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Author Ostler, Nicholas.

Title Empires of the word : a language history of the world / Nicholas Ostler.

Imprint New York : HarperCollins Publishers, c2005.

Copies

Location Call No. OPAC Message Status
 Axe 3rd Floor Stacks  409 Os7e 2005    ---  Available
Edition 1st American ed.
Description xxi, 615 p. : ill., maps ; 24 cm.
Bibliography Includes bibliographical references (p. 579-589) and index.
Contents Part I: The nature of language history -- Themistocles' carpet -- What it takes to be a world language; or, you never can tell -- Part II: Languages by land -- The desert blooms: language innovation in the Middle East -- Triumphs of fertility: Egyptian and Chinese -- Charming like a creeper: the cultured career of Sanskrit -- Three thousand years of solipsism: the adventures of Greek -- Contesting Europe: Celt, Roman, German and Slav -- The first death of Latin -- Part III: Languages by sea -- The second death of Latin -- Usurpers of greatness: Spanish in the New World -- In the train of empire:Europe's languages abroad -- Microcosm or distorting mirror? the career of English -- Part IV: Languages today and tomorrow -- The current top twenty -- Looking ahead.
Summary An offbeat natural history of language takes readers from the educational and cultural innovators of Sumeria, to the resilience of Chinese, to the global spread of English, in a volume that offers linguistic perspectives on numerous past and present civilizations.
Subject Language and languages.
Historical linguistics.
ISBN 0066210860
9780066210865

 
    
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