[Xmca-l] Re: Ruqaiya Hasan

[HENRY SHONERD]

I am saddened not only by Ruqaiya’s passing by also by how little I knew about Ruqaiya’s work. I hope to correct that now by reading more. Not least because of what David points out that she adds to Vygotsky: Grammar! There may be a thousand things that Ruqaiya has contributed to systemic functional linguistics, but connecting it so explicitly to Vygotsky, THAT I would like to read more and hear more about. If there is, as Mike suggests, an MCA honoring of her work, I would very much like to see that connection “foregrounded” (a term straight out of the Wikipedia article on Ruqaiya). 
Henry


On Jun 25, 2015, at 4:29 AM, David Kellogg <dkellogg60@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> I think that Ruqaiya was the only person I ever met who set out to
> "correct" Vygotsky and actually succeeded: her insight was that Vygotsky's
> theory, without a theory of grammar, was inevitably going to focus too
> narrowly on lexical meanings and their historical derivations. As Vygotsky
> himself pointed out, it's very hard to tell when children's word meanings
> develop. But Ruqaiya pointed out that it's very easy to tell when their
> wordings do.
> 
> I was hoping to see her at the next ISFC in Germany next month--I'll miss
> her.
> 
> David Kellogg
> 
> On Thu, Jun 25, 2015 at 4:56 PM, Phil Chappell <philchappell@mac.com> wrote:
> 
>> Many on this list will know of Ruqaiya Hasan's work and may even have
>> joined in an XMCA seminar we had back in the mid noughties. She was a great
>> advocate of intersections between Vygotsky, Halliday, Bernstein and Marx.
>> 
>> I'm sad to pass this message on.
>> 
>> Phil Chappell
>> 
>> Dear SFL Friends
>> 
>> With great sadness I have to tell you that Ruqaiya passed away suddenly
>> yesterday afternoon.  She suffered heart failure, brought on by the stress
>> of the cancer and the infection, which had so weakened her body.
>> Fortunately Michael was with her at that moment, and for some time
>> beforehand.
>> 
>> I have just spoken with Michael, and want to reassure you that he is doing
>> well in these circumstances - as courageous and determined as you know he
>> would be.
>> 
>> There will be a small funeral service in Sydney next week.  The time and
>> date are still being arranged, and details will be posted when they are
>> available.  There will also be a much larger scholarly event to celebrate
>> Ruqaiya's life and work, and to keep it moving forward, later in the year
>> at Macquarie University.
>> 
>> A wonderful life, an immense scholarly contribution, an extraordinary
>> friend to so many people around the world.
>> 
>> Best regards,
>> Geoff Williams
>> 
>> 
>> 
>>