UOS Journal of Social Sciences & Humanities (ISSN # 2224-2341)

UOSJSSH, Volume: 7, No. 1

Transitivity Analysis of Hamid’s Short Narrative A Beheading

Ifra Anam
Lecturer in English, Higher Education Department, Punjab
[email protected]

Dr Shahid Abbas
Assistant Professor, Department of English, University of Sargodha
[email protected]

Hafiz Ahmad Bilal

Professor of English, Higher Education Department, Punjab
[email protected]

Abstract
The study investigates the transitivity patterns in the short narrative A Beheading
(2010) by Mohsin Hamid to understand how language plays a role in the ideation
of our world experience. This study aims to discover and illustrate how various
processes and situations are represented in this interior monologue while also
determining how frequently and what kinds of processes are employed in the text.
The analysis shows that all six processes are employed in the narrative at varying
frequencies. The most common uses of the material and mental processes are to
provide the readers with a psychological impression of the protagonist's
perplexity, panic, regret, hope, and dissonant banality, and to arouse empathy for
the character. The circumstance of location is most often used to refer to the
location of events among the four circumstances of manner, time, accompaniment,
and location. This research follows Halliday (1985, 1994, 2004, 2014) and Eggins
(2004) in classifying processes, participants and circumstances, which are
employed to illustrate the characterization of the protagonist as a victim of
brutality. The transitivity experiences of this character reveal and criticize the way
influential political and religious personalities victimize journalists and writers.

Keywords: Transitivity, SLA, Ideation, narrative, process, participants, circumstance

Introduction

Linguistic choices play an important role to determine the purpose and meanings of specific
discourses. Likewise, fiction writers use language in a specific style in their texts to convey
particular meanings and a specific worldview. The current study attempts to investigate how the
linguistic choices in Hamid’s A Beheading shape experiential meanings. Following Halliday
(1994, 2014) and Eggins (2004), the current work has shown how thematic meanings are
encoded in events, characters and actions using the transitivity system.
According to Fludernik (2009), a story is a depiction of a prospective universe in
language or image form, in the heart of which can be found one or more anthropomorphic
protagonists who are existentially fixed in space and time and who primarily engage in goal-
directed action and plot structure. He continues by saying that a story offers an epistemic

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Ifra Anam, Dr. Shahid Abbas & Hafiz Ahmad Bilal

framework that aids in producing explanatory patterns for occurrences and in making sense of
their diversity and plurality, and the reader creates the underlying reality in their minds (pp.2-7).

Systemic Functional Grammar and Transitivity

Language is thought of as a "system of meanings" that forms human experience, labels
objects, restricts them into categories, and develops these categories into taxonomies. Michael
Halliday, a linguist, developed Systemic Functional Grammar (SFG) in the 20th century
(Halliday, 2014, p.30). Language, according to him, is a sophisticated semiotic system with
multiple levels or strata, including lexicogrammar, semantic, and phonological strata (Halliday,
2014: 24-26). These systems are each positioned inside their respective meta-functional
frameworks. The interpersonal metafunction, is concerned with the expression and attitudes
toward whoever we address, as well as what we are talking about; the ideational metafunction, is
concerned with the representation of human experience; and finally, the pragmatic metafunction,
is concerned with the expression and attitudes toward what we are talking about. According to
Halliday (2014), these three metafunctions sometimes referred to as modalities of meaning, are
distinct and are characteristic of all languages (pp.29-30). The author separates two parts of the
ideational metafunction: the experiencing and the logical. It is possible for us to construct our
understanding of the world, thanks to the ideational metafunction. The present research is limited
to the exploration of this metafunction through transitivity analysis.

The transitivity system, according to Halliday (2004), reduces the world of experience
into a distinct set of Process Types (p.170). He defined it as a set of potentials that the speaker
uses to encode his understanding of how the outside world functions (Halliday, 1974, p.134). As
a result, the transitivity system serves to document how an action is carried out as well as how
the speaker or reader encodes in language their mental representations of the environment and
accounts for their experience of it. The Whorfian theory, which argues that language is the
primary means by which reality is created, is supported by this idea. Clauses describe diverse
processes, events, and actions. To sum up, it is thought that transitivity is a substantial and potent
semantic phenomenon that has an impact on the verb as well as its participants and environment
(Halliday, 1985).

