This book is a transformational generative discussion of American English designed for use at the undergraduate as well as the graduate level. Chapter 1 deals with the definition of language and questions of dialect and standard language. Chapter 2, "The Nature of Linguistic Data," considers the speaker's knowledge of his language and the approaches which the linguist can use in describing this knowledge. Chapter 3, "Towards A Syntactic Description of English," discusses the characteristics requisite to an adequate theory of language and presents a rudimentary theory which is then used to represent some English sentences. Chapter 4 discusses "The Nature of Semantics," and Chapter 5, "Some Transformations in English," deals with the relationship between deep and surface structure, showing how sentences with like meaning can have different surface manifestations and vice versa. Chapter 6 then presents a discussion of "English Sentence Types," while Chapter 7, "Morphology," deals "with the way in which the categories and feature specifications underlying the sentences of a natural language are realized as elements which ultimately are to be spoken or written." Finally, Chapter 8 raises the question "Why Deep and Surface Structure?" A bibliography, a glossary, and a set of probelms corresponding to each chapter complete the book. (FWB)