How Languages Work

This new introduction to linguistics presents language in all its amazing complexity, while guiding students gently through the basics. Students emerge with an appreciation of the diversity of the world's languages as well as a deeper understanding of the structure of language, and its broader social and cultural context.

In this fascinating survey of everything from how sounds become speech to how names work, David Crystal answers every question you might ever have had about the nuts and bolts of language in his usual highly illuminating way. Along the way we find out about eyebrow flashes, whistling languages, how parents teach their children to speak, how politeness travels across languages and how the way we talk show not just how old we are but where we’re from and even who we want to be.

What could Greek poets or Roman historians say in their own language that would be lost in translation? After all, different languages have different personalities, and this is especially clear with languages of the ancient and medieval world. This volume celebrates six such languages - Ancient Greek, Latin, Old English, Sanskrit, Old Irish, and Biblical Hebrew - by first introducing readers to their most distinctive features, then showing how these linguistic traits play out in short excerpts from actual ancient texts. It explores, for instance, how Homer's Greek shows signs of oral composition, how Horace achieves striking poetic effects through interlaced word order in his Latin, and how the poet of Beowulf attains remarkable intensity of expression through the resources of Old English. But these are languages that have shared connections as well. Readers will see how the Sanskrit of the Rig Veda uses words that come from roots found also in English, how turns of phrase characteristic of the Hebrew Bible found their way into English, and that even as unusual a language as Old Irish still builds on common Indo-European linguistic patterns. Very few people have the opportunity to learn these languages, and they can often seem mysterious and inaccessible: drawing on a lucid and engaging writing style and with the aid of clear English translations throughout, this book aims to give all readers, whether scholars, students, or interested novices, an aesthetic appreciation of just how rich and varied they are.

A practical and easy-to-understand guide to the logical structure of both Hebrew and Greek. Ideal for biblical language students.

The series builds an extensive collection of high quality descriptions of languages around the world. Each volume offers a comprehensive grammatical description of a single language together with fully analyzed sample texts and, if appropriate, a word list and other relevant information which is available on the language in question. There are no restrictions as to language family or area, and although special attention is paid to hitherto undescribed languages, new and valuable treatments of better known languages are also included. No theoretical model is imposed on the authors; the only criterion is a high standard of scientific quality.

OVER 600,000 COPIES SOLD! Based on the #1 New York Times bestseller The 5 Love Languages® (over 20 million copies sold) Dramatically improve workplace relationships simply by learning your coworkers’ language of appreciation. This book will give you the tools to create a more positive workplace, increase employee engagement, and reduce staff turnover. How? By teaching you to effectively communicate authentic appreciation and encouragement to employees, co-workers, and leaders. Most relational problems in organizations flow from this question: do people feel appreciated? This book will help you answer “Yes!” A bestseller—having sold over 600,000 copies and translated into 24 languages—this book has proven to be effective and valuable in diverse settings. Its principles about human behavior have helped businesses, non-profits, hospitals, schools, government agencies, and organizations with remote workers. PLUS! Each book contains a free access code for taking the online Motivating By Appreciation (MBA) Inventory (does not apply to purchases of used books). The assessment identifies a person’s preferred languages of appreciation to help you apply the book. When supervisors and colleagues understand their coworkers’ primary and secondary languages, as well as the specific actions they desire, they can effectively communicate authentic appreciation, thus creating healthy work relationships and raising the level of performance across an entire team or organization. **(Please contact [email protected] if you purchased your book new and the access code is denied.) Take your team to the next level by applying The 5 Languages of Appreciation in the Workplace.

It is commonly agreed by linguists and anthropologists that the majority of languages spoken now around the globe will likely disappear within our lifetime. This text focuses on the question: what is lost when a language dies?

An engaging account of how new languages come into being, arguing that children are the driving force.