Processes, Participants and Circumstances

The clause is the main grammatical structure in systemic functional grammar in
Downing's opinion (2006). In actuality, it is the unit that enables us to manageably group
together a variety of representational patterns or schemas to reflect the depth of our experience,
both semantically and syntactically. She continues that we are interested in events and acts, and
especially in the human individuals who are involved in them and the traits ascribed to them as
language users. In other words, we're interested in learning what and how these participants act,
what they say and perceive under specific circumstances (p.123). According to Halliday (1985),
this is the transitivity system which outlines various processes that are understood in the
language as well as the structures through which they are articulated. (p.101). He suggests
following components of transitivity process:
● Process, technically defined as the happening or doing of any action such as, run, cook,
hit, catch or any state of being represented by auxiliaries.
● The participants are the individuals or the entities and their attributes involved in the
process. They represent who or what is doing what to whom or what.

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Transitivity Analysis of Hamid’s Short Narrative A Beheading
● The circumstance provides information about the time, place, manner and cause of the
process with the help of adverbials.

The semantic categories "participant," "process," and "circumstance" illustrate how verbal
constructions are employed to express events in the real world (Halliday, 1985: 102).
Participants are actively involved in the process since every experiential form of clause involves
at least one participant, and some varieties even have three. It is important to keep in mind that
transitivity is a quality of how language users conceptualise events and represent those
conceptualizations verbally rather than being a characteristic of the event itself. To put it another
way, a language user might choose to linguistically encode the same event as transitive—that is,
by including both an Agent and an Affected, or as intransitive, that is, by including only one
participant who functions as either the Agent or the Affected (Martinez, 2002, p.614). This
research will follow Halliday (1985,1994 2004, 2014) and Eggins (2004) in classifying
processes, who distinguish three primary transitivity processes—Material processes, Mental
processes, and Relational processes—as well as three additional secondary processes—Verbal
processes, Behavioral processes, and Relational processes. These share characteristics with all
three of the main processes. According to Simpson, the distinction between these processes is
temporary and not absolute (2004).

Material Process
Generally, the processes that are described by the material clauses involve some
observable, tangible activity. They are verbs of action, of doing, or of happening. This implies
that someone performs something or takes an action(Eggins, 2004). An actor, a goal, a range,
and a beneficiary are the four participants of a material clause (Eggins, 2004; Martin et al., 1997)

Mental Process
In the mental process, sensing is constructed by the mind. It consists of conscious
functions such as perception, thought, and affection (Martin et al, 1997). It shows that something
occurs in the participant's (senser's) mind and encodes the meanings of feeling and thought
(Eggins, 2004). Participants include Senser and Phenomena.

Relational Process
Being or having in the realm of abstract relations is construed through relational
processes. The procedure in this instance takes the shape of a relation between two participating
entities or between one participating entity and an attribute. The classical concept of "copula
constructions'' is generalised in Halliday's category of relational clauses (Martin et al., 2000).
According to Eggins (2004), it "covers the various ways that being can be articulated in English
sentences." It doesn't require anyone or anything to act on someone else. It is focused on the
connection between two entities or ideas (Babaii & Ansary, 2005). Attributive clauses with
Carrier + Attribute and identifying clauses with Token and Value are the two sub-types of the
relational process.

Behavioral Process
The term behavioural process refers to the construction of mental, linguistic, and
physiological (human) conduct (Thompson, 1996). This process is referred to by Halliday (1985)
as a "half-way home" between mental and physical processes. It doesn't involve any action or

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Ifra Anam, Dr. Shahid Abbas & Hafiz Ahmad Bilal

call for any reaction. It is expressed by verbs like watch, dream, think, listen, laugh, sneeze, lie
etc, among others. It only has one (obligatory) behaver, who is usually a conscious creature.

Verbal Process
The verbal process includes saying and all of its synonyms, such as asking, questioning,
commanding, offering, asserting, explaining, demanding, threatening, suggesting, etc. The
participant roles associated with verbal processes include the sayer (the speaker), target (the
object being addressed by the act of saying), receiver (the addressee), and verbiage (statement,
question, report, answer, and story), which is a nominalized expression of the verbal pr ocess
(Eggins, 2004; Halliday, 1994, Martin et al., 1997).

