An invention for creating, sending, and using self-descriptive objects as messages over a network is disclosed. In an embodiment of the present invention, self-descriptive persistent dictionary objects are serialized and sent as messages across a message queuing network. The receiving messaging system unserializes the message object, and passes the object to the destination application. The application then queries or enumerates message elements from the instantiated persistent dictionary, and performs the programmed response. Using these self-descriptive objects as messages, the sending and receiving applications no longer rely on an a priori convention or a special-coding serialization scheme. Rather, messaging applications can communicate arbitrary objects in a standard way with no prior agreement as to the nature and semantics of message contents.