This paper gives a cross-linguistic comparison of the way information is organized for expression in descriptions in English and German, given the same communicative tasks. The study focuses on factors governing the use of spatial concepts and the ways in which they are mapped into linguistic form. This involves a comparison of the concepts used in linearizing information and establishing cohesion in descriptions and shows how systematic preferences for one set of spatial concepts over another when describing the relative location of objects can be attributed to general principles of organization at text level The grammatical and lexical structure of locative expressions in English and German also reflects requirements defined by language-specific patterns of information organization. These factors lead to different preferences in conceptualizing subject matter for expression, given a specific communicative task.