Existential Process
By assuming that "there was/is something," the existential process demonstrates that
something occurs or exists. There is no literal meaning to the term "there" when it refers to a
place.

Mohsin Hamid’s A Beheading

Mohsin Hamid's agonising short story A Beheading (2010) is an example of how clear-
cut and vivid he is when exposing contemporary examples of governmental cruelty. It is almost
completely the character's thoughts, with a few lines whispered to his captors. Other than what
the reader might deduce from the basic information, no background is given for the story,
possibly a writer or journalist who was kidnapped from his home in the middle of the night.
Bound, put into a car, and placed in front of a camera. The outcome is obvious from the story's
title. The reader is presented with pace, a foreboding mood, a shared bewilderment, darkness,
emotion, and a rawness; there isn't any background information or explanation provided.

Literature Review
Halliday was a pioneer in transitivity analysis (1971). He looked at how William
Golding's The Inheritors used transitivity syntactic patterns to build the book's theme, in this
case, the interaction between a new tribe that the Neanderthals had never encountered. Another
well-known example comes from Kies (1992), who also explored passivity in George Orwell's
1984. To put it another way, transitivity analysis has long been used to understand how writers
and speakers use language, meticulously examining the way that sentences reflect semantic
processes, who participates in them, and the circumstances in which they occur. As a result,
transitivity analysis is not a brand-new tool in stylistics study. By using functional analysis,
particularly transitivity analysis, researchers have attempted to study the ways in which language
patterns can produce particular meanings and ideologies that are not always obvious to readers
(Mehmod et al., 2014, p. 79). Burton (1982), Kennedy (1982), Simpson (1993), Montgomery
(1995), Silva (1998), Ji & Shen (2004, 2005), Iwamoto (2008), Rodrigues (2008), Mwinlaaru
(2012), and numerous other linguists have also employed the SFL framework to analyse literary
discourse. The transitivity model has been demonstrated to be a practical technique for exploring
the experience's meaning and analysing the characters in creative writing. These research
endeavours provided us with the framework for examining the linguistic choices made in the
selected data. In Pakistan, Qasim et al. (2018) have analysed the characters from The Reluctant
Fundamentalist by Mohsin Hamid from the perspective of transitivity. The current study adds to
this body of knowledge and sheds light on how to comprehend transitivity patterns in literary

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Transitivity Analysis of Hamid’s Short Narrative A Beheading
texts, particularly those written from the first-person narrative point of view. This study
demonstrates how a specific choice of transitivity structures has aided in the interpretation of the
text's major ideas.

Research Objective
This study seeks to trace the type of transitivity patterns of Processes, Participants, and
Circumstances which have been employed to construct and represent the experience of reality
around the protagonist in the selected text.

Methodology
The entire text of the short story is marked with statement numbers and this research
follows Halliday (1985, 1994, 2004, 2014) and Eggins (2004) in classifying processes,
participants and circumstances, which are employed in the text. This study analyses all clauses to
sort out all types of processes, participants and circumstantial elements to reveal the scheme of
thought which the writer utilises to unveil the characters and their thoughts.

Data Findings
Overall 204 instances of process use have been found in the total of 118 statements.
Table 2 presents the frequency of each process type. Total 82 instances of circumstance have
been found in the text. Table 3 presents the frequency of each type of circumstance.

