Style is an important component of communication: it is the how in communicating the what, demonstrating the ontological unity of the two in language variability that provides the ground for the functioning of what-how and what-for. This volume approaches style within the framework of cognitive linguistics, a usage-based functional model, which interprets language as being conceptual, whereas conceptual knowledge is interpreted as experiential. Consequently, style is considered not as a set of predetermined ornaments on texts, but as a system of context-sensitive probability schemes of formation contributing to the meaning of discourse. Style is the outcome of linguistic potential, constrained by socio-cultural factors, functioning in the on-line and consolidated stylistic structure of discourse.

Text is a linguistic unit of communication in which linguistically expressed conceptual units are connected in different conceptual structures. The conceptual construal of things, events and relations is structured on the basis of a variety of cognitive and communicational options. These choices form discourse schemas, partly in a culturespecific way. There is a dynamic relationship between schema and instantiation. The volume approaches these questions from a functional perspective, where the processual nature of discourse is as important as its structural character. The volume has two parts: the first one presents theoretical papers, the second deals with certain discourse types, and some linguistic features that characterize specific discourse types.