With surface and performance, this collected volume places two concepts centre-stage which could be regarded as key terms for the object of linguistics. At the same time, they delineate the field which the papers in the volume sound out both theoretically and in empirical studies.
An introductory section containing methodological explorations of surface and performance is followed by three thematically distinct sections. The first main section contains papers examining surface and performance from the aspect of order. A second block is concerned with understanding as a quality of communication essential to the concept of language, and a third section focuses on the concepts of mediality and medium. The volume presents the proceedings of a conference held on Monte Verità (Switzerland), which followed on epistemologically from an earlier conference and the resultant collected volume (Linke/Ortner/Portmann: Sprache und mehr. Ansichten einer Linguistik der sprachlichen Praxis. Tübingen 2003). The present volume progresses the discussion of how the object of linguistics is understood and demonstrates the innovative potential of a linguistics oriented on the materiality of linguistic surface structures and which explicitly sees its object as the dynamics and communicative added value of linguistic performance.