Table 1. The Process types and Participant Configurations

S1. I pt: Senser hear pr: Mental the window shatter Pt: act Phenomenon
S2. There ‘s(is) pr: Existential no air conditioner on pt: Existent to muffle pr: Material the
sound pt: Goal
S3. I pt: Actor get pr:Material out of bed cir:Location.
S4. I pt: Senser wish pr:Mental I pt: Carrier wasn’t pr: Relational Attributive my age pt:
Attribute
S5. I pt: Senser wish pr:Mental I pt:Carrier was pr:Relational Attributive as old as my
parents pt:Attribute.Or as young as my son pt:Attribute
S6. I pt: Senser wish pr: Mental it pt:Carrier didn’t have to be pr:Relational Attributive me
pt:Sayer telling pr:Verbal my wife pt:Reciever to stay pr:Material where cir: Location she
pt:Carrier is pr:Relational Circumstantial, saying pr:Verbal everything pt:Verbiage will be
pr:Relational Attributive fine pt:Attribute in a voice she doesn’t believe cir:Manner and I
Senser don’t believe pr:Mental either.
S7.We both pt: Senser hear pr: Mental the shouting pt: Fact Phenomenon downstairs cir:
Location. ‘Put on some clothes, pt: Verbiage ’I pt:Sayer ’m saying pr: Verbal to her pt:
Receiver. ‘It’ll be better if you’re wearing clothes.’ Pt: Verbiage
S8.The electricity pt:Goal’sgone pr:Material so I pt: Actor use pr:Material my phone pt:Goal to
light the way cir: Reason.
S9.Already there’s pr: Existential the sound of men running up the wooden stairs pt: Existent.
S.10I pt: Actor shut pr: Material the bedroom door pt:Goal and lock pr: Material it pt: Goal
behind me cir: Location.
S11.Shadows pt: Actor are jumping pr:Material and stretching pr:Material from multiple
torches cir: Location.

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Ifra Anam, Dr. Shahid Abbas & Hafiz Ahmad Bilal

S12. I pt: Actor raise pr:Material both my hands pt: Goal. ‘I’m here,’ pt: Verbiage I pt:Sayer
say pr:Verbal to them pt: Reciever.
S13. I pt: Senser want pr: Mental to say pr: Verbal it pt:Verbiage loudly cir: Manner.
Projection
S14. I pt:Sayer sound pr: Verbal like a whispering child cir: Manner. ‘Please. Everything is all
right.’ Verbiage
S15.I pt:Carrier ’m pr:Relational Attributive on the floor cir: Location.
S16.Someone pt: Actor has hit pr: Material me pt: Goal.
S17. I pt:Senser don’t know pr: Mental Cognitive if it pt:Carrier was pr:Relational Attributive
with a hand or a club cir: Accompaniment.
S18. My mouth pt:Carrier is pr: Relational Attributive full of liquid pt:Attribute. I pt:Actor
can’t get pr:Material any words pt:Goal out cir: Location.
S19. I’ pt: Behaver (a)m gagging pr: Behavioural and I pt: Agent have to let Causativemy jaw
Goal hang open pr: Material so I pt:Behaver can breathe pr: Behavioural.
S20. Behind my back cir: Location my wrists pt:Goal are being taped Material together .
S21. It pt: Phenomenon feels pr:Mental like electrical tape pt:Phenomenon, the kind of tape
pt:Range you Actor wrap pr:Material arounda tennisball cir:Location for street cricket cir:
Reason when cir: Time you pt: Carrier ’re pr: Relational Attributive a kid pt:Attribute
S22. I’ pt: Behaver am lying pr: Behavioural on my facecir location and there’s pr:Existential a
grinding pain pt:Existent from that cir:Reason so I Actor make pr:Material some noise Goal
before cir: Time I Senser black out Mental.
S23. I pt:Carrier ’m pr:Relational Attributive between two men circ: Location
S24. They pt: Actor are holding pr:Material me pt:Goal under my armpits cir: Location and
dragging pr:Material me pt:Goal out the front door cir:Location.
S25. I pt:Senser don’t know pr:Mental how much time has passed pt:Phenomenon.
S26. It’ is Relational Attributive still night cir:Time
S27. The electricity pt:Actor has come pr:Material back cir:Location so the gatelights
pt:Carrier are pr:Relatiobnal on pt:attribute.
S28. The gatekeeper pt:Carrier is pr:Relational Attributive dead identity pt:attribute. He
carrier’s pr:Relational Attributive an old man pt:Attribute and he pt:Behaver’s lying pr:
Behavioural foldedin cir: Manner on himself cir: Location.
S29. His face Carrier is Relational Attributive so thin attribute.
S30. He pt:Senser looks pr:Mental like cir: Manner we pt:Actor ’ve been starving pr:Material
him pt:Goal
S31. I pt:Senser (a)’m wondering pr:Mental how cir: Manner they pt: Actor killed pr:Material
him pt:Goal. I Senser ’m looking pr:Mental at him cr:Location, looking pr:Mental for blood
pt:Phenomenon.
S32. But I pt: Carrier don’t have pr:Relational Possessive enough time pt:Attribute.
S33. I pt: Senser think pr:Mental there are pr: Existential four of them pt:Existent
S34. They pt:Carrier have pr: Relational Possessive a copper-colored ’81 Corolla
pt:Attribute.
S35. We pt:Carrier used to have pr:Relational Possessive a car like pt:Attribute that when I
pt:Carrier was pr:Relational Attributive growingup pt: Attribute.
S36. This one pt:Carrier is pr: Relational Attributive in bad shape pt:Attribute.
S37. They pt:Actor open pr:Material the trunk pt:Goal and dump pr:Material me pt:goal

