Babel: Vòng quanh thế giới qua 20 ngôn ngữ

by Gaston Dorren, Hoàng Đức Long (dịch)

“Những người say mê nghiên cứu ngôn từ sẽ thu được nhiều niềm vui thích từ cuốn sách này […] Các ngọn tháp Babel tất yếu sẽ sụp đổ, nhưng sẽ có thứ gì đó lớn lao và có lẽ thậm chí là vĩ đại hơn luôn luôn mọc lên thế chỗ chúng.”
– The New Zealand Listener

Đây là cuốn sách thú vị và giá trị cho mọi độc giả muốn tìm hiểu về ngôn ngữ học.

Sự đa ngữ của loài người là một món quà hay một sự trừng phạt? Và, liệu ngọn tháp Babel ngôn ngữ có đáng mơ ước hay không? “Nói được thêm một ngôn ngữ chính là có thêm một tâm hồn”, đó là phát biểu của Hoàng đế Charlemagne. 6000 ngôn ngữ hiện có của thế giới là 6000 vũ trụ tinh thần khác nhau, nơi tích lũy nguồn tri thức và văn hóa vô cùng đa dạng của nhân loại. Năng lực đa ngữ giúp một người có thể sống một đời sống phong phú và cảm thông với nhiều góc nhìn. Tình trạng đơn ngữ, dù đó là thứ ngôn ngữ được ưa chuộng nhất thế giới, cũng sẽ thu hẹp khả năng trải nghiệm cuộc sống của mỗi người. Tuy nhiên, trên thực tế, chúng ta đang mất đi một ngôn ngữ mỗi tuần. Và theo thống kê, một nửa số ngôn ngữ sẽ mất đi trong hơn một trăm năm tới.

Gaston Dorren, tác giả của cuốn sách viết về 20 “người khổng lồ” trong số 6000 ngôn ngữ của thế giới bao gồm tiếng Việt này, đã dành rất nhiều tâm huyết cho nỗ lực tìm hiểu các ngôn ngữ khác nhau và góp phần duy trì trạng thái đa dạng về ngôn ngữ của nhân loại. Trong từng chương viết về mỗi ngôn ngữ, Dorren dồn nén cả những dữ kiện quan trọng lẫn phù phiếm nhưng hấp dẫn giúp cho việc đọc trở nên thú vị. Ví dụ như, các ngôn ngữ được sử dụng cho những mục đích dân tộc chủ nghĩa ra sao? tại sao các ngôn ngữ châu Âu vẫn còn đang được sử dụng ở nhiều cựu thuộc địa? tại sao người Brazil ngày nay lại gọi Bồ Đào Nha – đất nước “mẫu quốc” xưa kia và cũng là quê hương của ngôn ngữ chính thức tại Brazil – là “đất nước bé nhỏ”? ngôn ngữ được sử dụng cho hai giới ở Nhật Bản khác nhau như thế nào? nguyên nhân của việc ban hành “Đạo luật Sinhala độc tôn” và những hệ quả của nó đối với tình hình xung đột sắc tộc tại Sri Lanka? Có những phương ngữ của tiếng Hmong có tới 12, thậm chí 14, thanh điệu. Tiếng Quan thoại dù có cả tỉ người nói và được hậu thuẫn bởi sự phát triển mạnh mẽ về kinh tế và vị thế chính trị của đất nước Trung Quốc nhưng vẫn khó có thể soán ngôi tiếng Anh. Và, tiếng Anh, ngôn ngữ cầu nối với tỉ lệ người dùng lên tới một phần tư dân số thế giới, có khả năng sẽ dần dần bị chia tách thành những biến thể chịu ảnh hưởng của các ngôn ngữ địa phương, khác xa với nguồn chung ban đầu, giống như tiếng Latinh nhiều thế kỷ trước.

Khác với một cuốn sách học thuật đầy “hăm dọa”, Babel Vòng quanh thế giới qua hai mươi ngôn ngữ rất dễ tiếp nhận, ngay cả với những người đọc không có nền tảng dày dặn về ngôn ngữ học, nhờ tác giả của nó có tài lý giải những khái niệm ngôn ngữ học khó hiểu nhất theo cách dễ hiểu và cách tổ chức các chương, mục vừa ngắn gọn, nhiều thông tin, vừa hóm hỉnh, cuốn hút.

