Marion Dexter Learned was a champion of German-American culture at the turn of the 20th century, chosen to give the German address at Kaiser Wilhelm's celebration and the English address at the Bismarck Memorial. This treatise on Pennsylvania German is one for which he is still known and represents a description of the language that is at once concise and thorough, including sections on ethnography, history, phonology, grammar, and etymology. Though it is written by a linguist for linguists, it is still of use to less specialized readers who wish to gain a sense of this dialect's structure and historical significance.