The Unfolding of Language: An Evolutionary Tour of Mankind's Greatest InventionBlending the spirit of Eats, Shoots & Leaves with the science of The Language Instinct, an original inquiry into the development of that most essential-and mysterious-of human creations: Language Language is mankind's greatest invention-except, of course, that it was never invented." So begins linguist Guy Deutscher's enthralling investigation into the genesis and evolution of language. If we started off with rudimentary utterances on the level of "man throw spear," how did we end up with sophisticated grammars, enormous vocabularies, and intricately nuanced degrees of meaning? Drawing on recent groundbreaking discoveries in modern linguistics, Deutscher exposes the elusive forces of creation at work in human communication, giving us fresh insight into how language emerges, evolves, and decays. He traces the evolution of linguistic complexity from an early "Me Tarzan" stage to such elaborate single-word constructions as the Turkish sehirlilestiremediklerimizdensiniz ("you are one of those whom we couldn't turn into a town dweller"). Arguing that destruction and creation in language are intimately entwined, Deutscher shows how these processes are continuously in operation, generating new words, new structures, and new meanings. As entertaining as it is erudite, The Unfolding of Language moves nimbly from ancient Babylonian to American idiom, from the central role of metaphor to the staggering triumph of design that is the Semitic verb, to tell the dramatic story and explain the genius behind a uniquely human faculty. |
Contents
Introduction I | 1 |
A Castle in the Air | 21 |
Perpetual Motion | 45 |
The Forces of Destruction | 73 |
A Reef of Dead Metaphors | 115 |
The Forces of Creation | 144 |
Craving for Order | 171 |
The Unfolding of Language | 210 |
Flipping Categories | 275 |
Laryngeals Again? | 284 |
The Cooks Counterpoint | 294 |
Notes | 306 |
329 | |
Glossary | 341 |
Acknowledgments | 347 |
Epilogue | 260 |
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The Unfolding of Language: The Evolution of Mankind's Greatest Invention Guy Deutscher No preview available - 2006 |
Common terms and phrases
a-mutation action Ælfric's Akkadian already analogy ancestor appear appendage Arabic August Schleicher auxiliary century chapter common complex consonantal root consonants construction course created developed distinction emerged endings English erosion exactly example express fact forms French future tense German girl give going gonna grammatical elements grammatical words Grimm's law happened Hebrew Hittite hollow verbs i-mutation idea Indo-European Indo-European languages instance irregularities Kavadh language's Latin linguists look mammoth story marker Mbabaram meaning metaphors modern languages natural noun nuances original participants past tense pattern phrase plural pointing words postpositions prefix prehistoric prepositions principles pronouns pronunciation property-words Proto-Germanic Proto-Indo-European quirk vowel reason relative clause role RSPEL MEMBER Schleicher seems Semitic languages Semitic verb sense sentence similar simple slots snog sound speakers spear spoken stage started stone structure of language Sumerian syntactic categories Tarzan templates thing-words things TROY Turkish turn verb verbal system vowel mutation