#pop linguistics

allthingslinguistic:

allthingslinguistic:

Looking for pop linguistics books or linguistics-related fiction to read, find in a library, ask for as a gift, or give to a language nerd in your life? Here’s an extensive list of books you might be interested in. 

New nonfiction books! 

• Because Internet by Gretchen McCulloch (my book about internet language, 2019)
• Language Unlimited by David Adger, 2019 
• Don’t Believe A Word by David Shariatmadari, 2019
  
• Babel: Around the World in 20 Languages by Gaston Dorren, 2018
• The Prodigal Tongue by Lynne Murphy (my livetweet), 2018
  

Recent general books 

• John McWhorter has many pop linguistics books, including notably: The Language Hoax, The Power of Babel,Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue,What Language Is,Word on the Street
• David Crystal also has many pop linguistics books, including more recently: the history of English spelling,A Little Book of Language (note that Crystal also writes “interesting facts about words” books, so check the description if this is a relevant factor for you)
  
• The Sense of Style by Steven Pinker (the one style book on this entire list, because he approaches it from a genuinely linguistic perspective: see my review here). 
  
• The Riddle of the Labyrinth by Margalit Fox (about cracking Linear B)
  
• You Are What You Speak by RL Greene  
  
• The Unfolding of Language by Guy Deutscher (about the history of language) 
  
• How Babies Talk by Roberta Michnick Golinkoff and Kathy Hirsh-Pasek
  
• In The Land of Invented Languages by Arika Okrent (my review)
  
• The Art of Language Invention by David J. Peterson (my livetweet)
• Word by Word by Kory Stamper, who also has a second book coming out! (my livetweet) 
• You’re The Only One I Can Tell by Deborah Tannen

Older general books 

(Most of these I read when I was getting into linguistics so I can vouch for them being interesting enough when I read them such that they’ve stuck in my mind many years later, but I’m not sure how they’d stack up on re-reading. Just so you know.)

• Steven Pinker’s pop linguistics books have gotten older but are still classics: The Language Instinct,Words and Rules,The Stuff of Thought
  
• Older David Crystal books: How Language Works,The Stories of English
• Verbatim (a collection of essays on pop linguistics, edited by Erin McKean - my comments)
  
• Talk, Talk, Talk by Jay Ingram 
  
• A Mouthful of Air by Anthony Burgess 
  
• Alpha Beta by John Man (about the history of the alphabet) 
• The Articulate Mammal by Jean Aitchison
  
• Deborah Tannen has several older highly readable books on conversation, including You Just Don’t Understand,That’s Not What I Meant!,You’re Wearing That?

Specific Topics

• Hearing Gesture by Susan Goldin-Meadow
• Talking Hands by Margalit Fox (my comments)
  
• The Language of Food by Dan Jurafsky
  
• Babel No More by Michael Erard
  
• Latin Alive: The Survival of Latin in English and the Romance Languages by Joseph Solodow (my review) 
  
• Predicting New Words by Allan Metcalf 
• Shady Characters by Keith Houston (about punctuation marks - my comments)
• Speculative Grammarian’s satirical linguistics book(my review - you should probably already know some linguistics before reading it though) 
  
• How We Talk by Nick Enfield (review on Superlinguo)
• An ABC for Baby Linguists (great for linguist parents!) 
• The Language Construction Kit by Mark Rosenfelder (conlangs, older)
  
• How to Keep Your Language Alive andLanguage Revitalization for Families, both by Leanne Hinton (see also Ola!, and my thoughts on it)
• The Signs of Language by Bellugi/Klima (a sign language classic, but readable)
  

Beginner-friendly textbooks

Comprehensive but more friendly than actual textbooks: 

• Linguistics for Dummies
  
• Linguistics for Everyone
  
• Introducing Linguistics: An Illustrated Guide 
  

Actual textbooks, still at an introductory level:

• Language Files
• Contemporary Linguistics (thefifth edition is also fine, and cheaper)
• iLanguage (previous edition is cheaper)
  
• Describing Morphosyntax is popular among budding conlangers 
  

LingFic

Fiction that contains a significant linguistic element, enjoyable for both practising linguists and language enthusiasts: 

• Ella Minnow Pea by Mark Dunn (my comments)
• The Last Samurai by Helen DeWitt (my livetweet)
  
• Ancillary Justice by Ann Leckie (my comments) and Left Hand of Darkness by Ursula K. LeGuin, both of which do interesting things with language & gender
• Carry On by Rainbow Rowell (my livetweet)
  
• Eunoia by Christian Bök (my comments). It’s entirely online here.
• Bel Canto by Ann Patchett 
  
• New Finnish Grammar by Diego Marani (reviewfrom@superlinguo​)
• Native Tongue trilogy by Suzette Haden Elgin 
• “The Story of Your Life” (short story) by Ted Chiang (the movie based on it is called Arrival and stars a linguist)
• A Clockwork Orange by Anthony Burgess
  
• Embassytown by China Miéville 
• TheLord of the Rings books
  
• See also more recommendations on the #lingfic hashtag andthis list at conlang.org 

Anyone else have pop linguistics books (or #lingfic) to recommend, or reviews to link to? I’ll try to keep this list updated as I hear of and review other books, old and new, so make sure to check out the source post andmy books tag if you’re viewing it as a reblog. There are some great additions in the extensive reblogs by Stan CareyandSuperlinguo.

Fiction Updates: 

• Too Like The Lightning by Ada Palmer (my livetweet)
• The Fifth SeasonandThe Obelisk Gate by N.K. Jemisin (my twolivetweets)
• PygmalionandMy Fair Lady are classics, although real linguists aren’t nearly as keen on “proper” English as Henry Higgins
• The Space Trilogy by C.S. Lewis features a philologist
• The Raven Tower by Ann Leckie (my livetweet) 

I also keep a list of linguistically interesting fiction (lingfic) on Goodreads. 

Keep reading

Revised and updated for another year!