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Transitivity Analysis of Hamid’s Short Narrative A Beheading
insIde cir:Location.
S38. I pt:Senser can’tsee pr:Mental anything pt:Phenomeonon. My face pt:Carrier is
pr:Relational Atrributive partly pt:Manner on a rough carpet cir:Location.
S39. The other part pt:Carrier is pr:Relational Attributive on the spare tyre cir:Location.
S40. Its rubber pt: Actor sticks pr:Material to me pt:Goal.
S41. Or maybe I’pt:Actor msticking pr:Material to it pt: Goal.
S42. The shocks pt:Goal areshot pr:Material, and every bump pt:Actor slams pr:Material
through the car cir:Location
S43. I pt:Senser think pr:Mental of being at the dentist pt:Act Phenomenon, when it pt:Carrier
’salreadyhurting pr:Relational Attributive and you pt:Senser know pr:Mental it ’sgoing to
hurt pt:Phenomenon more cir:Extent and you pt:Senser just waitand try to think pr:Mental of
mind tricks to make it hurt less pt:Phenomenon
S44. I pt: Senser feel pr:Mental feverish pt:Phenomenon , a high, malarial fever that makes me
shiver and drift in and out of sleep Projection.
S45. I pt:Senser hope pr:Mental they pt:Actor didn’t kill pr:Material my son pt:Goal andmy
wife pt:Goal andmy parents pt:Goal. I pt:Senser hope pr:Mental they pt:Actordidn’t rape pr:
Material my wife pt:Goal. I pt:Senser hope pr:Mental whatever they pt:Actor do pr:Material to
me pt: Goal they pt: Actor don’t use pr:Material acid pt:Scope on me pt:Goal.
S46. I pt:Senser don’t want pr:Mental to die pt:Phenomenon but I pt:Senser don’t mind
pr:Mental dying pt:Phenomenon . I pt:Senser just don’t want pr:Mental to be tortured
Phenomenon.
S47. I pt:Senser don’t want pr:Mental anyone pt: Actor to crush pr:Material my balls pt:Goal
with a pair of pliers circ: Accompaniment and put pr:Material his cigarette pt:Goal out in my
eye cir:Location.
S48. I pt:Senser don’t want pr:Mental this car pt:Phenomenon ride pr:Material ever to end
cir:Location.
S49. I’ pt:Senser m getting used to pr:Mental it pt:Pheomenon now cir:Time.
S50. They pt:Actor take pr:Material me pt:Goal out in the sunlight cir:Location.
S51. They pt:Carrier ’re pr: Relational Attributive big men pt:Attribute.Biggerthanme
pt:Attribute.
S52. They pt:Actor take pr:Material me pt:Goal into a house with paint peeling off the walls
cir:Location and put pr:Material me pt:Goal in a bathroom with no windows cir:Loaction , just
a skylight .
S53. I pt:Behaver’ve Behavioural already cir:Extent pissed pr:Behavioural myself and my legs
pt: Carrier itch pr: Relational Attributive from dried urine cir: Reason.
S54. I pt:Sayer don’t make pr:Verbal a sound pt:Verbiage. I pt:Behaver sit pr:Behavioural
there circ: location and prepare pr:Mental to cooperate pt:Phenomeon.
S55. I pt:Senser wish pr: Mental I pt:Senser could remember pr: Mental how to say pr:Verbal
my prayers pt:Verbiage
S56. I pt:Sayer ’d ask pr:Verbal them pt:Reciever to let me pray pt:Verbiage .
S57. Show pr: Material them pt: Goal we’re the same pt: Range.
S58.But I pt: Senser can’t risk pr: Mental it pt:Phenomenon.
S59. I pt:Actor ’ll pr:Material make a mistake pt:Range and if they pt:Senser see pr:Mental
that pt:Phenomenon , things pt:Carrier will be pr: Relational Attributive even cir:Extent worse
pt:Attribute for me .

