A plea for a mentalistic view of linguistics, for an integration of linguistics and psycholinguistics, and for a choice of a functional point of view in developing a process model for language. N. discusses Chomsky's formalist point of view and sums up arguments why the functionalist point of view is more promising; he considers the plausibility of S.C. Dik's functional grammar; and he sketches the outlines of a more general production model for language, transforming conceptualizations into utterances.