When Pieter Verburg (1905-1989) published Taal en Functionaliteit in 1952, the work was received with admiration by linguistic scholars, though the number of those who could read the Dutch text for themselves remained limited. The title alludes to the theories of linguistic function set out in 1936 by Karl Bu hler, but Verburg regards the three functions of discourse - focussing respectively on the speaker, the person addressed and the matter discussed - as no more than sub-functions of the human function of speech. His central concern is to explore the relationships between thought and