Product Description
We use language every day. But when did you last stop to think about what you are saying? Was the expression you've just used coined yesterday, or has it been kicking around in the English language for hundreds of years? Why does English have several words for one thing, and lack words which we actually need? (When someone says 'we are doomed!' a word for 'we' meaning 'us but not you' would really be appreciated.)
The Little book of English is a selection of writings on the English language, each of which highlights controversial or quirky aspects of English you might never have thought of before - for example:
Why are millennia described with a foreign plural but pizzas with a standard 's'?
How many words in English come from the Vikings?
Where do new words and expressions come from?
What is 'a perfect English accent'?
Is the English language evolving - or devolving?
When does grammar have rules, and when are the 'rules' only guidelines?
Questions such as this examined in short articles that are intriguing and sometimes provocative, scholarly but never academic. You'll find topics to discuss over the coffee table, and to debate with friends. Anyone who has read or listened to English from even fifty years ago knows that our language is changing fast as it moves into the future. Why not relax and enjoy a learned and amusing commentary on the journey?
The Little book of English is a selection of writings on the English language, each of which highlights controversial or quirky aspects of English you might never have thought of before - for example:
Why are millennia described with a foreign plural but pizzas with a standard 's'?
How many words in English come from the Vikings?
Where do new words and expressions come from?
What is 'a perfect English accent'?
Is the English language evolving - or devolving?
When does grammar have rules, and when are the 'rules' only guidelines?
Questions such as this examined in short articles that are intriguing and sometimes provocative, scholarly but never academic. You'll find topics to discuss over the coffee table, and to debate with friends. Anyone who has read or listened to English from even fifty years ago knows that our language is changing fast as it moves into the future. Why not relax and enjoy a learned and amusing commentary on the journey?
