John McWhorter delivers a fascinating, detailed exploration of how language changes. He explores changes in grammar, vocabulary, and sounds; the splitJohn McWhorter delivers a fascinating, detailed exploration of how language changes. He explores changes in grammar, vocabulary, and sounds; the splitting, merging, and death of languages; geographical distribution and language families. His style is conversational and engaging, his lectures are well structured and interesting.
At the same time, John McWhorter can be opinionated, inappropriate, and mildly creepy. I enjoyed most of the material, and found it educational. But the wtf moments kept coming. For example, he uses the example "I push the dog into the water", because he finds pushing a dog off the Titanic into the water to die funny. Huh?? As an example of how people talk in real life, he cites Brits discussing dog breeding where he needs to explain that the word "bitch" here is means female dog and not a derogatory comment. You'd think there would be thousands of examples not needing that explanation. At some point he goes on about "leftist academia" completely out of context. He uses the term "Negro" when "Black" would be the commonly used term (he is Black).
I took a big issue with the first chapter, where he discusses what language is, but fails to define it. What I gathered, is that language is a higher form of communication that only humans are capable of, and it has grammar. He goes on to explain how animals cannot do it. So it all boils down to: language is something that only people do, so only people are capable of doing it.
He has an antropocentric bias. He speaks at length how we cannot teach dogs or chimpanzees to speak, as even after years, they only learn a few words of our human speech. But seriously. Both dogs and chimpanzees understand us way more than we understand them! Honeybees can tell each other where pollen is by dancing - McWhorter concludes that that's all they can do, they cannot chew the fat. How does he know? Just because we have decoded only this meaning, it does not mean they don't have thousands of other things they talk about. I happen to know that they can vote on prospective hive locations (Honeybee Democracy).
Dogs have an entire world of scents completely closed to us. He is sure a dog cannot tell her CV to us, but maybe she can, we just can't smell it. And we have recently discovered that whale song has the elements of language, such as equivalents of sounds and syllables.
Back to the good, some interesting tidbits from the lectures:
- Languages naturally get more complex if their speakers remain an isolated group. Thus the most complex languages are not the large, wide spread ones, but isolated, tribal languages. (Joke on you, language elitists.)
- When adults learn a language, they drop complexities. Thus when different groups merge (due to migration, conquest, or trade), languages tend to simplify. This is how English got stripped of most of the grammar present in other Germanic languages, such as verb endings and genders.
- We can trace the origin of peoples by comparing their languages. A language develops dofferently when their speakers spread around, and we can trace when and where the languages diverged.
- Language families developed as one original language, that later split into different languages, then sub-languages, etc.
- Creole languages are created when two languages merge, and this is the only way we know that new languages are born.
And much, much more. McWhorter clearly knows his linguistics. But he should stay away from anything else....more
John McWhorter takes us on a fascinating survey of the roughly 170 language families of the world. He starts with Indo-EuExtended review July 30, 2022
John McWhorter takes us on a fascinating survey of the roughly 170 language families of the world. He starts with Indo-European, as most listeners of these lectures are native English speakers, but also because linguistics started in Europe. Indo-European is the most studied and currently most widely spread language group of the world. He introduces the basic concepts of language development and features using this group. After this he goes on a tour around the world, starting in Africa, the cradle of humanity, with the suspected first languages of the world, the click languages.
I am Hungarian and English is my second language; I also (used to) speak German (I rather forgot now as I have not used it). Since Hungarian is not an Indo-European language, I have perhaps a different take from native English speakers on these lectures.
The journey is fascinating. Studying languages makes us realize how many ways humans can express themselves; how many concepts differ between cultures; how structures we might consider essential we can completely dispense with. I have long known, that gender, pronouns, and most tenses are unnecessary, since my native language does without them beautifully; but it is interesting to see English speakers’ reaction, as they take them for granted. Many languages without those, however, have additional complexities: Hungarian, for example, has countless endings, conjugations, and matching of connecting vowels. Or let’s take Chinese, famously mono-syllabic, but also famously difficult due to use of tones. Japanese has many language constructs around social hierarchy and multiples. There are languages where you talk to your mother-in-law in a different dialect, where women talking to men, men talking to women, or their own genders, require different forms.
The number and form of sounds also differs greatly. Click languages have the most, numbering close to a hundred. Some languages have many consonants but only few vowels; one Caucasian languge makes do with only two. Others have many vowels and few consonants. Polynesian languages have few of each, and make up for it by very long words. Given that these languages are the last group that developed, and click languages the first, it might be that languages go from many sounds and drop them over time; albeit that is just conjecture, as most languages have sounds between thirty and fifty.
One of McWhorter’s major points is to get the idea out of his listeners’ head that English is somehow especially complicated, or that “savages” speak less sophisticated languages than the “civilized” people. In fact, the opposite is true: the more isolated a language and spoken by the less people, the more complicated it gets, because it is “allowed to do what languages do”, and increase in complexity. When a language is learned by babies, no grammatical feature, special cases, tenses, conjugations, exceptions to the rule are hard. When a language is learned by many adults, however, such as when two languages mix, a people are conquered, displaced, or use a language for trade, grammar complexities tend to drop. This happened to English, which is quite grammatically stripped compared to most languages, and especially among other Germanic languages, all of which have multiple genders, conjugations and endings.
