Inventing English : a portable history of the language

Resource Information

The work Inventing English : a portable history of the language represents a distinct intellectual or artistic creation found in San Francisco Public Library. This resource is a combination of several types including: Work, Language Material, Books.

Label

Inventing English : a portable history of the language

Title remainder

a portable history of the language

Statement of responsibility

Seth Lerer

Creator

• Lerer, Seth, 1955-

Contributor

• hoopla digital

Subject

• English language -- Etymology
• English language -- History
• English language -- Middle English, 1100-1500
• Electronic books
• Linguistics
• English language -- Old English, ca. 450-1100

Language

eng

Summary

Why is there such a striking difference between English spelling and English pronunciation? How did our seemingly relatively simple grammar rules develop? What are the origins of regional dialect, literary language, and everyday speech, and what do they have to do with you? Seth Lerer's Inventing English is a masterful, engaging history of the English language from the age of Beowulf to the rap of Eminem. Many have written about the evolution of our grammar, pronunciation, and vocabulary, but only Lerer situates these developments in the larger history of English, America, and literature. Lerer begins in the seventh century with the poet Caedmon learning to sing what would become the earliest poem in English. He then looks at the medieval scribes and poets who gave shape to Middle English. He finds the traces of the Great Vowel Shift in the spelling choices of letter writers of the fifteenth century and explores the achievements of Samuel Johnson's Dictionary of 1755 and The Oxford English Dictionary of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. He describes the differences between English and American usage and, through the example of Mark Twain, the link between regional dialect and race, class, and gender. Finally, he muses on the ways in which contact with foreign languages, popular culture, advertising, the Internet, and e-mail continue to shape English for future generations. Each concise chapter illuminates a moment of invention-a time when people discovered a new form of expression or changed the way they spoke or wrote. In conclusion, Lerer wonders whether globalization and technology have turned English into a world language and reflects on what has been preserved and what has been lost. A unique blend of historical and personal narrative, Inventing English is the surprising tale of a language that is as dynamic as the people to whom it belongs

Cataloging source

Midwest

Dewey number

420.9

Index

no index present

Literary form

non fiction

Nature of contents

dictionaries

Target audience

adult