Over a month ago, I got a review copy of Mikael Parkvall’s Limits of Language: Almost Everything You Didn’t Know You Didn’t Know About Language and Languages
Parkvall, a Swedish linguist, says in the foreword: “I hope that Limits of Language can show the uninitiated some of the incredible aspects that linguistics and human languages have to offer, teach beginners some of the basics of linguistics, but also to serve as a reference book for experienced linguists—here, the linguist can identify the extremes, and thereby judge to what extent his or her own language is ‘normal’.” (This last clause explains the title; I must admit I was disappointed that it was not from the Godard/Wittgenstein quote cited in this post, but you can’t have everything.) You can see the table of contents at the end of this LINGUIST List post; it includes things like “Language as a legal matter,” “Language in alternate history,” and “Classic example sentences” as well as basics like “Language change,” “Consonants,” and—close to my heart—”Language myths” (which starts with a subject dear to Geoff Pullum’s heart: “The legendary snow hoax”). But you can’t predict what’s going to be included in a section; under “Language change” we find “Bizarre sound change” (“Examples include */w/ → /q/, */j/ → /q/, */V/ → /ŋgV/, and even */s/ → /k/ before /e/ and /i/”), under “Place names” there’s a two-page discussion of American toponyms like Calnevari (California + Nevada + Arizona), and under “Written language” are “Frequent alphabet changes” and “Chromatographic writing” (a script used by the Edo of Nigeria in which “the color of the ovals is distinctive”). Wherever you open the book, you find some fascinating nugget like “An odd geolinguistic situation”:
The tiny Caribbean island of Saint-Barthélemy, or St. Barth, presents a remarkable linguistic fragmentation. Despite being a mere 10 kilometers across, and home to little more than 3 000 people, it has traditionally had at least four distinct languages. In the north-western part, a Norman patois has some 500-700 speakers, and in the east, a French-lexicon creole is used by 600-800 people. In the middle region, an archaic variety of French is now on the verge of extinction. In addition to this, in the administrative center of Gustavia, a black population, some 100 strong, speaks a local and slightly creolized variety of English. On top of this, standard French is the official language, and is increasingly used…. Understandably, this diversity requires isolation, and as late as in the 1940s, there were people in the northwestern village of Flamands who only visited Gustavia once a year. And yet, the distance between the two is about two kilometers.
(And there’s a map!) Under “Miscellaneous” on p. 375, after a brief explanation of Shaw’s “ghoti” = “fish,” we learn “Mark Okrand also included this as a deliberate pun in his creation Klingon (pp 157-158). The Klingon word for ‘fish’ is ghothI.” At the end there’s an extensive “Linguist’s Calendar” (on November 16 in 1974, “A puzzle for future Alien linguists to solve, a message containing information on mankind and the planet we inhabit is broadcast to the M13 star cluster, 50 000 light-years from us”) and a 15-page bibliography in small type. It’s fun to leaf through, and if you’re interested in pursuing a subject further, they point you in the right direction. What more could you ask?
Geoff Pullum wrote about the U.K. edition a couple of years ago, calling it “the ideal birthday present for the linguist in your life who you feel already has everything.” It would also, of course, be the ideal Christmas present for anyone who loves language and prefers facts to fancy.
I think you ought to add this as a customer’s review at amazon, because there’s no information about the book there (except that people who bought it also bought Pullum & Liberman’s Far From The Madding Gerund).
Is the new edition any different? I see that the number of pages has increased according to Amazon but that might just be down to more generous leading and margins.
No idea—I haven’t seen the U.K. edition.
Thanks for pointing me to your previous essay, Hat — superb. I read a sampling of the other essays, but most of them struck me as bilge, so I gave up.
This is a No Bilge Zone.
Being the author of the above-mentioned book (thanks a lot for the kind words about it!), I can tell Graham Asher and anybody else who might be interested that the American version is different only in 1) layout (made by a pro this time), 2) American rather than British spelling, and 3) correction of the most embarassing errors and typos.
Since finishing the book, though, I have continued collecting material for a future, more extensively revamped and expanded version, so there will hopfully be a “Limits 2.0” in a couple of years. (of course, all suggestions are welcome).
I’m delighted to hear it, and I wish more publishers would follow that plan.
Parkvall’s book has got the best two recommendations a book of that type could get, Hat’s and Pullum’s, so I’m sure to buy it.
Parkvall’s book has got the best two recommendations a book of that type could get, Hat’s and Pullum’s, so I’m sure to buy it.
Especially considering that part of the book is devoted to exposing certain factoids as language myths, it would be unfortunate if it spread the myth that Shaw invented “ghoti”. The myth was shown to be so in http://languagelog.ldc.upenn.edu/nll/?p=81 and http://languagehat.com/archives/003105.php
“Limits 2.0”
Wouldn’t a sequel make more money–call it, say “outer limits of language” if that isn’t copyrighted, or “infinities of language”, if that fits the philosophy. Then everyone who bought the second book would buy the first book too, in an only slightly revised reissue with a new ISBN, of course, maybe with someone well known writing a unique essay in the introduction or somesuch, to dry up the secondhand market. I don’t actually know how these things work, mind you, I’m just guessing.
I happened to see Limits of Language in the public library yesterday, after reading this post, so I got it out. It looks like a lot of fun (even if, yes, the UK edition’s formatting is a little unusual) so thanks for the recommendation.
(Incidentally, I was at the library returning Deutscher’s The Unfolding of Language. He did change the joke to Minsk/Pinsk in the paperback, as promised here.)
He did change the joke to Minsk/Pinsk in the paperback, as promised here.
Excellent!
I should kill this careless moron where he stands. In fact, the word is ghotI’: glottal stop at the end, and no /x/ — Klingon has very, very strict rules on the composition of syllables (…though apparently none whatsoever on the composition of words). The /t/ is aspirated (you must not be afraid to spit your conversation partner in the face), but that’s not phonemically distinctive and not written.
In sum: [ʁotʰɪʔ].
…where /x/ should better be called /χ/, though that doesn’t really matter.
Note to the author, who has visited the thread and may again: David’s “careless moron” is merely an assumption of Klingon attitudes, which of course tend toward the aggressive, and is (I hope) not actually directed at you in David’s propria persona.
Klingons can be mean indeed, but any corrections, including those from outer space, are appreciated.