Concerned with language as a form of social experience, this book considers language, English in particular, as an element in the pattern of daily life, as a form of contract between individuals and society, as the object and instrument of social judgments, as a historical testament to the continuity of human culture, and as the medium of literary art. Chapters include discussions of how language and the social environment are governed by conventions of usage; factors governing communication between persons; the game-resembling quality of interlocutory language; how an individual must learn in his language-behavior to make concord between self-assertion and what the community demands of him; how language provokes the classifying judgments and prejudices that are called forth by any other form of social behavior but with peculiar immediacy and force, language growth and language change; and literary language--the ways in which written language can be used for utilitarian ends or for pleasure. The book concludes with a chapter on our experience of language. Appendixes provide a list of phonetic symbols and terminology, specimens of English (1014-1970), and a select bibliography. (HOD)