The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language

by David Crystal

• ISBN13: 9780521559676
• ISBN10: 0521559677
• Edition: 2nd
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 1997-02-13
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

This second edition of The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language presents a mass of new information and introduces the subject of language to a fresh generation of students and general readers. The first edition of the book is probably the most successful general study of language ever published. This second edition extends the range of coverage to include advances in areas like machine translation, speech interaction with machines, and language teaching. There is new material on acoustics, physiological concepts of language, and World English, and a complete update of the language distribution maps, language-speaking statistics, a table of the world's languages, and further reading. All geopolitical material has been revised to take account of boundary changes. The book has been redesigned and is presented for the first time in full colour, with new pictures and maps added.

Table of Contents

Part I. Popular Ideas about Language: 1. The prescriptive tradition

2. The equality of languages

3. The magic of language

4. The functions of language

5. Language and thought

Part II. Language and Identity: 6. Physical identity

7. Psychological identity

8. Geographical identity

8. Ethnic and national identity

10. Social identity

11. Contextual identity

12. Stylistic identity and literature

Part III. The Structure of Language: 13. Linguistic levels

14. Typology and universals

15. The statistical structure of language

16. Grammar

17. Semantics

18. Dictionaries

19. Names

20. Discourses and text

21. Pragmatics

Part IV. The Medium of Language: Speaking and Listening: 22. The anatomy and physiology of speech

23. The acoustics of speech

24. The instrumental 25. Speech reception

26. Speech interaction with machines

27. The sounds of speech

28. The linguistic use of sound

29. Suprasegmentals

30. Sound symbolism

Part V. The Medium of Language: Writing and Reading: 31. Written and spoken language

32. Graphic expression

33. Graphology

34. The process of reading and writing

Part VI. The Medium of Language: Signing and Seeing: 35. Sign language

36. Sign language structure

37. Types of sign language

Part VII. Child Language Acquisition: 38. Investigating children's language

39. The first year

40. Phonological development

41. Grammatical development

42. Semantic development

43. Pragmatic development

44. Language development in school

Part VIII. Language, Brain and Handicap: 45. Language and the brain

46. Language handicap

Part IX. The Languages of the World: 47. How many languages?

48. How many speakers?

49. The origins of language

50. Families of languages

51. The Indo-European family

52. Other families

53. Language isolates

54. Language change

55. Pidgins and creoles

Part X. Language in the World: 56. The language barrier

57. Translating and interpreting

58. Artificial languages

59. World languages

60. Multilingualism

61. Language planning

62. Foreign language learning and teaching

63. Language for special purposes

Part XI. Language and Communication: 64. Language and other communication systems

65. Linguistics

Appendices.