Sunday, May 24, 2015

Through the Language Glass - Guy Deutscher

Yet another random book find on the Library Sale shelves. I picked this book up thinking I should read it as a prelude to the Language Freak Summer Challenge, which I think might not be on this year. In any case as a language junkie the topic, summarized in the subtitle "Why the World Looks Different in Other Languages," jumped out at me. I had no idea just how little I actually knew about linguistics (to be fair to myself, I have never formally studied linguistics, just random languages). My mind was blown right away, when the author described languages that have no separate words for "green" and "blue" - speakers of such languages consider these colors to be different shades of the same color. I hadn't come across this idea before! There were many interesting revelations about the relationship between language and thought which I won't spoil here. I'd like to read the author's other book after reading this one. Interesting book for readers interested in linguistics and foreign languages.

2 comments:

  1. thanks, sounds the type of books I would enjoy

    ReplyDelete
  2. Salut Emma ! C'était très intéressante. I recommend it to you!

    ReplyDelete