VỀ TÁC GIẢ:
Gaston Dorren là tác giả Lingo, một cuốn sách về các ngôn ngữ châu Âu mà, như tờ Telegraph đánh giá, “vừa thật sự thú vị vừa vô cùng khôi hài [với] khả năng gây ấn tượng mạnh mẽ về sự chuyển pha dễ dàng từ những câu chuyện bông đùa và những sự thật đáng ngạc nhiên sang việc luận bàn về những quan điểm ngôn ngữ học phức tạp”. Ông thường xuyên viết bài cho tạp chí ngôn ngữ học nổi tiếng Onze Taal, và biên tập cho trang blog Language Writer. Là một người đa ngữ thật sự, Gaston nói được tiếng Hà Lan, tiếng Limburg, tiếng Anh, tiếng Đức và tiếng Tây Ban Nha, đồng thời đọc được tiếng Pháp, tiếng Afrikaans, tiếng Frisian, tiếng Bồ Đào Nha, tiếng Ý, tiếng Catalan, tiếng Đan Mạch, tiếng Na Uy, tiếng Thụy Điển, tiếng Luxembourg và tiếng Esperanto. Trong khi viết Babel, ông cũng cố gắng học tiếng Việt.

Genres: Nonfiction, Language, Linguistics, History, Travel, Science, Adult

480 pages, Paperback

First published December 1, 2018

About the author

Having started to talk before I could walk, I remember my pre-schooler’s frustration at being unable to read. In my teens and later, I learnt a handful of languages sort of well; I've dabbled in many others since.

In recent years, I've published several books about language and linguistics, in both English and Dutch.
* Lingo (2014), about the languages of Europe; also available in Dutch (Lingua), German (Sprachen), Russian (Lingvo), Spanish, Swedish and Norwegian; Italian forthcoming.
* Babel (2018), about the world's 20 largest languages. Spanish, Mandarin (2), Norwegian, Italian, Polish, Russian, Korean, Vietnamese and Dutch translations are scheduled for 2019/20.
* Vakantie in eigen taal (2016), about the Dutch languages.
* Nieuwe tongen (1999), about heritage languages in the Netherlands and Flanders.

I live in Amersfoort, the Netherlands, with my wife, Marleen.

I have a rather catholic taste in fiction. In English, from David Mitchell, Pat Barker and Alain de Botton to P.G. Wodehouse, Jasper Fforde and Rowling's Harry Potter series. In my mother tongue, from Renate Dorrestein and the (van het) Reve brothers to many others of lesser international renown.

When it comes to linguistic non-fiction, I like John McWhorter, Guy Deutscher, David Crystal, Nicholas Ostler, Henriette Walther (French), Karl-Heinz Göttert (German), Lola Pons Rodríguez (Spanish), Marc van Oostendorp (Dutch) and Joop van der Horst (Dutch).

Reviews

[Bandit · Rating 2 out of 5]

Babel was supposed to be a great linguistic adventure. Around the world in 30 languages Sounds exciting, doesn’t it. And I do have a serious interest in linguistics, so it seemed right up my alley. Until it wasn’t. At least, not quite what was expected. It’s a literary equivalent of meeting someone at a party and they tell you they are really into books and you’re really into books so you think you’ll have this awesome stimulating conversation, but turns out what really gets them going is fonts and paper. They are talking about what you both love, but not quite about the main things you love about it. Much like this book.Technically it does deliver, the author presents 20 chapters for 20 most popular languages in the world, culminating, of course, with the modern lingua franca English and some meditative contemplation of the future of it and future of sharing a language in general, since quite possibly the need is going to be taken care of with the translation gadgets soon enough. The language chapters varied very much in tone and context, it seemed like the author was trying to find a different approach each time, but it did create a certain lack of uniformity. What was uniform throughout is his attention to peculiar details and minute quirks of grammar and syntax as oppose to spending more time on the cultural and historical aspects of the specific languages. He did cover both, but in the proportions I was hoping for. And he did try to infuse the narrative with personality, but it often ended up reading like a jazzed up textbook as oppose to compelling account of linguistic adventures. There was a lovely amount of photos, though, to balance it out somewhat. And I did learn a lot, so in a way this book served its purpose. What really messed up this reading experience for me, though, were the publishers. And mind you, this won’t affect the final product, but the Netgalley ARC of it was horrid, apparently the great irony of putting out a crappily formatted version barely readable at times book on languages eluded Grove Atlantic, so they thought they’d offer this version with words clumped together, some letters omitted, moreover about 90% of all numerical data omitted and so on. So in theory these advance reading copies are offered in advance so that they can be hyped up by the reviews, right? Well then why wouldn’t someone present something actually presentable to be judged by? Would a restaurant offer an almost but not quite cooked meal to a reviewer and expect praise? It’s the same thing, really. If you can’t present a product in a way that is ready to be enjoyed, just don’t do it. There isn’t a scarcity of books out there to create desperation interest in the inferior product. Or at least have a decency of warning the readers beforehand about the dismal quality of the ARC they are about to download. This won’t matter for anyone who actually buys the book or takes it from the library, but anyone considering a Netgalley download…beware. So I enjoy nonfiction with the main goal of self edification and I did learn a decent amount of information, although the frustration of the actual reading experience made the worthiness of this read questionable. The entire thing was very much like a chore to get through with some, but not enough, informational delights and treasures along the way. Thanks Netgalley.

