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Author: Rosemarie Ostler
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 1250046122
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 320
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Book Description
"Standard grammar and accurate spelling are widely considered hallmarks of a good education, but their exact definitions are much more contentious -- capable of inciting a full-blown grammar war at the splice of a comma, battles readily visible in the media and online in the comments of blogs and chat rooms. With an accessible and enthusiastic journalistic approach, Ostler considers these grammatical shibboleths, tracing current debates back to America's earliest days, an era when most families owned only two books -- the Bible and a grammar primer. Along the way, she investigates colorful historical characters on both sides of the grammar debate in her efforts to unmask the origins of contemporary speech." --
Author: Rosemarie Ostler
Publisher: Macmillan
ISBN: 1250046122
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 320
Get Book Here
Book Description
"Standard grammar and accurate spelling are widely considered hallmarks of a good education, but their exact definitions are much more contentious -- capable of inciting a full-blown grammar war at the splice of a comma, battles readily visible in the media and online in the comments of blogs and chat rooms. With an accessible and enthusiastic journalistic approach, Ostler considers these grammatical shibboleths, tracing current debates back to America's earliest days, an era when most families owned only two books -- the Bible and a grammar primer. Along the way, she investigates colorful historical characters on both sides of the grammar debate in her efforts to unmask the origins of contemporary speech." --
Author: Rosemarie Ostler
Publisher: Macmillan + ORM
ISBN: 1466846283
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 289
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Book Description
A “lively and revealing” history of America’s obsession with grammar—from the debate over double negatives to the influence of frontier vernacular (Kirkus Reviews). Standard grammar and accurate spelling are widely considered hallmarks of a good education, but their exact definitions are much more contentious—capable of inciting a full-blown grammar war at the splice of a comma. With an accessible and enthusiastic approach, Ostler considers these grammatical shibboleths, tracing current debates back to America’s earliest days, an era when most families owned only two books—the Bible and a grammar primer. Along the way, she investigates colorful historical characters on both sides of the grammar debate in her efforts to unmask the origins of contemporary speech. Linguistic founding fathers like Noah Webster, Tory expatriate Lindley Murray, and post-Civil War literary critic Richard Grant White, all play a featured role in creating the rules we’ve come to use, and occasionally discard, throughout the years. Founding Grammars is for curious readers who want to know where grammar rules have come from, where they’ve been, and where they might go next.
Author: Rosemarie Ostler
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0197647316
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 305
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Book Description
The story of how English became American -- and how it became Southern, Bostonian, Californian, African-American, Chicano, elite, working-class, urban, rural, and everything in between By the time of the Revolution, the English that Americans spoke was recognizably different from the British variety. Americans added dozens of new words to the language, either borrowed from Native Americans (raccoon, persimmon, caucus) or created from repurposed English (backwoods, cane brake, salt lick). Americans had their own pronunciations (bath rhymed with hat, not hot) and their own spelling (honor, not honour), not to mention a host of new expressions that grew out of the American landscape and culture (blaze a trail, back track, pull up stakes). Americans even invented their own slang, like stiff as a ringbolt to mean drunk. American English has continued to grow and change ever since. The United States of English tells the engrossing tale of how the American language evolved over four hundred years, explaining both how and why it changed and which parts of the "mother tongue" it preserved (I guess was heard in the British countryside long before it became a typical Americanism). Rosemarie Ostler approaches American English as part of the larger story of American history and culture, starting with what we know about the first colonists and their speech. Drawing on the latest research, she explores the roots of regional dialects, the differences between British and American language use, the sources of American slang, the development of African American English, current trends in political language, and much more. Plentiful examples of the American vernacular, past and present, bring the language to life and make for an engaging as well as enlightening read.
Author: Ralph Keyes
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190466782
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 320
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Book Description
Successful word-coinages--those that stay in currency for a good long time--tend to conceal their beginnings. We take them at face value and rarely when and where they were first minted. Engaging, illuminating, and authoritative, Ralph Keyes's The Hidden History of Coined Words explores the etymological underworld of terms and expressions and uncovers plenty of hidden gems. He also finds some fascinating patterns, such as that successful neologisms are as likely to be created by chance as by design. A remarkable number of new words were coined whimsically, originally intended to troll or taunt. Knickers, for example, resulted from a hoax; big bang from an insult. Casual wisecracking produced software, crowdsource, and blog. More than a few resulted from happy accidents, such as typos, mistranslations, and mishearing (bigly and buttonhole), or from being taken entirely out of context (robotics). Neologizers (a Thomas Jefferson coinage) include not just scholars and writers but cartoonists, columnists, children's book authors. Wimp originated with a book series, as did goop, and nerd from a book by Dr. Seuss. Coinages are often contested, controversy swirling around such terms as gonzo, mojo, and booty call. Keyes considers all contenders, while also leading us through the fray between new word partisans, and those who resist them strenuously. He concludes with advice about how to make your own successful coinage. The Hidden History of Coined Words will appeal not just to word mavens but history buffs, trivia contesters, and anyone who loves the immersive power of language.
Author: John HENLEY (called “Orator Henley.”.)
