Founding Grammars

Founding Grammars PDF 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.

Founding Grammars

Founding Grammars PDF Author: Rosemarie Ostler
Publisher: Macmillan + ORM
ISBN: 1466846283
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 289

Get Book Here

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.

An Introduction to an English Grammar: containing I. A compendious way to master any language in the world. II. A particular account of those eastern and northern tongues, grammars of which are not publish'd in the collection to which this attempt belongs ... III. A dissertation on the Saxon. IV. A grammar of it. Being number X., of the Complete Linguist, etc

An Introduction to an English Grammar: containing I. A compendious way to master any language in the world. II. A particular account of those eastern and northern tongues, grammars of which are not publish'd in the collection to which this attempt belongs ... III. A dissertation on the Saxon. IV. A grammar of it. Being number X., of the Complete Linguist, etc PDF Author: John HENLEY (called “Orator Henley.”.)
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 248

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The United States of English

The United States of English PDF 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.

The Hidden History of Coined Words

The Hidden History of Coined Words PDF Author: Ralph Keyes
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190466774
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 393

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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.

Murray's English Grammar Simplified

Murray's English Grammar Simplified PDF Author: Allen Fisk
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : English language
Languages : en
Pages : 194

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Universal Grammar and Narrative Form

Universal Grammar and Narrative Form PDF Author: David Herman
Publisher: Duke University Press
ISBN: 9780822316688
Category : Language Arts & Disciplines
Languages : en
Pages : 298

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Book Description
In a major rethinking of the functions, methods, and aims of narrative poetics, David Herman exposes important links between modernist and postmodernist literary experimentation and contemporary language theory. Ultimately a search for new tools for narrative theory, his work clarifies complex connections between science and art, theory and culture, and philosophical analysis and narrative discourse. Following an extensive historical overview of theories about universal grammar, Herman examines Joyce's Ulysses, Kafka's The Trial, and Woolf's Between the Acts as case studies of modernist literary narratives that encode grammatical principles which were (re)fashioned in logic, linguistics, and philosophy during the same period. Herman then uses the interpretation of universal grammar developed via these modernist texts to explore later twentieth-century cultural phenomena. The problem of citation in the discourses of postmodernism, for example, is discussed with reference to syntactic theory. An analysis of Peter Greenaway's The Cook, The Thief, His Wife, and Her Lover raises the question of cinematic meaning and draws on semantic theory. In each case, Herman shows how postmodern narratives encode ideas at work in current theories about the nature and function of language. Outlining new directions for the study of language in literature, Universal Grammar and Narrative Form provides a wealth of information about key literary, linguistic, and philosophical trends in the twentieth century.

Portuguese Hebrew Grammars and Grammarians

Portuguese Hebrew Grammars and Grammarians PDF Author: Moses Bensabat Amzalak
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Hebrew language
Languages : en
Pages : 58

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Handbook of Graph Grammars and Computing by Graph Transformation

Handbook of Graph Grammars and Computing by Graph Transformation PDF Author: Grzegorz Rozenberg
Publisher: World Scientific
ISBN: 9812384723
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 570

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Book Description
Graph grammars originated in the late 60s, motivated by considerations about pattern recognition and compiler construction. Since then the list of areas which have interacted with the development of graph grammars has grown quite impressively. Besides the aforementioned areas it includes software specification and development, VLSI layout schemes, database design, modeling of concurrent systems, massively parallel computer architectures, logic programming, computer animation, developmental biology, music composition, visual languages, and many others. The area of graph grammars and graph transformations generalizes formal language theory based on strings and the theory of term rewriting based on trees. As a matter of fact within the area of graph grammars, graph transformation is considered a fundamental programming paradigm where computation includes specification, programming, and implementation.

Handbook Of Graph Grammars And Computing By Graph Transformation, Vol 1: Foundations

Handbook Of Graph Grammars And Computing By Graph Transformation, Vol 1: Foundations PDF Author: Grzegorz Rozenberg
Publisher: World Scientific
ISBN: 9814498106
Category : Computers
Languages : en
Pages : 570

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Book Description
Graph grammars originated in the late 60s, motivated by considerations about pattern recognition and compiler construction. Since then the list of areas which have interacted with the development of graph grammars has grown quite impressively. Besides the aforementioned areas it includes software specification and development, VLSI layout schemes, database design, modeling of concurrent systems, massively parallel computer architectures, logic programming, computer animation, developmental biology, music composition, visual languages, and many others.The area of graph grammars and graph transformations generalizes formal language theory based on strings and the theory of term rewriting based on trees. As a matter of fact within the area of graph grammars, graph transformation is considered a fundamental programming paradigm where computation includes specification, programming, and implementation.Over the last 25-odd years graph grammars have developed at a steady pace into a theoretically attractive and well-motivated research field. In particular, they are now based on very solid foundations, which are presented in this volume. Volume 1 of the indispensable Handbook of Graph Grammars and Computing by Graph Transformations includes a state-of-the-art presentation of the foundations of all the basic approaches to rule-based graph specification and transformation: algebraic approach, logic approach, node-based rewriting, (hyper)edge-based rewriting, programmed graph rewriting, and 2-structures. The book has been written in a tutorial/survey style to enhance its usefulness.

The Grammar of English Grammars

The Grammar of English Grammars PDF Author: Goold Brown
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : English language
Languages : en
Pages : 1086

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Book Description