Why am I passionate about this?
I have been a Professor of Middle Eastern Studies and Linguistics at Dartmouth College since 1997. Previously: Professor of Hebrew at London University. BA Oxford, Ph.D. London. Author/co-author of seven books, including The Story of Hebrew (Princeton, 2017) – one of CHOICE Magazine’s 'Outstanding Academic Titles for 2017', a Princeton University Press nomination for the Pulitzer Prize for nonfiction – and (co-author Jon Schommer) A Screenful of Sugar? Prescription Drug Websites Investigated. Over 80 papers on language and its social and political impact, in particular in pharmaceutical and financial literacy.
Lewis' book list on the story of a language
Why did Lewis love this book?
There was probably never a language documentary as compelling as The Story of English, and the companion book The Story of English was an inspiration for my own book – and my title.
How could the language of a small out-of-the-way island go global and become the entire world’s second language? Conquest? (that’s a plus and a minus) Dysfunctional spelling and crazy grammar? (joke) Political and cultural good fortune? (Definitely.) But what else? And to what ends?
And this language ‘game’ has had so many players besides the English – the Scots, the Irish, the Americans, Africa, and Asia. And of course, 35 years ago no one could have imagined how many more global roles English would be playing.
1 author picked The Story of English as one of their favorite books, and they share why you should read it.
Now revised, The Story of English is the first book to tell the whole story of the English language. Originally paired with a major PBS miniseries, this book presents a stimulating and comprehensive record of spoken and written English—from its Anglo-Saxon origins some two thousand years ago to the present day, when English is the dominant language of commerce and culture with more than one billion English speakers around the world. From Cockney, Scouse, and Scots to Gulla, Singlish, Franglais, and the latest African American slang, this sweeping history of the English language is the essential introduction for anyone who…
- Coming soon!