As Verschueren writes in his preface, this book is an attempt to meet a double challenge: (a) to present a coherent theory of pragmatics, describing research to date and setting parameters for future research; and (b) to serve as a textbook that is accessible to all students with a basic linguistics background. This is no easy task, but Verschueren has managed to write a book that is accessible to the nonspecialist student and also provides a valuable synthesis of the pragmatic perspective for language specialists in a variety of disciplines. Most chapters have detailed summaries and are followed by suggestions for future research and additional reading.