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Henry Hitchings
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Publisher | John Murray | ||
ISBN | 978-071956455 | ||
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Reviewer
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Vicky
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Synopsis
Communication is essential to our lives, but how often do we stop to think about where the words we use have come from? Have you ever thought about which words in English have been borrowed from Arabic, French or Dutch? Try admiral, landscape and marmalade just for starters. The Secret Life of Words is a wide-ranging account not only of the history of English, but also of how words witness history, reflect social change and remind us of our turbulent past. Henry Hitchings delves into our promiscuous language and reveals how and why it has absorbed words from more than 350 other languages many originating from the most unlikely of places, such as shampoo from Hindi and kiosk from Turkish.
From the Norman Conquest to the present day, Hitchings narrates the story of English as an archive of our human experience and uncovers the secrets behind everyday words. This is a celebration of our language; after reading it, you will never again take the words we use for granted.
Review
Wow! This is a very densely written book about how we seems to have collected numerous foreign words into the English language and made them our own. For instance shampoo is a Hindi word - the origin from the verb champna - to knead or press to relieve fatigue and stimulate circulation! Isn't that why we enjoy having our heads massaged and washed in a Hairdressing Salon!
Also Propaganda wasn't a political word as we know and understand it now, but a specialist term for the promotion of the Christian Faith!
Everytime we the British went and explored far flung foreign countries we came back with new words and incorporated them into the English language, making this is as much a history lesson on culture as well as words.
A book to enjoy reading slowly to take in all the history and meanings of all the words and how the cultures they came from enriched our language.
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