An understanding of the structure and function of discourse in social communication and in its internal representation to the individuals is sought in this multidisciplinary collection of papers. The approaches are divided into theoretical orientations and empirical orientations. The theoretical papers deal with: (1) comprehension in conversation, (2) creativity in verbalization and its implication for the nature of stored knowledge, (3) semantic processing units in understanding text, (4) the discovery of a functional theory of discourse, and (5) a critical review of theories of speech production. Topics covered in the empirical papers that have a sociolinguistic and psychosocial perspective include: style variables in referential learning, the effects of setting and dialect on young children's use of language, and prose processing. Papers emphasizing psycholinguistic concerns focus on: (1) the encoding of articles and quantifiers in textual comprehension, (2) the psychology of conversation, and (3) children's illocutionary acts. Topics with an applied basis include: (1) they ways in which speakers use noun phrases to instruct their listeners; (2) verbal teaching patterns; and (3) what is remembered from prose. Each article includes a specialized bibliography for further reference. (PMJ)