Presents an investigation into the evolution of language. This book exposes the elusive forces of creation at work in human communication. Along the way, it teaches why German maidens are neuter while German turnips are female, why we have feet not foots, and how great changes of pronunciation may result from simple laziness.

This handbook provides a critical state-of-the-art overview of work in linguistic typology. It examines the directions and challenges of current research and shows how these reflect and inform work on the development of linguistic theory. It describes what typologists have revealed about language in general and discovered (and continue to discover) about the richly various ways in which meaning and expression are achieved in the world's languages.

Typological research extends across all branc...

This book provides an introduction to compositional semantics and to the syntax/semantics interface. It is rooted within the tradition of model theoretic semantics, and develops an explicit fragment of both the syntax and semantics of a rich portion of English. Professor Jacobson adopts a Direct Compositionality approach, whereby the syntax builds the expressions while the semantics simultaneously assigns each a model-theoretic interpretation.

Alongside this approach, the author also presents...

Sociolinguistics and Second Language Acquisition is a comprehensive textbook that bridges the gap between the fields of sociolinguistics and second language acquisition, exploring the variety of ways in which social context influences the acquisition of a second language. It reviews basic principles of sociolinguistics, provides a unified account of the multiple theoretical approaches to social factors in second languages, summarizes the growing body of empirical research, including examples ...

Media Literacy teaches students how to navigate through the overwhelming flood of information found in today's media-saturated world. Author W. James Potter presents examples and facts to help students understand how the media operate, how they attract attention, and how they influence the public.

Now in its third edition, The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language provides the most comprehensive coverage of the history, structure and worldwide use of English. Fully updated and expanded, with a fresh redesigned layout, and over sixty audio resources to bring language extracts to life, it covers all aspects of the English language including the history of English, with new pages on Shakespeare's vocabulary and pronunciation, updated statistics on global English use that now cove...

Get to the heart of fake news and brush up on your media literacy skills as you explore the media landscape of today, and where it all came from, using the current and relevant research found in Media & Culture.

A student-friendly companion guide that builds the skills, habits, and strategies university writers need to complete the most common types of reading and writing assignments. The Everyday Writer empowers writers and strengthens their skills, creating awareness of the choices they have and encouraging reflection on the choices they make. It invites us to learn, practice, and examine the expectations of academic writing but it also honours the varieties of English we use and the experimenting ...

Introduction to Pragmatics guides students through traditional and new approaches in the field, focusing particularly on phenomena at the elusive semantics/pragmatics boundary to explore the role of context in linguistic communication. Offers students an accessible introduction and an up-to-date survey of the field, encompassing both established and new approaches to pragmatics. Addresses the traditional range of topics - such as implicature, reference, presupposition, and speech acts - as we...

A critical introduction to meaning and power in an age of participatory culture, social media and digital platforms. Helps students to understand the central role media play in the social world, and how they can become informed media citizens themselves.