The best linguistics books

What is my book about?

The Nazis tried to denigrate Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity as “Jewish science,” as opposed to the superior “Aryan science.” We rightly reject this as ideological nonsense, but it raises the interesting question of the cultural influences on Einstein’s thought. Plenty of other scientists were working around the ideas that Einstein published at the time he was thinking them. Why was it Einstein who put them down in print? When we learn science in school, it is taught as if laws of nature magically appeared in the brains of brilliant scientists fully formed. But scientists are people who lived at places at times and they way they thought was influenced by the world they lived in. We cannot separate science from history, politics, or religion. 

What is my book about?

Dr. Ecco is a mathematical detective. People come to him from all over the planet and pose questions that require logic and/or mathematics to solve, some of which involve danger. Unlike other detective novels, the reader has exactly the information that Dr. Ecco has, so you can match wits with the Greenwich Village detective.

What is my book about?

Logic Lists English as a series of eight books, strips language naked, pointing out it is a simplified code, made obvious in the film Windtalkers, starring Nicolas Cage. The native speakers used their own language to relay military secrets, which the enemy couldn’t understand as they didn’t know the linguistic rules being used.

The first volume, Rhyming Words, uses a vertical grid, to show common combinations of consonants (Br- / Bl- ) and vowel sounds horizontally (A / E / I / O / U). It is set out in this way as columns for teaching purposes in the classroom, repeating the sounds firstly, then later writing out the patterns shown. This format ensures changes in language are accommodated over the years as sounds won’t really alter, even if the spelling does.

What is my book about?

A Boob’s Life explores the surprising truth about women’s most popular body part with vulnerable, witty frankness and true nuggets of American culture that will resonate with everyone who has breasts – or loves them.

Author Leslie Lehr has gone from size AA to DDDDD and everything between, from puberty to motherhood, enhancement to cancer, and beyond. And she’s not alone—these are classic life stages for women. At turns funny and heartbreaking, A Boob’s Life explores both the joys and hazards inherent to living in a woman’s body. Lehr deftly blends her personal narrative with national history, starting in the 1960s with the women’s liberation movement and moving to the current feminist dialogue and what it means to be a woman. Her insightful and clever writing analyzes how America’s obsession with the female form has affected her own life’s journey and the psyche of all women today.

What is my book about?

Barry Green with W. Timothy Gallwey, the popular author of the Inner Game of Tennis, Inner Skiing, Golf, and Work. Together they have taken the same principles which proved so successful when used in sports and applied them to music. The Inner Game is designed to help every musician overcome obstacles, improve concentration, reduce nervousness, and paving the way for heightened performance.

Green explains how innate skills can be enhanced by focusing on the music rather than outer games of technique and awards. The technique can be summarized in 4 words: turn up the music and are used for the purpose of drowning out the shouts...that come from the interfering voices of doubt, fear, and judgment. Instead of listening to the inner voices, the musician focuses only on musical sounds that include their awareness, commitment, and trust skills.

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Satori, an arrogant yet alluring Chaos Magician, is heartbroken when Star tells him it is over. He performs a magical ritual to win her back, but accidentally brings Lilith, Mother of Demons, to Earth. How can Satori survive the demon’s wrath and reclaim the heart of his beloved?

Beautiful and vulnerable, Star has yet to discover her own power and strength. When she falls in love with the enchanting Lilith, her world descends into madness and violence. Satori’s strange world threatened her sanity, what then of Lilith’s? A sensuous story, full of dark fantasy and horror, that offers readers a glimpse into the seedier side of the Gothic subculture in Britain.

What is my book about?

Could I manage as well as they do? That’s the question that made me write After Tomorrow. I’d been learning about refugees in Chad, and how they cope with living in camps. Suddenly I thought, Suppose it was me? And then (because I’m a storyteller) Suppose it was a boy called Matt, who’s good at mending bikes…?

What if the pound collapsed and money stopped working? What if people started fighting over food? Would Matt and his family escape through the Channel Tunnel? What would happen when they arrived in France as refugees? I researched hard, to make sure the story was as realistic as possible. And the more I learned, the more scarily plausible it seemed…

What is my book about?

This book argues that we are currently witnessing a proliferation of meaningless research in the social sciences of no value to society. The explosion of published outputs creates a noisy, cluttered environment which makes meaningful research difficult, as different voices compete to capture the limelight even briefly. The result is a widespread cynicism among academics on the value of academic research, sometimes including their own. Publishing comes to be seen as a game of hits and misses, devoid of intrinsic meaning and value and of no wider social uses whatsoever. The book’s second part offers a range of proposals aimed at restoring meaning at the heart of social science research, and drawing social science back, addressing the major problems and issues that face our societies.

What is my book about?

Critical Thinking: The Basics is an accessible and engaging introduction to the field of critical thinking, drawing on philosophy, communication, and psychology. Emphasising its relevance to decision making (in personal, professional, and civic life), academic literacy, and personal development, this book supports the reader in understanding and developing the knowledge and skills needed to identify poor reasoning, construct strong arguments, and engage critically in dialogues.

With discussion questions/exercises and suggestions for further reading at the end of each chapter, this book is an essential read for students approaching the field of critical thinking for the first time, and for the general reader wanting to improve their thinking skills and decision-making abilities.

What is my book about?

Humanity's manifest destiny to control the galaxy was thwarted by a devastating event known as The Collision—an attack that left millions of humans dead and a young boy named Abraham burning with a lust for revenge. The veneer of an ecumenical interstellar society begins to crack as the revenge campaign against the Riskar, perpetrators of the Collision, leads to the discovery of an ancient war between two factions of humanity vying for control of the galaxy's most powerful military—with Abraham mysteriously at the center of it all. Abraham's future, and the future of the galaxy itself, depends on uncovering the origins of his mysterious heritage.