Just a Phrase I'm Going Through: My Life in Language

by David Crystal

Looks behind the curtains at the adventures, challenges and pitfalls of the author's life in linguistics. This book answers the question that the author is most frequently asked: 'How did you become a linguist?'

Genres: Linguistics, Language, Nonfiction, Biography, Autobiography, Collections, Memoir

Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2009

About the author

David Crystal works from his home in Holyhead, North Wales, as a writer, editor, lecturer, and broadcaster. Born in Lisburn, Northern Ireland in 1941, he spent his early years in Holyhead. His family moved to Liverpool in 1951, and he received his secondary schooling at St Mary's College. He read English at University College London (1959-62), specialised in English language studies, did some research there at the Survey of English Usage under Randolph Quirk (1962-3), then joined academic life as a lecturer in linguistics, first at Bangor, then at Reading. He published the first of his 100 or so books in 1964, and became known chiefly for his research work in English language studies, in such fields as intonation and stylistics, and in the application of linguistics to religious, educational and clinical contexts, notably in the development of a range of linguistic profiling techniques for diagnostic and therapeutic purposes. He held a chair at the University of Reading for 10 years, and is now Honorary Professor of Linguistics at the University of Wales, Bangor. These days he divides his time between work on language and work on internet applications.

source: http://www.davidcrystal.com/

Reviews

[Delia Turner · Rating 4 out of 5]

I picked this book up in a used bookstore, confident I would enjoy it as much as several other books I have read by David Crystal (including the Cambridge Encyclopedia of Language, a superb explanation of linguistics). Reading this memoir about his life as a linguist, I realized why I had run across so many of his books. It’s a matter of probability. He has written many, many unusual and original books for a mass audience (and many others for academics about language and linguistics). He seems to have a knack for finding that no book exists on a specific subject, and a further knack for writing that book.

The book is chatty and heavy on names of individuals and organizations, and at times I felt I was standing under a prolix waterfall of words. It is also most definitely not a book about the underlying concepts of linguistics. But I found it highly readable nonetheless.

It was published in 2009 but Crystal as of this writing is still around, aged 80, and of course has a Twitter account (@davcr) and a new book out soon.

[Andrea Patrick · Rating 3 out of 5]

I came across this memoir from one of my favorite linguists and had to give it a try. It pushed me into trying to learn some Welsh, reading quite a lot of English history, and reopening my Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language, edited by the same guy. Six months later, I finished the memoir! So, though not a page-turner, a worthwhile read. I'm still working my way through the CEEL, which is excellently laid out in easily digested two-page spreads. I could probably read it front-to-back, but I'm leisurely flipping through it during weekend lunches.

[Jarda Kubalik · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mostly anecdotal memories and stories - a look back behind an incredible career. Not many people in the modern times have taken linguistics and English so close to general public while staying loyal to academic rigour and research enthusiasm. One thing I admire about DC's work is that it has remained very apolitical, unbiased and unaffected by all these pseudo-theories and wanna-be paradigm shifts. With the proverbial British both feet on the ground, the massive volume of his work stood the test of time.

[MN · Rating 2 out of 5]

I thoroughly enjoyed the sections on the evolution of linguistics departments in the UK during the 1960s and 1970s; and on speech therapy - the kind of subject matter about which Crystal always writes well. Sections on his childhood and schooldays were rather too bland to engage interest - these tales should have been reserved for (or perhaps constrained to) after dinner speeches. His account of changes in publishing in response to, first, the 1980s recession and then the rise of the web appealed for personal reasons (basically: I was there).

David Crystal is astonishing for the breadth of his linguistics knowledge and the diversity of his interests, but I couldn't help wondering about the purpose of the book. There's so much emphasis on his need to seek out projects for financial reasons, towards the end of the book, that I can't quash the impression that the book was written to pay the mortgage.

I'm grateful for Crystal's reference to David Malouf, 'The only speaker of his tongue', during the course of remarks on language death, but his failure to refer to Bernard Comrie's descriptive grammars (Routledge) in this context, reveals a bias in Crystal's account of publishing in linguistics, the degree of which, given a little consideration, only becomes greater and greater: no mention of Comrie's World's Major Languages series (Routledge); CUP's red textbook series (Crystal refers only to the blue); Reidel's list; Simon and Schuster's EFL publications. It is hard to resist the conclusion that Crystal jumped the wrong way in opting to popularise the subject, and then continued to do so in order to keep afloat financially.

My conclusion: Crystal's achievements undoubtedly deserve public recognition. However, they, and so he, would have fared better in the hands of a biographer.

[Jessica Healy · Rating 3 out of 5]

David Crystal is always a fascinating writer, although I think in this book he seemed, at times, slightly out of his comfort zone. Still, interesting enough autobiography, although it seemed to only scratch the surface. I particularly enjoyed reading his occasional descriptions of obscure grammatical constructions, and then trying to spot them in later chapters!

[Ellie Hull · Rating 4 out of 5]

really interesting and a full life. my own complaint would be that he's stil quite guarded in revealing more than the general gist of events, but one can't complain!