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Words and Rules: The Ingredients of Language Paperback – October 24, 2000

by Steven Pinker (Author)

40 customer reviews

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Words and Rules: The Ingredients of Language
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How does language work, and how do we learn to speak? Why do languages change over time, and why do they have so many quirks and irregularities? In this original and totally entertaining book written in the same engaging style that illuminated his bestselling classics, The Language Instinct and How the Mind Works, Seven Pinker explores the profound mysteries of language.

By picking a deceptively simple phenomenon--regular and irregular verbs--Pinker connects an astonishing array of topics in the sciences and the humanities: the history of languages; the theories of Noam Chomosky and his critics; the attempts to create language using computer simulations of neural networks; what there is to learn from children's grammatical "mistakes"; the latest techniques in identifying genes and imaging the brain; and major ideas in the history of Western philosophy. He makes sense of all this with the help of a single, powerful idea: that language comprises a mental dictionary of memorized words and a mental grammer of creative rules. His theory extends beyond language and offers insight in the very nature of the human mind.

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Product Details

Paperback: 368 pages
Publisher: Harper Perennial; Reprint edition (January 15, 2000)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0060958405
ISBN-13: 978-0060958404
Product Dimensions: 5.3 x 0.8 x 8 inches
Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces
Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (40 customer reviews)
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #309,978 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #694 in Books > Reference > Words, Language & Grammar > Grammar
- #965 in Books > Politics & Social Sciences > Social Sciences > Linguistics
- #1278 in Books > Science & Math > Behavioral Sciences > Cognitive Psychology

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Customer Reviews

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

10 of 11 people found the following review helpful

Market Mis-management

By Christopher G. Loverich on June 4, 2011

Format: Paperback Verified Purchase

As many other's have pointed out, this book has been inappropriately marketed. Having some background in neuroscience and some possible future work in the linguistics field, I had reasonable expectations that this would be a mid-level overview of the structure and functioning of language with regard to our brains' techniques for processing / producing it. This is fairly far from the mark. It is instead mostly about the actual words and rules of language - specifically english verbs. I felt like I was back in 7th grade grammar class as he carried on example after example ad infinitum. I first started skimming, then skipping paragraphs, chapters... the rest of the book.

It is very well written - amazingly so at times - and I think if the above is what your after you will not be let down. I debated not reviewing it though given the nature of the expectations (based on comments, reviews, etc.) I think my sentiments will hold true for many would be readers --> Make sure this is the material you think it is before buying. Most would be better off grabbing one of this other works (language instinct, blank slate).

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2 of 3 people found the following review helpful

The Fruit Flies of Language

By John M. Ford on August 9, 2010

Format: Paperback Verified Purchase

Psychologist, linguist, and well-known author Steven Pinker illustrates the processes of human language through an extended discussion of regular and irregular verbs. He skillfully uses our grade-school struggles with the rules and exceptions of English vocabulary to explore the larger realm of human language competence. "Like fruit flies, regular and irregular verbs are small and easy to breed, and they contain, in easily visible form, the machinery that powers larger phenomena in all their glorious complexity."

Pinker's book explores in great detail the two different systems of the brain that produce language. One is regular and rule-like and produces patterns that range from the regular forms of some verbs to the grammatical and organizational regularities of larger chunks of language. The other is idiosyncratic and irregular and stores pieces of our linguistic competence that frustrate linguists and second-graders alike. Our working language is shaped by the interplay between these systems. They both leave their traces in the historical changes in language, similarities between different languages, the creative mistakes children and adults make while learning language, and in the way we invent and reinvent new words.

This book is recommended to anyone who wants to understand how our mind enables us to use language. Don't worry about being trapped into a narrow dissection of verbs--the book simply uses them as an increasingly-familiar theme to explore larger language issues. And don't shrink from an imagined tangle of technical terminology. Pinker's use of language is as deft as his grasp of it. His book is an enjoyable, as well as an informative read.

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1 of 1 people found the following review helpful

Thinky thoughts about thinking thoughts

By Cecil Bothwell VINE VOICE on February 8, 2013

Format: Paperback

I'm exploring linguistics a bit in support of a novel that's currently taking shape on my laptop, so I've been reading Pinker.

