A revelatory and exhilarating tour de force, Nicholas Ostler's The
Last Lingua Franca: The Rise and Fall of World Languages explores
the rise of a linguistic diversity we could never before have
imagined. In the twenty-first century, can we really take the
dominance of English for granted? In their time, Greek, Latin,
Arabic, Sanskrit and Persian have each been world languages,
sweeping the globe for centuries at a time. And yet they have all
been displaced, just as Nicholas Ostler predicts English will be.
What forces drive these linguistic currents? What characteristics
do lingua francas share? And most importantly, how do they lose
their power? 'Frequently jaw-dropping and never less than
convincing' Henry Hitchings, Financial Times 'Sweepingly learned
and engagingly garrulous' Sunday Times 'A much-needed challenge to
conventional wisdom' Guardian A linguist of astonishing voracity
... the predictions are striking' Economist Nicholas Ostler is the
author of Empires of the Word: A Language History of the World and
Ad Infinitum: A Biography of Latin. He studied Greek, Latin and
Philosophy at the University of Oxford and holds a Ph.D. in
Linguistics from MIT. With a working knowledge of twenty-six
languages, Nicholas now runs an institute for the protection of
endangered languages.
General
| Imprint: |
Penguin Books
|
| Country of origin: |
United Kingdom |
| Release date: |
October 2011 |
| First published: |
November 2011 |
| Authors: |
Nicholas Ostler
|
| Dimensions: |
198 x 130 x 20mm (L x W x T) |
| Format: |
Paperback - B-format
|
| Pages: |
352 |
| ISBN-13: |
978-1-84614-216-1 |
| Categories: |
Books >
Language & Literature >
Language & linguistics >
General
|
| LSN: |
1-84614-216-4 |
| Barcode: |
9781846142161 |
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