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Ifra Anam, Dr. Shahid Abbas & Hafiz Ahmad Bilal

S60. Maybe I pt:Sayer can just mumble pr:Verbal to myself pt:Reciever and they pt:Senser ’ll
thiNk pr:Mental I’ pt:Carrier m pr:Realtional Atrributive religious pt:Attribute
S61. They pt:Actor come pr:Material back cir: Location when cir:Time it pt:Carrier ’s
pr:Relational dark pt:Attribute
S62. They pt:Sayer arespeaking pr:Verbal a languageIdon’t understand pt:Verbiage
S63. I pt:Senser don’tthink pr:Mental it’s Arabic or Pashto pt: Phenomenon.
S64. What pt:Value is pr:Relational Identifying it pt:Token?
S65. Is pr:Relational Identifying it pt:Token fucking Chechen pt:Value?
S66. What pt: Value is pr: Relational Identifying that fucking language? Pt: Token
S67. Who the fuck pt: Value are pr: Relational Attriburive these people pt: Carrier?
S68. That pt:Carrier ’s pr:Realtional Atrributive good pt:Attribute.
S69. The more pathetic cir:Extent I pt:Senser look pr:Mental, the better cir:Extent.
S70. ‘Sirs,’ pt:Verbiage I pt:Sayer say pr:Verbal in the mostgrovellingUrduIcan manage
cir:Manner. ‘What have I done? I beg your forgiveness.’ pt:Verbiage
S71. My mouth pt:Actor doesn’twork pr:Material properly cir:Manner so I pt:Sayer have to
speak pr:Verbal slowly cir:Manner
S72. Even then cir: Extent I pt:Carrier sound pr: Relational Attributive likeI’m drunk
pt:Attribute.
S73. Or like someone pt:Actor has cut off pr:Material half my tongue cir:Extent.
S74. They pt:Senser ignore pr:Mental me pt:Phenomenon.
S75. One pt:Actor is setting up pr:Material a video camera Goal on a tripod Location.
S76. The other pt:Actor is plugging pr:Material a light pt:Goal into a portable UPSunitthe size
of a car battery cir:Location
S77. I pt:Senser know pr:Mental this pt:Phenomenon fact.
S78. I pt:Senser don’t want pr:Mental this pt:Phenomenon fact.
S79. I pt:Senser don’t want pr:Mental to be that goat pt:Phenomenon fact.
S80. The one we bought for Big Eid. Phenomenon fact.
S81. I pt:Actor usedto feed pr:Material it pt:Goal after school cir:Time
S21. We pt:Carrier kept pr:Relational Possessive it pt:Atrribute for a week cir:Extent
S83. I pt:Actor wouldbreak pr:Material shoots pt:Goal off the hedge, green shootsthatstained
my hands pt: Range, and feed pr:Material them pt:Goal to that goat pt:Range
S84. It pt:Carrier was pr:Relational Atrributive a nice goat pt:Attribute, but with dead eyes cir:
Accompaniment
S85. I pt:Senser didn’t like pr:Mental its eyes pt:Phenomenon.
S86. I pt:Senser liked pr:Mental the way it chewed sideways pt:Fact phenomeon
S87. It pt:Carrier was pr: Relational Attributive like a pet pt:Attribute .
S88. I pt:Actor never cir:Time petted pr:Material it pt:Goal, but it pt:Carrier was pr:Relational
Attributive like a pet.pt:Atrribute
S89. It pt:Carrier had pr:Relational Attributive small feet pt:Attribute
S90. It pt:Behaver could stand pr:Behavioural on a brick cir:Location to reach the leaves
cir:Reason
S91. My parents Agent let Causative me pt:Senser watch pr:Mental a man pt: Actor come pr:
Material and wrestle pr:Material it pt:Goal to the ground cir:Location and say pr:Verbal a
prayer pt:Verbiage and sacrifice pr:Material it pt:Goal to God Contigency.
S92. ‘Look, pr:Mental don’t do pr:Material this pt:Goal.’ I’ pt:Sayer m speaking pr:Verbal

