The Anthropology of Language: An Introduction to Linguistic Anthropology

by Harriet Joseph Ottenheimer

This text provides an introduction to the field of linguistic anthropology, which appeals to undergraduates from a wide variety of fields and at a wide variety of levels, from freshmen to seniors. This text comes with access to a companion website designed to make the intersection of linguistics and anthropology accessible and interesting to undergraduate students. In addition to THE ANTHROPOLOGY OF LANGUAGE, Harriet Ottenheimer has also creating a workbook/reader that is a perfect bundle option for this text. See the supplement section for details.

Genres: Linguistics, Anthropology, Language, School, Nonfiction, Textbooks, Reference

310 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 2005

Reviews

[Riversue · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enjoyable, clearly written textbook.

[Jennifer · Rating 5 out of 5]

I picked up this book (and its companion reader) as a way of reviewing the material I learned as an undergrad majoring in Language Studies. Yes – it’s true – for fun I read linguistic textbooks. Call me a nerd – I’m fine with that.

This book is an excellent overview of the major disciplines in linguistics such as phonetics, syntax, semantics, historical linguistics, etc. all through the lens of anthropology. The author’s voice comes through clearly and the result was that reading it I felt like I was in Professor Ottenheimer’s class and she was one of my favorite profs.

The text is easy to understand and when used in conjunction with the reader, allows one to easily teach oneself the basics of many aspects of linguistics. Since this is an overview of course it’s just the basics, but the reader should come away with a new appreciation of language, its usage, and its study.

[Evan · Rating 1 out of 5]

This is a terrible book. It oversimplifies, it is filled with inaccuracy, it makes logical errors on nearly every page, and it is just plain bad. In addition, it is written as if its readers are young children with short attention spans and poor reading skills. Find a different book if you are interested in this subject matter.