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 248
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Book Description
Author: Mary-Kate Mackey
Publisher: Red Wheel/Weiser
ISBN: 1632659387
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 265
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Book Description
A veteran writing teacher shares techniques and exercises to help anyone who struggles with written communication create effective and engaging content. In almost any career, you must know how to write—even if it’s not part of your job description. But if you are a reluctant writer, producing even the simplest memo may be a struggle. Write Better Right Now is the springboard to get you ahead in any job, passion project, or situation that requires writing skills. No matter what you are called upon to do—blog posts, speeches, web content, press releases, or more—this step-by-step manual gives you the solid techniques you need to get the task done. Write Better Right Now works because it is: —Short: It takes a concise approach, from first thoughts to final edits, and its mix-and-match structure means you only have to read the sections you need. —Practical: It is loaded with summations, short cuts, tips, cheat sheets, and hands-on exercises. —Solution-driven: Knowing where you’ve gone wrong is half the battle. Write Better Right Now offers you the tools to identify your own problem patterns and choose the quickest and most appropriate fixes. You can improve your writing today. With straightforward guidance, Write Better Right Now is the quick read for productive people who need to create clear and crisp communication—right now.
Author: Lynne Murphy
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 1524704881
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 370
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Book Description
CHOSEN BY THE ECONOMIST AS A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR An American linguist teaching in England explores the sibling rivalry between British and American English “English accents are the sexiest.” “Americans have ruined the English language.” Such claims about the English language are often repeated but rarely examined. Professor Lynne Murphy is on the linguistic front line. In The Prodigal Tongue she explores the fiction and reality of the special relationship between British and American English. By examining the causes and symptoms of American Verbal Inferiority Complex and its flipside, British Verbal Superiority Complex, Murphy unravels the prejudices, stereotypes and insecurities that shape our attitudes to our own language. With great humo(u)r and new insights, Lynne Murphy looks at the social, political and linguistic forces that have driven American and British English in different directions: how Americans got from centre to center, why British accents are growing away from American ones, and what different things we mean when we say estate, frown, or middle class. Is anyone winning this war of the words? Will Yanks and Brits ever really understand each other?
Author: Tiago Timponi Torrent
Publisher: John Benjamins Publishing Company
ISBN: 9027257523
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 182
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Book Description
Since its foundation in the 1980's, Construction Grammar has been crossing the traditionally imposed borders. From superimposed levels of analysis to the lexicon-grammar continuum, the constructionist approach to language has been built by, quoting Charles Fillmore, "the insistence on seeing specific grammatical patterns as serving given semantic (and often pragmatic) purposes, and in the effort to construct a uniform theory capable of presenting both the simplest and most general aspects of language and the large world of complex grammatical structures". In this volume, five chapters derived from the plenary talks at the 9th International Conference on Construction Grammar provide a sample of the bridges the insistence and effort of construction grammarians have built in the past three decades with other analytical models – namely Cognitive Grammar and Collostructional Analysis –, perspectives – Diachronic Construction Grammar – and applications – Language Pedagogy and Natural Language Understanding. Originally published as special issue of Constructions and Frames 12:1 (2020).
Author: Jess McHugh
Publisher: Penguin
ISBN: 1524746649
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 433
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Book Description
“An elegant, meticulously researched, and eminently readable history of the books that define us as Americans. For history buffs and book-lovers alike, McHugh offers us a precious gift.”—Jake Halpern, Pulitzer Prize winner and New York Times bestselling author “With her usual eye for detail and knack for smart storytelling, Jess McHugh takes a savvy and sensitive look at the 'secret origins' of the books that made and defined us. . . . You won't want to miss a one moment of it.”—Brian Jay Jones, author of Becoming Dr. Seuss and the New York Times bestselling Jim Henson The true, fascinating, and remarkable history of thirteen books that defined a nation Surprising and delightfully engrossing, Americanon explores the true history of thirteen of the nation’s most popular books. Overlooked for centuries, our simple dictionaries, spellers, almanacs, and how-to manuals are the unexamined touchstones for American cultures and customs. These books sold tens of millions of copies and set out specific archetypes for the ideal American, from the self-made entrepreneur to the humble farmer. Benjamin Franklin’s Autobiography, How to Win Friends and Influence People, Webster's Dictionary, Emily Post’s Etiquette: Americanon looks at how these ubiquitous books have updated and reemphasized potent American ideals—about meritocracy, patriotism, or individualism—at crucial moments in history. Old favorites like the Old Farmer’s Almanac and Betty Crocker’s Picture Cook Book are seen in this new way—not just as popular books but as foundational texts that shaped our understanding of the American story. Taken together, these books help us understand how their authors, most of them part of a powerful minority, attempted to construct meaning for the majority. Their beliefs and quirks—as well as personal interests, prejudices, and often strange personalities—informed the values and habits of millions of Americans, woven into our cultural DNA over generations of reading and dog-earing. Yet their influence remains uninvestigated--until now. What better way to understand a people than to look at the books they consumed most, the ones they returned to repeatedly, with questions about everything from spelling to social mobility to sex. This fresh and engaging book is American history as you’ve never encountered it before.
Author: Peter Martin
Publisher: Princeton University Press
ISBN: 0691210179
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 370
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Book Description
Peter Martin recounts the patriotic fervor in the early American republic to produce a definitive national dictionary that would rival Samuel Johnson's 1755 Dictionary of the English Language. But what began as a cultural war of independence from Britain devolved into a battle among lexicographers, authors, scholars, and publishers, all vying for dictionary supremacy and shattering forever the dream of a unified American language.
