Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue : : the Untold History of English

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Call Number: 420.9 McW
On Shelf At: Downtown Library

Location & Checkout Length	Call Number	Checkout Length	Item Status
Downtown 2nd Floor 4-week checkout	420.9 McW	4-week checkout	On Shelf

We speak a miscegenated grammar -- A lesson from the Celtic impact -- We speak a battered grammar -- Does our grammar channel our thought? -- Skeletons in the closet.
Why do we say "I am reading a catalog" instead of "I read a catalog"? Why do we say "do" at all? Is the way we speak a reflection of our cultural values? Delving into these provocative topics and more, author McWhorter distills hundreds of years of lore into one lively history. Covering the little-known Celtic and Welsh influences on English, the impact of the Viking raids and the Norman Conquest, and the Germanic invasions that started it all during the fifth century AD, and drawing on genetic and linguistic research as well as a cache of trivia about the origins of English words and syntax patterns, McWhorter ultimately demonstrates the arbitrary, maddening nature of English--and its ironic simplicity, due to its role as a streamlined lingua franca during the early formation of Britain. This is the book that language aficionados have been waiting for.--From publisher description.

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Fun History of Our Language submitted by sdunav on June 28, 2012, 12:32pm Recommended by a blogger at the Ann Arbor library, and rightly so - McWhorter is a funny writer and a historical linguist. He describes the mid-400 AD period when Old English speakers (Angles and Saxons and Jutes) met the Celts, and we got all kinds of weird Celtic things in English, like the "meaningless do". I never realized how much we use the word "do" without it doing anything.

And then we've got the Vikings prancing in and dropping words and truncating our grammar about four centuries later. Which makes it hard for us English speakers to learn Dutch or German or Swedish.

And he pulls in Twain and Monopoly and Clue and Chaucer and Shakespeare and the Norman Conquest and Phoenicians in the first millenium BC and it's all so clear. Even when he disagrees with other linguists, he's funny and yet respectful. I was only mildly interested in the topic, but now I want to read whatever else he's written.

Also, there's some interesting stuff on how language does *not* shape culture, or worldview, if you're interested in Sapir-Whorf ideas....he cites Dan Everett ("Don't Sleep, There Are Snakes") and discusses the Piraha, whom I just read about a few months back. Which was fun because McWhorter didn't really agree with Everett much but had interesting comments on his work. Also, I learned that forks are feminine in German but spoons are masculine. And that bad grammar is just evolving grammar. It's ok to split an infinitive as long as you're writing clearly and gracefully.