Patterns of Language: Structure, Variation, Change

by Robbins Burling

Presents a comprehensive introduction to linguistics, This book includes chapters on variation and change in lexicon, phonology, and syntax. It also covers topics such as pidgins and creoles, first and second language acquisition, development of language in the human species, growth of writing, printing in information technology and others.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0121449203
• ISBN13: 9780121449209
• Release Date: January 1992
• Publisher: Emerald Group Publishing
• Length: 461 Pages
• Weight: 1.50 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.8" x 6.5" x 9.2"

Customer Reviews

good intro to linguistics

I had to read this book for my Intro to Linguistics course, and I thought it did a fairly decent job of going over all the basics. If you don't know anything about linguistics, you might want to take a look at this book, although it would still be helpful to have someone who does know something about it around to explain some things. The author's descriptions of what the phonetic symbols sound like don't always help very much. The organization of this book is a bit odd; the most obvious example is that phonetics isn't discussed in detail until Chapter 5, even though the author makes use of phonetic symbols in the previous chapters. If you read the book from the beginning to the end, you may get a little confused - reading the chapters out of order is practically a must. Also, there are far too many examples. I found myself skimming over a lot, because, after the first example, I understood what was being discussed and didn't need the next page or so of examples. The charts are wonderful, though, and there are a lot of them.