Linguistic Revelations: A Stylistic Study of Sassoon’s Post-Traumatic Experience in Barker’s Regeneration

Abstract

This paper adopts Halliday’s Systemic Functional Grammar (SFG) to study Siegfried Sassoon, a major character in Pat Barker’s Regeneration. SFG shows the relationships between various process types and the participants who participate in the action. Accordingly, Barker`s characterization of Sassoon is better understood through the analysis of the linguistic choices they make. Therefore, the study claims that Barker’s and Sassoon’s linguistic choices can reveal many aspects of the latter’s world view and psychology. One such issue demonstrated by Regeneration a psychological disorder inflicting the soldiers is Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).