A Mouthful of Air: Language, Languages...Especially English

Description

From Publishers Weekly Burgess, who invented a teenspeak for the gangs in his novel A Clockwork Orange, infects readers with his love of words in a delightful, wittily urbane romp through the world's languages, in particular "volatile and hospitable" English. This is several books in one: a painless primer on linguistics; a survey of tongues from Albanian to Welsh (spoken by King Arthur, a Romanized Celt); the story of alphabets and of language's evolution from prehistoric Indo-European to words like quark ; an exploration of how English became rich and flexible as Old English was transformed into what is spoken and written today. Chapters cover slang and taboo words, great dictionary makers, poetry, the Bible, film dubbing, how Shakespeare spoke his lines. Burgess also offers tips for learning foreign languages and suggestions for secondary-school English teachers. A Mouthful incorporates much of Language Made Plain , published some 30 years ago, but it contains a wealth of new material. Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. Read more From Library Journal Burgess has written a fascinating study of language. His wide knowledge of languages, music, and literature and his ability to explain the most difficult concepts make this an engrossing book. In the first section, Burgess discusses languages in general, paying special attention to grammar and phonetics. The second section is devoted to the English language. Burgess's discussion of the Celtic languages and Shakespeare's pronunciation are excellent brief summaries, and his understanding of grammar and phonetics is the key to his explanations of the change and development of English. He compares various languages and shows the differences and similarities of structure and content. Demonstrating a sound historic knowledge of English, he explains many of the difficultaspects of the language while providing interesting comments about Creole languages, slang, black English, and language education. Highly recommended. Previewed in Prepub Alert, LJ 4/15/93.- Gene Shaw, NYPLCopyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc. Read more See all Editorial Reviews

Features:

Product Details:

• Hardcover: 416 pages
• Publisher: William Morrow & Co; 1st edition (August 1, 1993)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0688119352
• ISBN-13: 55
• Product Dimensions: 6.8 x 1.2 x 9.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.7 pounds

Handling

We will ship all orders within 3 business days of payment.

Delivery

We do not ship outside of the USA, **except** via eBay Global Shipping Program. [however, for postcards and other lightweight paper items, we DO ship internationally ourselves.]

Feedback

We take our reputation seriously, we buy and sell online, so we understand the value of trust. If you are unsatisfied with your order, please contact us and we will work with you to resolve it to your satisfaction. PLEASE be aware that if there is just ONE photo in our listings, it means it is a GENERIC STOCK PHOTO. If there are TWO OR MORE PHOTOS, they are photos of the EXACT ITEM YOU WILL RECEIVE.