Thursday, December 12, 2013

The Life of Language







In The Life of Language: the fascinating ways words are born, live and die, Sol Steinmetz and Barbara Ann Kipfer attempt to present linguists for a broad audience.  They succeed at this by explaining each topic with the barest minimum of jargon and profession terms (and linguists abound with both).

They handle such necessary topics “New Root Formation: The Birth of Words,” “Modification: How Words Grow and Thrive,” and “Generation:  Many Ways of Growing Words.” All this is done is accessible prose.  The average reader with no background in linguists can pick this book up and learn a great deal of the dynamics of language.

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