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This book looks at how language has evolved around the globe from ancestral proto-languages to our recognisable modern tongues. It demonstrates how language has been shaped by social and cultural influences, and even explains how our anatomy affects the articulation, and therefore evolution, of words. Discover the surprising stories behind the origin of the written word, the difficulties of decipherment and the challenge of inventing from scratch languages such as Dothraki.
Combining expert analysis with accessible narrative and fun illustrations, The Secret Life of Language makes even the complex topics of philology, morphology and phonology easy to understand.
Simon Pulleyn fell in love with languages at school and has been studying them ever since. He read Latin and Ancient Greek at Oxford taking Indo-European Comparative Philology and General Linguistics as his special subject. His doctorate was on prayer in ancient Greek religion and made use of much comparative material from other languages and cultures. He taught Classics at Oxford for almost a decade. He has just completed a large book on Homer's Odyssey for Oxford University Press. He is also a Fellow of the Oxford Institute for Animal Ethics and has lectured and published on topics concerning animals in classical antiquity.
Book Binding
Paperback
Book Dimensions
18.8 x 1.6 x 24.4 cm
Book Format
Unabridged
Book Genre
Reference
Book ISBN
9781788400244
Book Page Count
192
Book Publication Date
30th August 2018
Book Publisher
Cassell