A study of the written language that was produced within one junior high school social studies classroom over a 38-minute period was based on the assumptions that (1) written language is not only affected by the context of the communicative event in which it is involved, but is also involved in the construction of the communicative event; (2) the learning of the written language of the classroom can be conceptualized as consisting of three components--the development of written language communicative competence, learning the forms of classroom written language behavior, and learning about the written language of the classroom; and (3) the learning of language does not occur separately from the learning of thought. A microanalytic description of three different written language events from the social studies classroom revealed an emphasis on procedural aspects for completing the instructional task. Students were observed to have learned the procedures of the patterns but not how the patterns were used to communicate across space and time. It appeared that reading or written language was, in effect, a set of procedures one enacts. The study suggests that students learn a "cultural stance" toward the written language (and communication in general) of their culture. (HOD)