A History of English in Its Own Words

by Craig M. Carver

In this fascinating book Craig Carver explains the etymologies of more than 750 words in order of their entrance into the English language. The author explodes many myths about out language and uses the latest scholarship in this highly readable compendium. Line drawings.

Genres: Nonfiction, History, Writing, Reference

275 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1992

Reviews

[Kathy Sebesta]

Too pedantic. Written in 1991, it is of course pre-computer so it felt the necessity to be all-inclusive. Today you'd just look up the word or phrase and find some explanation that's probably more readable.

[Jack Townsend]

Has some good information about words. I am usually interested in historical development of the language rather than a dictionary-like presentation. Hence, my rating has more to do with my reading preferences than the book itself.

[Jim Peterson]

Very unscholarly. No references are given. Readers are just expected to assume the research is good because it is a book. It is probably not even peer-reviewed. You can probably trust this as much as you can trust chain mail.

For a better overall history, look to Baugh and Cable or, for a focus on dialects, David Crystal.

[Cat.]

I didn't get through most of this, maybe half. Interesting, but too many entries. I didn't get to the 1800s--the words were arranged by first appearance in the language). I guess I could have skipped around more, but now I'm tired of seeing this book around!