Language: History & General Works

Elegant, erudite and utterly up to date, this book contains more than 1500 unique New Zealand words and expressions. From afakasi to zespri, the Bo...

From Monte Carlo to Shanghai, Bikini to Samarra, Around the World in 80 Words is a whimsical voyage through the far-flung reaches of the English la...

It's the most simple, unassuming, innocent-looking verb: 'to be'. Yet it is jam-packed with more different meanings, forms, and uses than any other...

Singlish is the colloquial variety of English spoken in Singapore. It has sparked much public debate, but so far the complex question of what Singl...

Written originally for the education of the polite London classes in canting the language of thieves and ruffians should they be so unlucky as to...

This book is a selection of the papers presented at the International Symposium on the History of the Hebrew Language on 1617 October 2012. The sel...

Chinese, one of the oldest active languages, evolved over 5,000 years. As such, it makes for a fascinating case study in the development of lang...

An amazing number of the words we use today were invented in the First World War. They provide a unique insight into the experience of the war and ...

A handy guide to the meanings and origins of the many foreign phrases we use every day.English as we know it today is enriched with many borrowings...

Buried in the Egyptian desert some 4,000 years ago, the Pyramid Texts are among the world''s oldest poetry. Yet ever since the discovery of these h...

Language Policy and Planning in the Mediterranean World is a collection of the best papers presented at the MedLPLP conference held at the Universi...

Do, or should, dictionaries control language? How do they treat language change, both now and in the past? Which words do dictionaries leave out - ...