Customer Reviews

The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language

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_The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language_, Second Edition, by David Crystal is a linguaphile's delight. It provides a wealth of information to engage the mind indefinitely.

Instead of being organized alphabetically, as most encyclopedias are, _The Encyclopedia of Language_ is divided into eleven parts that comprise sixty-five thematic sections. Each section includes a comprehensive discussion of the theme, enhanced by sidebars and colorful visuals. Sections range in length from two to twenty pages, making the chunks of information small enough to be palatable yet large enough to be satisfying.

Topics addressed include language and thought, the structure of language, the anatomy and physiology of speech, written language, language acquisition, languages of the world, language disabilities, and language change. Obviously, this is only a sample. In addition, the book has eight appendices, including an extensive glossary and a table giving information about nearly 1,000 of the world's languages.

While many of Crystal's topics have their technical aspects, the author keeps his tone conversational and his information accessible to the lay reader. In this way he celebrates the existence of human language and deepens our appreciation of it.

I have always found linguistics to be a fascinating subject, but my encounters with the majority of textbooks on this subject have made for rather dry reading. Bearing this is mind, I initially approached this book with low expectations. However, once I opened the cover I could not put it down again. David Crystal has a quite a talent for presenting various topics surrounding language in a way that is both extremely interesting and easy to understand. The eleven chapters address in general terms language structure, geographic and social factors relating to language, physiological and neurological aspects of speech and language acquisition, languages of the world, written language, and a great deal of more information covering a variety of language-related topics, to include sign language, body language, and animal communication. No one is going to become an expert on linguistics by merely reading this book, but it is a superb general reference and introduction to language and linguistics.

This book is a linguaphile and language lover's delight, to read or just to browse like a coffee table book. It covers just about every major topic in the study of language you can think of, from traditional classical and comparative philology and linguistics to modern developmental and neurological studies of language.

The book is comprised of 11 major sections and 65 smaller sections, with 8 appendices devoted to various topics, and there is an extensive glossary of linguistic terms as well as a table giving essential information about almost 1000 of the world's languages. Although a scholarly book, it's well written and Crystal never gets overly pedantic or dry. This is no doubt one of the most comprehensive and detailed compendia of information for the general reader about the subject of language ever written.

After reading this, you'll be more than ready to tackle a formal or more technical introductory text in linguistics, if you want to continue your studies. If you do, I highly recommend David Lyons's classic, Introduction to Theoretical Linguistics, now out of print but worth getting if you can find a used copy. If you can't find that there are several other recent texts that are quite good. But if you decide to stick with this book, you'll still have learned a lot. Whichever way you decide, good luck and happy reading.

According to the author, this book operates on two levels. First it addresses the kind of interest in language history and behaviour that we encounter daily (for instance: a young child's attempts to talk), and secondly, it attempts to make sense out of what we observe. To address these concerns, the book consists of 11 main categories having topics such as "Popular Ideas About Language," "The Medium of Language: Writing and Reading," and ""The Languages Of The World."

These 11 categories are further broken down into 65 subsections on such subjects as "Language and Thought," "Investigating Children's Language," and "Language And The Brain."

One of the beauties of this book is that it practices what it preaches. In the section on Plain English, it emphasizes simplicity as the key to readability and it is written in just such a simple, readable manner. In this regard, Crystal quotes the recommendations of the "Plain English Advocates" as follows:

"Prefer the shorter word to the longer one. Use simple . . . . rather than fancy ones."

"Write short sentences with an average of no more than 20 words."

"Write short paragraphs with an average of about 75 words."

And very importantly, I think, "Write with your ear. . . . . Do not write anything you could not comfortably say."

There is much more like this. Along these same lines he quotes George Orwell's six rules of what to do when instinct fails. A couple of these rules also merit mention.

"Never use a long word when a short word will do." and "If it is possible to cut a word out, cut it out." And, again, more along these lines.

I think that these few rules and others like them are important to one of the main themes of the book which is effective communication.

There are segments of the book that, in my opinion, ought to be invaluable to the professional researcher as well as the casual reader. For instance, there are sections that relate language to childhood development, contain discussions of language and other systems of communication, and discussions of language and social identity to name but a few. Many are accompanied by charts, tables, illustrations, maps, etc. where they add breadth to the discussion.

To summarize, THE CAMBRIDGE ENCYCLOPEDIA OF LANGUAGE has something to offer to a wide range of readers, from the would-be writer, to the experienced writer who wishes to be more effective, to the researcher, to the intellectually curious.

This book contains everything a linguist would ever want. David Crystal has brought together everything he knows about child language aquisition, journalese and a plethora of other topics which are too vast to mention. Definately worth every penny. There is hours of reading and learning to be done with this book, and each page brings new and interesting facts, even though the original book is over a decade old! the perfect gift for a loved linguist, a fact-finder of a friend and even has a use in the hands of the illiterate!

If I were to describe this volume as a coffee table book on linguistics, you'd be forgiven for thinking that it would be hard to imagine something less inviting. Maybe a history of grout?

But that's what it is, and it's absolutely fascinating. It's a large format, profusely illustrated book on the history, structure, analysis and use of the English language, from the earliest arrival of the Angles in the British Isles, to the latest computerized analyses of language, and everything in between. There are features on Old English, dialect, regional differences, drift, humor, grammer, writing systems, alphabets...and it's all presented in the most engaging and entertaining manner.

Now I am perhaps more enamored of this sort of thing than the typical reader, having come from a psycholinguistics background, but I think there's much in here to entertain (and inform) anyone with even a passing interest in language, and English in particular. There are long articles that delve into areas in detail, but there are also enough brief sidebars to make this an excellent book for simply opening at random to pick out an entertaining bit here and there.

And of course it's all authoritative enough to serve as an excellent resource for the beginning linguistics student as well. Quite an accomplishment.

I blew it... I don't know how my earlier review of this book wound up with only two stars - I intended to give it FIVE stars, as I hope will be obvious to anyone who reads the review - mea culpa!

While it doesn't cover any particular subject with too much depth, this book provides a wonderful introduction to many aspects of linguistics, including sociolinguistics, psycholinguistics, speech acoustics, and more. It also includes many interesting sidebars that just add to the depth of the book. What a deal. :)

David Crystal's Encylcopedia of Language is an excellent and readable book for lay-people like myself. I often come to it for information on a particular language-related question, or else I'll just open it up at random and see where I land.

There are plenty of diagrams and coloured pictures throughout, as well and quite a few interesting stories placed in vignettes.

As other reveiwers have pointed out, a huge range of topics are included here. I'm yet to find an aspect of language that hasn't been covered in some way.

This isn't Everything You Need to Know to Become a Linguist. But it *is* a good reference book for people who aren't linguists and would like to see what the field is about. There's a little bit of everything; no great depth, but you can't *have* everything and still have a book small enough to lift.

It's also awful fun to browse if you like languages in general and are curious about "how they work" or what linguists study. I'm not letting go of my copy, ever.