In ' Idioms and Idiomaticity' Dr. Fernando has kept technicalities to a minimum, assuming that the reader is familiar with basic grammatical terms and basic linguistic concepts. There have been a few reference books that a teacher might turn to in order to explore the functions of idioms in the context of communication. This new publication by Fernando uses a Hallidayan functional grammatical framework, whilst keeping to aminimum of those grammatical terms essential to the connective functions inherent in idiomaticity. A broad knowledge of idioms particularly in current use would seem to be a standard requirement of such a teacher. Whilst primary school teachers may prefer to focus on semantic aspects of idioms as students encounter them in reading or conversation, the secondary teacher of English literature and facilitator of essay writing will find this a useful text.
Idioms offer familiar, succinct ways of getting across complex information packages .
Mainstream teachers of English, secondary ESL teachers and possibly some teachers in Intensive English Centres with advanced students of English would find much to assist them in their analysis of English literature and newspaper journal articles, especially in the area of imaginary. Part of this difficulty lies in the fact that we are training significant numbers of teachers for whom English is not their first language, as well as educating students who are the first in their families to aspire to be university graduates. The implication here is that there is neither evidence in such students' background of a broad literary knowledge nor, frequently, of educated conversation in English. This is not a cause for despair but points to a need t ensure that teacher educators are skilled in linguistic as well as literary analysis. Fernando reminds us that grasping only the stable basic meaning of words, whether idioms or non-idioms, is not enough.