<!doctype html public «-//w3c//dtd html 4.0 transitional//en»> http-equiv=content-type> What theories and methods serve to model the relationship between language and shared knowledge? How can genericity be functionally described as a central means of knowledge creation? How is linguistic generalization accomplished in the context of colonial communication? These questions are the subject of a study at the interface between discursive linguistics, (post)-colonial linguistics, the history of linguistic usage, and pragmatism.