Weeds in the Garden of Words: Further Observations on the Tangled History of the English LanguagePeople who love English - the way words are used and put together to create meaning; the arcane rules and infuriating exceptions; the vital, living history of the way the language has changed through the centuries to create a richness and depth that exceeds that of many other languages - are often verypassionate about how it is used and how it is changing and about all its little tricky eccentricitiesWeeds in the Garden of Wordsis the perfect book for people who love English.Professor Kate Burridge's book is approachable, entertaining and fun - designed to browse through and find oneself hooked by fascinating pieces on such topics as why verbs move to nouns and vice versa, why pronunciation may differ from place to place, why regionalisms develop and the creative way of slang and jargon. Weeds in the Garden of Wordsis filled with the joys of the eccentric, unruly, rich and complex language that is English. |
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Weeds in the Garden of Words: Further Observations on the Tangled History of ... Kate Burridge No preview available - 2005 |
Weeds in the Garden of Words: Further Observations on the Tangled History of ... Kate Burridge No preview available - 2005 |
Common terms and phrases
17th century adjectives adverbs American English appear Australian English become belly body certainly clearly cluster colloquial compound computer mouse consonant contexts course derives describe dialect dice disappeared dropped early ending English language English speakers English spelling etymology euphemism euphemistic example expressions fact French gad-fly Gafoops garden German gotten grammar grave fears gravy haplology hyphen instance involved jargon KATE BURRIDGE kind language change Latin lexical linguistic linguistic weeds look Macquarie Dictionary meaning Modern English mouses never nipplegate nouns Old English once ordinary originally Oxford English Dictionary particular passive perhaps person phonetic phrase placenames plural probably pronounced pronunciation referred rhotacism rhyming slang salt sense sentence sexual shift simply singular someone sometimes sort sound change speech spelling pronunciation Standard English syllable taboo there's things tricky usage usually verb versus vocabulary vowel what's writing yeah-no