Some observations as a non-English speaker. When McWhorter picks characteristic features for a language group, it does not mean that other language groups do not have that. For instance, vowel matching of endings as a particular feature of Turkic languages also features in Hungarian. I suspect there are many such examples. His pronounciations are terrible, although I am sure that for the range of languages he covers, are way better than mine. He points out that writing systems are different from the languages, by the example of Chinese characters that can be used for different words in different languages; but fails to mention that Latin script also transcribes many different languages and we don’t think it odd.
McWhorter is engaging and very enthusiastic of his subject. Unfortunately, this is punctuated by tasteless or downright offensive jokes and stories. He calls Polynesian languages “coconut” languages, describes a Swami woman as smelling of fresh fish, tells numerous offputting food and party stories (such as a woman spewing crackers); sprinkles in mildly sexual and creepy comments; and thinks saying that a dead language is “as dead as the Golden Girls minus Betty White” is somehow funny.
He is clearly well educated and highly intelligent, nevertheless he insists on coming off as stupid and shallow: he often says “but that’s boring” about something I actually find interesting; he uses “top” and “bottom” instead of north and south; describes long Polynesian words as something he would like to eat (because, I think, it sounds like mahimahi); insists that “black people don’t get lice”; that some languages are spoken by “minus seventeen people”; and makes passive aggressive comments about other linguists, such as “it is not nice to say they are wrong, so I am not going to say it [end of lecture]”.
Overall, this lecture series is like walking around on the fascinating streets of Paris and taking in the history, culture, atmosphere and the waft of fresh baguettes; but having to watch out for the dog turds. (If you’ve been to Paris, you know what I am talking about.)...more
Just finished listening and I really liked it. The audio is available on Hoopla and the author narrates. I would not have known he was not a professioJust finished listening and I really liked it. The audio is available on Hoopla and the author narrates. I would not have known he was not a professional narrator - he does a great job!
The story of the friendship between the two people is fascinating. It seems they were very much alike in both physical appearance and mental abilities and interests - with the one major difference of mental health.
Winchester does great historic research and writes an engaging narrative. I enjoyed the dictionary definitions for chapter titles - it gave us a flavor of the dictionary without being heavy handed with examples.
However, he fails on the discussion of Dr. Minor’s diagnosis. Psychiatry was in its infancy, yet he takes the diagnosis of schizophrenia as a given. His research into this mental illness is cursory at best and he does a lot of ill-educated guesswork. For example, he fails to mention that schizophrenia often manifests in the early 20ies, so Dr. Minor may not have been triggered by his war experiences, he may just have reached the age.
I have read Hidden Valley Road: Inside the Mind of an American Family which contains fascinating insight into schizophrenia. While I do not fault Winchester for not knowing much about it, I do blame him for speculating. He should have just left it alone....more
I expected a light-hearted punny book, but John Pollack takes his puns quite seriously. He takes us to a ride through history from the humble punt-of-I expected a light-hearted punny book, but John Pollack takes his puns quite seriously. He takes us to a ride through history from the humble punt-of-view of word play, its impact on the development of language, writing, and culture.
Punning was serious business from time immemorial. Ancient Babylonians punned to the death, and eighteenth century wit-seekers likewise duelled over dual meanings. Pardon my pun. Humor only came into it sometime during Shakespeare’s time, when puns were considered a sign of wit and a requirement for courtly conversation. A good pun is clever - it requires knowing of multiple meanings, and combining different, unusual contexts. This is no task for the dimwitted. Yet puns have aquired a bad reputation during the time of enlightenment. Pollack asserts that puns can be employed quite subversively, as they are the very expression of ambiguity, which goes against orderly thinking that requires precise meanings. But language and human thinking is never one-track: in fact, those who are able to think creatively, make unusual connections, are the ones driving human progress.
This was not what I expected, nevertheless I enjoyed it. While I would not go as far as saying that punning is the force that made us human (which Pollack slightly implies), I can get behind the idea that creative thinking and making new connections is what makes us adaptable....more
A great course I found on Hoopla and highly recommend to all who want to read more Shakespeare. It consists of 24 half an hour long lectures.
Marc ConnA great course I found on Hoopla and highly recommend to all who want to read more Shakespeare. It consists of 24 half an hour long lectures.
Marc Conner speaks clearly and engagingly about Shakespeare and his theater, and about his plays. In each lecture, he introduces a “tool” (or three) to help us understand dimensions of the play. For example, the type of play: a comedy is about young love that has an obstacle standing in the way, which is overcome, and the play ends in marriage(s). A tragedy would end with death. The best comedies snatch a happy ending from an almost tragedy. Another tool is to examine the first lines of what a character speaks. In case of history plays, follow the history (rather obvious). In tragedies, the tragic woman gives insight... etc, etc.
