ABSTRACT
Code determines the verbal repertoire or the range of 'styles' an individual can possess, since it determines the range of meanings which that person can express through linguistic means. Code therefore determines which options will be selected as appropriate to the given situation. Code enters the picture in determining how situation is interpreted, how meaning is organized. Code is therefore the product of individual experience. At the same time code directs further experience in that it determines the interpretation of meaning in speech events. The concept of code has therefore two facets—the semiotic and the linguistic. Both the speech models and the semiotic functions are referred to as universalistic or particularistic. Code determines the ways in which specific formal features relate to situation. Code determines the verbal repertoire or the range of 'styles' an individual can possess, since it determines the range of meanings which that person can express through linguistic means.