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Transitivity Analysis of Hamid’s Short Narrative A Beheading
English pt:Verbiage now cir:Time , slurring, making no sense Projection
S93. The words pt:Verbiage are just dribbling pr: Verbal outof my mouth cir:Location
S94. I pt:Actor can’t stop pr:Material them pt:Goal.
S95. They pt:Carrier are pr: Relational Attributive liketears pt:Attribute
S96. ‘I Actor ’ve always censored pr: Material myself pt: Goal
S97. I Sayer’ve never cir:Time written verbal about religion. Matter
S98. I pt:Carrier ’vealways cir:Extent tried pr: Relational Attributive to be respectful
pt:Attribute
S99. If I pt:Actor havemade pr:Material a mistake Range just tell pr:Verbal me pt:Reciever
S100. Tell pr:Verbal me pt:Receiver what to write pt:Verbiage
S101. I pt:Sayer ’ll pr:Verbal never cir:Extent write pr:Verbal again cir:Extent
S102. I Sayer’ll never cir: Time write pr: Verbal again cir: Extent if you Senser don’t want pr:
Mental me to pt: Phenomenon.
S103. It pt:Pheomenon doesn’t matter pr: Mental to me pt: Senser.
S104. It pt:Carrier is not pr:Relational Attributive important pt: Attribute.
S105. We pt:Carrier are pr: Relational Attributive the same pt: Attribute. All of us pt: Carrier. I
pt:Sayer swear pr:Verbal it pt:Pheomenon.’
S106. They pt:Actor tape pr:Material my mouth pt:Goal shut pr:Manner and pin pr:Material
me pt:Goal flat on my stomach cir:Manner
S107. One of them pt:Actor gets pr:Material behind me cir:Location and pr:Pulls Material my
head pt:Goal up by the hair cir:Location.
S108. It pt: Carrier feels pr: Relational Attributive sexual pt: Attribute the way he does it cir:
Manner
S109. I pt:Sensor wonder pr:Mental if my wife pt: Carrier is pr:Relational Attributive still
cir:Time alive pt:Attribute and if she pt:Actor ’s going to sleep pr: Material with another man
cir: Accompaniment after cir:Time I pt:Actor ’m gone pr: Material.
S110. How many cir:Extent men pt:Goal is she pt:Actor going to sleep pr: Material with cir:
Accompaniment?
S111. I pt:Senser hope pr:Mental she pt:Actor doesn’t pr: Material. I pt: Senser hope pr:
Mental she pt: Carrier ’s pr: Relational Attributive still cir: Time alive pt:Attribute.
S112. I pt: Senser can see pr:Mental the long knife pt:Phenomenon in his hand cir:Location
S113. He pt:Sayer ’s speaking pr:Verbal into the camera cir:Location
S114. I pt:Senser don’twantto watch pr:Mental . I pt:Behaver shut pr:Behavioural my eyes
pt:Behaviour.
S115. I pt:Senser want pr:Mental to do something pr:Material to make my heart explode Range
so I pt: Actor can be gone pr:Material now cir:Time.
S116. I pt:Senser don’t want pr:Mental to stay pt:Phenomenon.
S117. Then cir: Time I pt: Senser hear pr:Mental it pt:Phenomenon.
S18. I pt:Senser hear pr:Mental the sound of my blood rushing out pt:Phenomenon and I
pt:Behaver open pr:Behavioural my eyes pt:Behavior to see pr:Mental it pt: Phenomenon on
the floor cir:Location like ink cir: Manner and I pt:Senser watch pr:Mental as I pt:Senser end
pr:Mental before cir:Time I pt:Carrier am pr:Relational Attributive empty pt:Atrribute

Table 2. Frequency of Process types

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Ifra Anam, Dr. Shahid Abbas & Hafiz Ahmad Bilal