After an intro, Conner delves into twelve plays of the Bard, each illustrating a best example of the period of Shakespeare’s life and the type of play. These include Romeo and Juliet, The Midsummer Night’s Dream, Twelfth Night (his favorite), Macbeth, Hamlet, The Merchant of Venice, Henry V, Measure for Measure, and The Tempest (there are more). I have really enjoyed it, especially about the ones I read, but also ones I have not, or read too long ago.
Recommend for Shakespeare readers. Free on Hoopla....more
When I borrowed this audio from the library, I was attracted by its shortness and my hopes that it would be similar to Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The ZeroWhen I borrowed this audio from the library, I was attracted by its shortness and my hopes that it would be similar to Eats, Shoots & Leaves: The Zero Tolerance Approach to Punctuation, which I thoroughly enjoyed. Alas, this incoherent meandering of torturous ramblings was neither entartaining, nor made any sense.
I think the semicolon was involved somehow. And I think she said we should relax our rules about grammar... but in such circuituous, repetitive, pretentious drivel, that it made no argument about why. Or if it did, I did not get it.
I did, however, recently listened to Fry's English Delight: Series 2, in which the creators explained, succinctly and in a thoroughly entertaining fashion, that the reason is that language changes - and we should roll with the changes, instead of following rules just because someone wrote them down years ago. In fact, the Oxford English Dictionary has embraced this philosophy in its latest editions.
A punny excursion into the (British) English language. The four parts cover puns, metaphors, quotes and clichés. I find such linguistic musings entertA punny excursion into the (British) English language. The four parts cover puns, metaphors, quotes and clichés. I find such linguistic musings entertaining, and love Fry’s narration, which is how I happened upon this Audible program. Free with Audible subscription....more
For the first time in history, we have a way of capturing vast amounts informal language in writing on the internet. Tweets, posts, memes, texts are eFor the first time in history, we have a way of capturing vast amounts informal language in writing on the internet. Tweets, posts, memes, texts are easily searcheable and social networks can be analyzed with computers. What’s more, internet language evolves quickly, and the spread of new language features can be understood without the need of painstaking interviews, travels and transcribing. This is a gold mine for a linguist.
Gretchen McCollugh is hooked on this treasure trove for linguists. Her book is as much about social behavior on the internet as about language. I found the comparisons of certain online language features and behaviors to their offline origins quite illuminating. For example, how people used to draw smiley faces on postcards way before emojis; or how memes existed in graffiti form way before grumpy cat.
What she says here is fun and interesting, but both too much and too little. I feel that there is more to internet language than what she covers. At the same tome she can get really loquatious and go on about a thought for pages without adding any information or examples, simply repeating the same thing with additional similies.
So while I enjoyed this and found it informative, I also set it aside way too many times for giving it more than three stars....more
This is a pretty short and entertaining review of why English is so different from its closest cousins: the other twelve or so Germanic languages. TheThis is a pretty short and entertaining review of why English is so different from its closest cousins: the other twelve or so Germanic languages. There are three main characteristics that McWhorter explains that have no parallels.
The first one is the use of meaningless “do” in questions and negation (did you see him? No I did not.). The second is the odd continuous “-ing” to indicate present tense. In other Germanic languages, saying “I write” is perfectly normal to indicate that you are currently at the act of writing - in English you must say “I am writing”, otherwise people either assume you are a foreigner or that you are a writer. McWhorter argues these came from Welsh and Cornish, that were spoken on the island at the time of the English invasion. Since there are no other languages in the world (or not nearby, anyway) that have this structure, and they were on the same island... there really shouldn’t be much news to this. But apparently most scholars think it just evolved naturally - and he spends some time refuting their case.
The third oddity is English’s remarkable simplification compared to all other Germanic languages. While other languages have dropped endings and genders and conjugations over time, English grammar is downright stripped: no linguistic gender, only a couple endings, conjugation dropped completely, etc. McWhorter attributes this to the Vikings - namely, a bunch of adults having to learn a language and dropping much of the flourishes - and later this becoming the dominant language.
There are a few interesting tidbits about English history, a survey of many languages for comparative oddities, an analysis of written vs. oral language, and a short history of language evolution from early to medieval English.
I enjoyed it, but I did find it somewhat repetitive. And as far as the gist, I have summarized it here. This could have been a long article instead of a book. It is written with humor, and I do enjoy history, so overall it was worth my time. 3.5 stars....more
If you had asked me what topic was decidedly boring and unfunny, punctuation would have been on the list, along with watching paint dry and paying bilIf you had asked me what topic was decidedly boring and unfunny, punctuation would have been on the list, along with watching paint dry and paying bills. But Truss has proven me wrong: this book is both hilarious and educational. (Notice my inspired use of the colon?) She is on a crusade to improve our punctuation, and she won me over. Now I am eagerly awaiting her book about being on hold....more
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