Three Meta-functions in ‘To My Dear and Loving Husband’ Poem by Anne Bradstreet

Abstract

This study aims to analyze a literary work with systemic functional linguistics approach. Ideational, textual and interpersonal meanings are analyzed from the English poem entitled “To My Dear and Loving Husband” by Anne Bradstreet. The researcher applied meta-function concepts of Halliday and Matthiessen as the framework to investigate three metafunctions used in English Poem “To My Dear and Loving Husband” by Anne Bradstreet. In systemic functional linguistics, there are three meta-functions, namely ideational, textual and interpersonal meanings. The focus of this study is on three meta functions used in the data. This study applied qualitative method to gather in-depth insights into a problem. The poem was broken down into individual clauses which were then analyzed by applying SFL in tables. The result showed that the majority of the text used mental processes and topical unmarked theme, which indicated that the poet wished to immortalize her love for beloved husband and their love would remain forever in these lines of the poem.