or attitudes.
b. Two main aspects of this function are generally noted:
(1) evoking certain feelings and
(2) expressing feelings.
c. Expressive discourse, qua expressive discourse, is best regarded as neither true or false.
E.g., Shakespeare's King Lear's lament, "Ripeness is all!" or Dickens' "It was the best of times,
it was the worst of times; it was the age of wisdom; it was the age of foolishness…" Even so, the "logic"
of "fictional statements" is an interesting area
of inquiry.

3. Directive language function: language used for the purpose of causing (or preventing) overt
action.
a. The directive function is most commonly found in commands and requests.
b. Directive language is not normally considered true or false (although various logics of
commands have been developed).
c. Example of this function: "Close the windows." The sentence "You're smoking in a non-
smoking area," although declarative, can be used to mean "Do not smoke in this area."

II. It is rare for discourse just to serve only one function; even in a scientific treatise, discursive
(logical) clarity is required, but, at the same time, ease of expression often demands some
presentation of attitude or feeling otherwise the work might be dull.
 A. Most ordinary kinds of discourse is mixed. Consider the following example. Suppose you
want your listeners to contribute to the Multiple Sclerosis Society

B. There are several possible approaches:

1. Explain the recent breakthroughs in the scientist's understanding of the

disease(informative) and then ask for a contribution (directive).
2. Make a moving appeal (expressive) and then ask for a contribution (directive).
3. Command it (directive).
4. Explain the good results (informative), make a moving appeal (expressive), andthen ask
(directive).
5. Generally speaking, step 3 (specifically stating that which is desired as outcome)is the
least effective means. Usually, just making a moving appeal is the most effective for the general
population; explaining the recent research is the most effective for an educated audience. Asking for
the contribution is often not necessary, since the prospective contributor surmises this step.

C. Several other uses of language deserve mention.

1. The ceremonial--(also ritual language use) probably something quite different from
simply mixing the expressive and directive language functions because performative aspects are
included as well. Example: "Dearly beloved, we are gathered here together to witness the holy
matrimony of ….
2. Performative utterances: language which performs the action it reports. For example, "I
do" in the marriage ceremony and the use of performative verbs such as “accept," "apologize,"
"congratulate," and "promise." These words denote an action which is performed by using the verb
in the first person nothing more need be done to accomplish the action.
3. Phatic language: "Elevator talk" and street-corner conversations accomplishing asocial
task. Note the subtle transition from vocal behavior to body language from saying for example, "Hi"
or "How are your?" to a nod or a wave of the hand.
4. Most of the examples we have been talking about are not merely of academic interest,
even though we cannot take time out to trace the far reaching consequences.(E.g., in law, when a
speaker is charged "with inciting to riot," the prosecution must maintain he was using the directive
language function, while the defense will probably argue that the speaker was only expressing his
feelings. Also, performative utterances are not normally subject to hearsay rules since they imply an
action taken.)

DIFFERENT LINGUISTS/SCHOLARS AND THEIR REPRESENTATION OF THESE FUNCTIONS

GEOFFREY FINCH'S FUNCTIONS OF LANGUAGE

He divides the functions of language in two main categories i.e. Micro and Macro. Micro
functions are those which help us identify/name things, record, release emotional energy,
communicate, socialise, think and enjoy through language. On the other hand, macro functions are
generalised forms of micro ones which incorporate one or more than one functions within
themselves. Thus ideational function helps us conceptualise the world around us, interpersonal
function helps us create our relation with respect to other things and humans in society and
environment, poetic function gives us liberty to bend the world and create world through words,
textual function gives us ability to create understandable and interconnected texts.

JAKOBSON'S FUNCTIONS OF LANGUAGE

 Roman Jakobson defined six functions of language (or communication functions),according
to which an effective act of verbal communication can be described. Each of the functions has an

associated factor. For this work, Jakobson was influenced by Karl Bühler's Organon-Model, to which
he added the poetic, phatic and metalingual functions.

The six functions of language

1. The Referential Functioncorresponds to the factor of Context and describes a situation,
object or mental state.The descriptive statements of the referential function can consist of both
definitedescriptions and deictic words, e.g. "The autumn leaves have all fallen now."
2. The Poetic Functionfocuses on "the message for its own sake" (the code itself, and how it
is used) and isthe operative function in poetry as well as slogans.
3. The Emotive (alternatively called "Expressive" or "Affective") Functionrelates to the
Addresser (sender) and is best exemplified by interjections and othersound changes that do not
alter the denotative meaning of an utterance but do addinformation about the Addresser's
(speaker's) internal state, e.g. "Wow, what aview!"
4. The Conative Functionengages the Addressee (receiver) directly and is best illustrated by
vocatives andimperatives, e.g. "Tom! Come inside and eat!"
5. The Phatic Function is language for the sake of interaction and is therefore associated
with theContact/Channel factor. The Phatic Function can be observed in greetings andcasual
discussions of the weather, particularly with strangers. It also provides thekeys to open, maintain,
verify or close the communication channel: "Hello?", "Ok?","Hummm", "Bye"...
6. The Metalingual (alternatively called "Metalinguistic" or "Reflexive") Functionis the use of
language (what Jakobson calls "Code") to discuss or describe itself.

MICHAEL ALEXANDER KIRKWOOD HALLIDAY'S FUNCTIONS OF LANGUAGE (PRIMAILY

FORCHILDREN)

Language is ‘systemic’ because it is ‘paradigmatically organised’. What this means is that

any ‘piece’ of language on any scale can be described as the output of a system of choices. For
instance, a major clause must display some structure that is the formal realization of a choice from
the system of ‘voice’, .e. it must be either‘middle’ or ‘effective’, where ‘effective’ leads to the further
choice of ‘operative’(otherwise known as ‘active’) or ‘receptive’ (otherwise known as ‘passive’).

Halliday (1975) identifies seven functions that language has for children in theirearly years.
Children are motivated to acquire language because it serves certain purposes or functions for
them. The first four functions help the child to satisfy physical, emotional and social needs. Halliday
calls them instrumental, regulatory,interactional, and personal functions.

Instrumental: This is when the child uses language to express their needs (e.g.’Want juice’)
Regulatory: This is where language is used to tell others what to do (e.g. ‘Go away’)
Interactional: Here language is used to make contact with others and form relationships (e.g. ‘Love
you, mummy’)
Personal: This is the use of language to express feelings, opinions, and individual identity (e.g. ‘Me
good girl’)
THE NEXT THREE FUNCTIONS ARE HEURISTIC, IMAGINATIVE, AND REPRESENTATIONAL, ALL
HELPINGTHE CHILD TO COME TO TERMS WITH HIS OR HER ENVIRONMENT.

Heuristic: This is when language is used to gain knowledge about the environment
(e.g. ‘What the tractor doing?’)

Imaginative: Here language is used to tell stories and jokes, and to create an imaginary
environment.
Representational: The use of language to convey facts and information.

According to Halliday, as the child moves into the mother tongue, these functions give way
to the three meta functions of a fully tri-striatal language (one in which there is an additional level
of content inserted between the two parts of the Saussureansign [clarification needed]). These
metafunctions are the ideational, the interpersonal, and the textual.

Halliday’s work represents a competing viewpoint to the formalist approach of Noam

Chomsky. Halliday’s concern is with what he claims to be “naturally occurring language in actual
contexts of use” in a large typological range of languages whereas Chomsky is concerned only with
the formal properties of languages such as English, which he thinks are indicative of the nature of
what he calls Universal Grammar.