The Mother Tongue: English and How it Got that Way“Vastly informative and vastly entertaining…A scholarly and fascinating book.” —Los Angeles Times With dazzling wit and astonishing insight, Bill Bryson explores the remarkable history, eccentricities, resilience and sheer fun of the English language. From the first descent of the larynx into the throat (why you can talk but your dog can’t), to the fine lost art of swearing, Bryson tells the fascinating, often uproarious story of an inadequate, second-rate tongue of peasants that developed into one of the world’s largest growth industries. |
Contents
11 | |
The Dawn of Language | 21 |
Global Language | 35 |
The First Thousand Years | 46 |
Where Words Come From | 67 |
Pronunciation | 84 |
Varieties of English | 99 |
Spelling | 117 |
Old World New World | 161 |
English as a World Language | 179 |
Names | 196 |
Swearing | 214 |
Wordplay | 225 |
The Future of English | 239 |
Select Bibliocraphy | 247 |
Index | 257 |
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
According adopted American appeared authorities became become began Britain British called century certainly Chinese cited clearly comes common consider contained course describe dialects Dictionary distinction Dutch England English Language Europe evidence example exist expressions fact foreign four French German give given half hundred instance island Italian Italy Japanese kind known largely later Latin least less letter linguistic living London look matter means million move names native never Norman North noted once originally percent perhaps period person possible probably problem pronounced pronunciation reason remarkable Roman seems sense sentence Shakespeare short simply sometimes sound Spanish speak speakers speech spelling spoken suggest taken tell things thought tongue translate turn University verb vocabulary words writing York