Some reviewers get down into the weeds, even taking sides, for or against this author's particular views on language--and I say, bully for them! But, as a lay reader, I'm more interested in the windows than the floor, and the ideas Pinker's exposition triggers are the brain candy I'm after. That said, this book is pretty narrow compared to The Language Instinct, and pretty weedy (to continue with the above metaphor).

Whether his pet theories about language are correct or incorrect (dogs and cats or dead parrots? viz. a Monty Pythonesque parrot) seem less urgent to me than his vision. Specifically in this volume, examination of regular and irregular verbs leads the reader on a journey through the history of language, the physiology of the brain, the genetic triggers for certain language deficits, and the way we learn/fail to learn/mangle/invent language. By Pinker's reckoning, the irregular verbs are relics--words that were formed by ancient tongues according to ancient rules which have eroded through the millenia. Regular verbs are more modern and rule-bound. We have to memorize the irregulars because they don't adhere to modern rules--a fact that many of us are more likely to have confronted in learning a foreign language than in our native tongues (simply because we assimilated so many of our own irregulars as babes).

Steven Pinker has a wonderful sense of humor and is quite adept in wielding it to undergird his theorizing, which doubtless contributes to his popularity as a popularizer of science. Good stuff.

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2 of 8 people found the following review helpful

I should have know bettter

By Herbert W. Fawcett on April 5, 2013

Format: Paperback Verified Purchase

This is a pedantic exercise in the mechanics of language and doesn't use Dr. Pinker's abilities in the way I have come to expect.

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20 of 20 people found the following review helpful

Brilliant book inappropriately marketed

By Erik Fleischer on March 30, 2006

Format: Hardcover Verified Purchase

In Words and Rules, Pinker manages to condense and tie together an unbelievable amount of research. Reading this book carefully (i.e. really absorbing the densely packed information) and looking up some of its references is probably equivalent to a good undergraduate degree in linguistics.

Pinker has a knack for teasing apart all the different threads that make up a hugely complex subject, exploring each one with arguments and data from different academic currents, and then tying them up again so the reader can form a much better picture of the whole. And that's exactly what he does in this flawlessly well-written book.

The only problem with Words and Rules is its packaging: it's marketed as a popular science book for the general public, but unlike The Language Instinct and How the Mind Works, it can probably only be properly appreciated by either serious "language hobbyists" or linguists (I am both).

If you don't have a fairly good background, or at least a serious interest, in linguistics, you'll probably find this book too dense (at any rate, it's definitely not "light reading"). If you're a linguist (pure or applied), here's another real gem from Steven Pinker.

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Most Recent Customer Reviews

Interminable

Not exactly the most interesting or difficult topic, so there should be no reason for a long-winded narrative. Read more

Published 29 days ago by Alexander

Looking at regular and irregular verbs (and occasionally at regular...

Looking at regular and irregular verbs (and occasionally at regular and irregular nouns) Steven Pinker concludes that the irregular ones are memorized, in a way that... Read more

Published 11 months ago by Clinton Anderson

misleading endorsement

this book was published in 2011 however William Safire died in 2009 how can he give his endorsement in 2011 this is ridiculous!

Published 15 months ago by Chong Beng Lim

Amazing insight and knowledge of psychologists

I chose this book because it was recommended by my psychology professor and I loved it! I would defiantly recommend it to anyone who is interested in language and psychology. Read more

Published 21 months ago by Robert Munoz

Fascinating

Great book. It's not as much of a quick read as I had hoped but it was worth the money.

Published on January 7, 2013 by Andrew Cotton

not awesome

I read this with great interest as its core subject is of intense interest to me: where grammar rules come from, how they change, and what purpose they serve. Read more

Published on October 29, 2010 by Caraculiambro

Not bad but could be better

On pages 197/198 he argues that children make errors like "singed" and "goed" because the memory traces for the correct forms "sang" and "went" are weaker in children than in... Read more

Published on July 21, 2010 by M. Casanova

Great book!

This book is definitely fascinating, and Pinker weaves his sense of humor throughout explanations of why verbs, regular and irregular, are the way they are.

Published on March 14, 2007 by T. Chapman

My head still hurts

I have long been a Steven Pinker fan. It is great to have a neurologist appear who can explain the workings of the brain in a fairly easy to understand, often humorous and precise... Read more

Published on November 18, 2006 by George