As opposed to other better-known philosophers, like John Dewey, William James, or Charles S. Peirce, George H. Mead (1863-1931) remains quite neglected among the founding figures of the pragmatist movement. The aim of the dissertation, supported by extensive archival research, is to provide a comprehensive approach to Mead’s philosophy, understood as an original perspectivist pragmatism. His theory of language acquisition and the emergence of the self, his epistemology and its anthropological consequences, as well as the various educational, ethical, and political questions Mead discussed and took an active part in addressing while he was a professor at the University of Chicago, illuminate still pressing issues and lead to a renewed analysis of the far-reaching implications of the sociality of action.