Abstract:
A great deal of studies have been conducted using Systemic Functional Grammar
(SFG) particularly the Ideational Metafunction. Nevertheless, few of them have
adopted Systemic Functional Grammar to investigate the syntax of newspaper
headlines (Ansary, 2005; Ong„onda, 2016; Abdulameer, Noor and Nasser, 2019)).
The Ideational Metafunction of Systemic Functional Grammar (SFG) by Halliday
(1994) is employed to examine 60 Ghanaian Newspaper Headlines from 5 newspaper
agencies. The purposive sampling technique was used to sample the data from the
year 2018 to 2019. The analysis is situated within the general research paradigm of
qualitative research approach which is applied to identify the structural types of
Newspaper Headlines which are sentential (30 declarative, 4 imperative, 2
interrogative, 5 ellipted and 6 passivized) and 13 phrasal newspaper headlines. Based
on a type of the six-transitivity processes whether Material, Mental, Verbal,
Relational, Existential or Behavioural, the clausal elements and their functions were
identified in the sentential newspaper headlines; the structure of the phrasal
newspaper headlines together with the words that make up the structure and functions
have been analyzed. Though the Declarative Newspaper Headlines reported
education, finance, international news among others, they dominated political news
items. The Imperative Newspaper Headlines were adopted by religious and political
leaders to admonish and motivate the citizenry and congregants. To help create
suspense and arouse the interest in sporting events, the Interrogative Newspaper
Headlines were employed. The Phrasal Newspaper Headlines dominated political
news. As part of Block Language, the Elliptical Newspaper Headlines omitted
elements such as auxiliary verbs, articles, the dummy there with the verb be, noun
group with relational auxiliary or relational processes in clause complex and part of
the embedded clause (adjectival clause). The Passivized Newspaper Headlines, the
Agentless Passive as against the Agentive Passive reported criminal cases which were
undergoing investigations and arbitration of which the newspaper agencies could not
pronounce judgment ahead of the police and judicial systems since such cases are
generally based on allegations.
Description:
A Thesis in the Department of Applied Linguistics,
Faculty of Foreign Languages Education and Communication,
submitted to the School of Graduate Studies in partial fulfilment
of the requirements for the award of the degree of
Master of Philosophy
(Applied Linguistics)
in the University of Education, Winneba