ABSTRACT
It has become something of a truism in conversations among “Sydney School” linguiststhat students at riskof school failure farebetterwithin avisible curriculum. In this view, such students need explicit induction into the genres of power if they are to participate in mainstream textual and social processes within and beyond the school. Butwhat does “exp1icitinduction”mean in pedagogic terms, and what kinds of metalinguistic resources are going to serve learners well in this process? Many claims and counter-claims have been made about the role of genre in both textual and social processes (see, for example, Callaghan & Rothely, 1988; Cope & Kalantzis, 1993; Lee, 1997; Luke, 1996; Martin, 1993a; Reid, 1987). This chapter is one contribution to the ongoing dialogue between theorists of the Sydney School and beyond.’ It focuses on the role of a systemic functional metalanguage in the process of initiating students into subject-specific literacies rather than with social processes more broadly.zMoreparticularly, it explores the role of genre and register in one teacher’s mediation of the demands and possibilities of scientific literacy.
