The Life of Language: The Fascinating Ways Words are Born, Live & Die

By Sol Steinmetz and Barbara Ann Kipfer

If time travelers from the nineteenth century dropped in on us, our strange vocabulary would shock them just as much as our TVs, cars, and computers. Society changes, and so does its word stock. "The... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0375721134
• ISBN13: 9780375721137
• Release Date: July 2006
• Publisher: Random House Reference
• Length: 400 Pages
• Weight: 1.00 lbs.
• Dimensions: 8.2" x 0.9" x 5.5"

Customer Reviews

Outstanding Book

The Life of Language is an outstanding book. Its authors have done a masteful job of exploring the origins of words we use every day. In a lively, accessible writing style they consider not just the historical roots of our language but more modern phenomena such as what they call "acronymania," the increasing prevlalence of acronyms in contemporary discourse, and "cyberspeak," the many ways we combine "cyber" with other wrods to create new terminology ("cybersex," "cyberpunk," "cyberphobia," etc.) Anyone interested in the stories behind our words will be glad they bought this book.