6.2 Self-test on categories of language function

Not everybody’s reaction was positive. Lan was standing by his locker, talking to Hiroki, when Adam Ryan and others in the lunchtime ballkickers squad came streaming in from the oval.

‘Hey, if it isn’t the Multiculti Kid!’
‘Nah, it’s Steve Waugh! See the baggy green?’
‘Don’t think much of your Big Idea, but.’
‘You gunna play cricket too, Hiroki?’
‘Thought Nips couldn’t play cricket?’
‘They can’t. That’s why they have to form their own team. Nobody else’ll have ‘em.’
They hooted with laughter.
‘Any of you can be in the team,’ Lan said, ‘If you’re good enough cricketer, that is.’
‘Bad enough, you mean,’ jeered Adam.
‘We’re Australians,’ Ryan said, ‘We wouldn’t want to be in a loser team of Nips.’
They sauntered off down the corridor.

1. What is the above piece of writing predominantly expressing?
(a) interpersonal
(b) experiential
(c) textual

Answer: (a)

This passage shows human relationships being enacted.

(Starke, R. Nips X1, p. 20)

2. The questions in the above piece of writing are aimed at:
(a) obtaining information
(b) belittling Lan and Hiroki
(c) getting a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ response

Answer: (b)

It is obvious that the exchange between the two sets of boys is meant by Adam and his friend as a means of sneering at Lan’s and his friend’s efforts to create a cricket team. The mocking comparison that is made between Lan and Shane Warne and the wearing of ‘the baggy green’ and the hurtful comment made to Hiroki about his Japanese origins. Adam intimates at the end that he and his friends are Australians, not anyone who has come in from the outside.

3. The exclamations in the above piece of writing are:
(a) deliberate reactions to something that Adam and his friend have heard
(b) involuntary reactions to something that Adam and his friend have heard

Answer: (a)ß

Adam and his friend introduce the topic of the cricket match in mock surprise at meeting ‘the multiculti kid’ or as the second boy suggests, ‘Steve Waugh’ in his ‘baggy green cap’. These exclamations are meant ‘to cut Lan down to size’. They are perfect examples of sarcasm.

4. The three statements in the above piece of writing:
(a) simply volunteer information
(b) recount known information
(c) recount known information with a sneering intent

Answer: (c)

The two boys want Lan to know that they know of Lan’s plans and that they do not approve of them and so recount them in a very nasty manner. They persist in their stance of superiority: ‘We’re Australians’, implying Lan and his friends are not.

5. What, as a reader, do you find emerging from this mock exchange?
(a) simply school boy teasing
(b) racial discrimination
(c) basic school boy camaraderie

Answer: (b)

By intimating that Lan and Hiroki are not Australians and mocking their efforts to make connections with the other boys, Adam and his friend clearly show they believe there is a divide between them.

6. What grammatical form essentially helped to construct this above piece of writing and the meaning it conveys?
(a) Sentence level grammar
(b) Nouns and noun phrases
(c) Clause level grammar

Answer: (c)

This communication is made up of questions, statements and exclamations, examples of clause level grammar whose construction enable the sneering interaction to take place.

Functional Grammar and the making of meaning

6.2 Self-test on categories of language function