Process Type Statement No. Frequency

Material S2, S6, S3, S8, S10, S11, S12, S16, S18, S19, S20, S21, S22, 65
S24, S27, S30, S31, S37, S40, S41, S42,S45, S47, S48, S50,
S52, S57, S59, S61, S71, S73, S74, S75, S76, S81, S83, S88,
S91 ,S92, S94, S96, S99, S106, S107, S109, S110, S111, S115

Mental S1. S4, SS, S6, S7, S13, S17, S21, S25, S30, S31, S33, S38, 60
S43, S44, S45, S46, S47, S48, S49, S55, S58, S63, S77, S78,
S79, S85, S86, S92, S103, S109, S111, S112, S114, S116, S117,
S118
Relational S4, S5,6, 1S5, S17, S18, S21, S23, S26, S28, S29, S32, S34, 45
S35, S36, S38, S39, S43, S51, S53, S57, S59, S61, S64, S65,
S66, S67, S72, S21, S81, S84 , S87, S88, S89, S95, S98, S104,
S105, S108, S109, S111, S118
Verbal S6, S7, S12, S13, S14, S54, S55, S56, S60, S62, S70, S71, 24
S91,S92, S93, S97, S99, S100, S101, S105, S113
Existential S2, S9, S22, S33 04
Behavioural S19, S 22, S 28, S53, S54, S90, S114, S118 13

Table 3. Frequency of Circumstance

Circumstance Type Frequency
Location 36
Time 16
Manner 14
Extent 13
Accompaniment 05
Reason 05
Matter 01

Transitivity Analysis and Discussion

Table 1 displays the ranking and embedded clauses for each sentence, along with the
process type and participant choices for each clause. The frequency of material processes is
highly dominant in the text, with a frequency of 65, as shown in Table 2, which lists the total
number of each process type in the text. This suggests that the narrative is primarily concerned
with actions, events, and the people who take part in them. With a frequency of 60, the number
of mental processes likewise dominates the other process type. Although the text focuses
primarily on concrete, physical activities, it frequently places the main character in the position
of goal, which implies that the main character is a person who is impacted by the actions of
others. The main character primarily functions as the sensor in the text's perception of events,
according to the mental process. Table 2 additionally demonstrates that the text also uses a
sizable share of behavioural processes. The inclusion of existentials, with just 04 instances,
reveals that the activities are occasionally framed as taking place within surroundings that are

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Transitivity Analysis of Hamid’s Short Narrative A Beheading
declared merely as existing. In contrast to the higher percentage of mental processes, which hints
that conscious cognition, rather than bodily behaviour, is primarily the focus of the text, these
processes create the character as a physiologically affected participant. There are 44 occurrences
of relational processes in the text as well, but attributes predominate in this group. This suggests
that the text uses a lot of description. Each type of circumstantial factor in the texts is represented
numerically in Table 3. Since they add specificity to the information provided, circumstances
also serve to enhance the experiential richness of the text. Therefore, the frequency of
circumstantial detail increases the text's experience density and works in conjunction with other
techniques to create a highly composed style. While location is the most common condition, time
is the second most common, followed by method and then extent as the most common categories
observed in the text. There are fewer instances of accompanying circumstance, cause, and
matter. Therefore, the text focuses on locating events in time and space, documenting where,
when, and for how long they occurred as well as what led to those circumstances.

Conclusion
According to the data shown in Table 2, there are 204 processes utilised in the text of A
Beheading, with the material clause processes predominating as the data chosen are narrative
texts. A number of actors participate in these processes. Goal-directed material processes number
47. The process of creating mental clauses is connected to the following frequency. It reveals the
emotions and inner thoughts of Pakistani journalists who are subjected to severe and turbulent
circumstances. The next main frequency of process is relational, where attributive processes are
more numerical than possessive or identifying. The relative underrepresentation of relational
dynamics, however significant, demonstrates Hamid's goal to describe the characters'
circumstances. The verbal process is concerned with the phenomenon in which the speakers,
such as the protagonist, comment on the happenings, particularly the problem of media
victimisation. The existential processes introduce some significant occasions and institutions in
the form of declarations. The concluding clause, which uses a variety of transitivity processes,
demonstrates the text's complexity and intricate nature, highlighting both the distinctiveness and
variety of Pakistani English fiction and the author's overarching plan for revealing the characters'
motivations.

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