The English Languages

by Tom McArthur

Book Overview

Hundreds of millions of people use English every day everywhere in the world, but may or may not succeed in understanding each other. Despite the success of its standard form (or forms) in many... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0521485827
• ISBN13: 9780521485821
• Release Date: April 1998
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Length: 272 Pages
• Weight: 0.70 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 5.5" x 8.5"

Customer Reviews

This is an academic book and an historiographical study, not a phrasebook

As the previous review notes, this book is not really a "guide" to the various national varieties of the English language. Nor is it a phrase book. It won't help you very much in your travels. Rather, this is an historical study about different views on, and attitudes towards, the English language(s). So, for example, McArthur outlines how the English language has come to be periodized ( i.e., as "Old" English, "Middle" English, and "Modern" English). He analyzes different "models" of the language (e.g. "container" models, "organic" models) and how it is viewed globally (as different national "Englishes," or as off-shoots of British or American, or as various regional English standards, etc.). And he critically investigates the unique position of Scots English (dialect of English or separate language?) and the global implications of world English (will English break up into many national languages the way Latin did?). This is an excellent historiographical survey and it has wonderful excerpts from other sources about the history and contemporary extent of the English language. Taken for what it is intended to be, it's an excellent book. But don't be fooled by the title -- it's not a Berlitz guide.

Intriguing

This book is an intriguing analysis of the modern situation, wherein disparate dialects of English are evolving into increasingly distinct dialects, arguably distinct languages.