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The autistic child's attentional, motivational, and cognitive impairments, evident during the earliest periods of sensorimotor development, may later become masked by more striking peculiarities in language and social attachment, and by contrasting talents in specific, isolated areas. In primary childhood aphasia, the cognitive structures necessary for social attachment and early symbolization are relatively intact, but conceptual development is limited by linguistic handicaps and may eventually resemble the thought disturbance of childhood psychosis. When a child's spontaneous, socialized language is impoverished, he may make use of fixed verbal codes which are tied, loosely or closely, to the immediate social and affective context. Analysis of such language features and their relation to other types of performances reveals the distinction between reactive language use and normal imitation, on the one hand, and the adaptive mechanisms of autistic children, on the other. Since language is enriched in parallel with the formation of representations of oneself and others, central language disorder blocks the path toward the normal regulation of anxiety and appreciation of feelings. Meticulous observation of language-deviant children over long periods of time, guided by theory of normal linguistic and cognitive development, can reveal underlying competencies and patterns of dysfunction, and help clarify the structural basis and functional significance of symptomatic behavior.