The first part of The Brown Book, although one of the odder works of philosophy, is one of most systematic of Wittgenstein’s. It consists of a series of language games arranged to progressively develop certain features of language. Below I suggest a way of grouping the games according to the issues they seem designed to address. Many of these groups are marked in the text by a discussion in which Wittgenstein comments on several preceding games.
1-5: basic language games with various devices
The commentary on p. 81 suggests that Wittgenstein intends these to introduce the idea of a language game. You should also notice the variety of devices they employ: Wittgenstein uses language games in part to expose differences in use among words.
6-7: on names
These appear to concern the explanation of and grasp of meaning. The parenthetical commentary at the end of (6) indicates a tie to the importance of recognizing variety. (The paragraph at the end of (7) serves to introduce the next topic.)
8-13: articulation (words, patterns)
The use of signs that have signs as components is only one of the topics appearing in this group, but it is one that runs through them all. It is possible to see this discussion as a counter to Russell’s assumption that a proposition can be analyzed into a definite number of constituents. In the last part of (13) Wittgenstein begins to introduce the topic of the next group.
14-17: the use of samples
This group is close to the topic of the first two passages we looked at in The Blue Book (pp. 1-5 and 11-15). Wittgenstein provides a long commentary addressing such issues on pp. 85-89.
18-21(-“… has been given?”): rules
All Wittgenstein’s games could be said to have rules, but these have rules governing the use of certain rule-like devices. The topic of rules and their generality, will continue into Wednesday’s assignment (and from a certain point of view through the rest of part I). The games 18-21 can be seen to introduce this topic. (The end of the discussion after 21 begins to introduce the more specific topic of the following group, and that has been left for the next assignment.)