[Dan Ust · Rating 3 out of 5]

Reads more like a collection of mostly unrelated articles each on a different language. On the plus side, I learned a lot — even about languages I knew something about already. But the book lacks overall coherence... making it feel more like a jumble.

This goes all the way through. For instance, you might learn something of the intricacies of the Bengali script, but little else about it. Ditto for loan words from Arabic. Or Spanish grammar... I get that the author has to find something interesting to say about each language, but each language felt isolated. The overall effect is best described as disjointed.

I was also reading this book along with a close friend. He semi-bailed on it, skimming the last third or half. I’d hoped reading along with something else would make for discussions to reinforce what I’d read. Perhaps this book is best as something you pick up and read at random — not as a read through.

[Emma Deplores Goodreads Censorship · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a fascinating survey of the 20 most spoken languages in the world, and what makes them each unique: in some cases features of the languages themselves, in others aspects of their histories or the place they hold in culture or the overall linguistic culture of the areas where they’re spoken. It doesn’t try to present a unified thesis, and each language’s chapter is relatively self-contained, but overall it touches on a wide variety of subjects relevant to language, allowing it to add up to more than the sum of its parts.

Here are the 20 languages with the largest numbers of speakers, in order beginning with the most spoken (behind spoiler tags so you can guess first!): English, Mandarin, Spanish, Hindi/Urdu (we’ll come back to that), Arabic, Bengali, Portuguese, Russian, Malay, French, German, Swahili, Japanese, Punjabi, Persian, Javanese, Turkish, Tamil, Korean, Vietnamese. Note that this count includes second-language speakers; with native speakers only, Mandarin would be first by a long shot and a couple others wouldn’t even come close to making the list. Some of these are languages of empire, others trade languages that became useful for inter-ethnic communication, and others spoken in relatively small but densely populated regions. Each one gets a chapter, plus one bonus chapter on the Japanese writing system, organized from least- to most-spoken languages.

A non-exhaustive summary of interesting tidbits:

Vietnamese: Pronouns are relational rather than absolute; in other words, there’s no single word for “I” or “you.” If you’re speaking to a slightly younger person, you would refer to yourself as “chi” (older sister) or “ahn” (older brother), and the younger person as “em” (younger sibling). They do the same—so a literal translation of a conversation would be along the lines of, “Big Sister is happy to see Little Sibling!” “Little Sibling is happy to see Big Sister too!” With larger age gaps, you’d use aunt/uncle or grandparent pronouns. The author studied Vietnamese for the book and found it quite difficult—and his Vietnamese cleaning lady seems to have been unimpressed, particularly when he used pronouns referring to her as younger than she is (not a compliment in Vietnamese culture!).

Tamil: Has speakers who take devotion to their language to the next level, from writing erotic poems about it to self-immolation in the name of language autonomy. English remains an official language in India largely because linguistic minorities in the south (who successfully lobbied for a reorganization of states along linguistic lines) feel very strongly about resisting the encroachment and domination of Hindi.

Javanese: Has a whole separate mode of speaking (krama) when talking to or even about higher-status people, including extensively different vocabulary. This is difficult even for native Javanese speakers, impacting social mobility. In a show of statesmanship, the leaders of Indonesia’s independence movement—despite being mostly Javanese-speakers themselves and the fact that it was the most widely spoken language in the country—opted for Malay (rechristened Indonesian) as the national language instead, in part because of krama. Likewise, there’s been a decline in Javanese mothers speaking the language to their children, as they report that Indonesian allows for closer family relationships. Krama has not existed for “time immemorial,” but was propagated by the elites during Dutch colonization.

Punjabi: Is only sort of tonal—yes, this falls on a continuum; in the case of Punjabi, the tone only affects the meaning of a few words. Some diaspora speakers don’t use it at all.

Japanese: Expects men and women to speak differently, with a long history of promoting inarticulate or girlish speech as most becoming to a woman. Predictably, others have shown up after the fact to argue that this is how women naturally speak. The differences are fading, but there are still “women’s words” (often slightly more flowery than the generic) and a smaller number of “men’s words.”

Swahili: Is a lingua franca without a lot of native speakers, but widely spoken for interethnic communication. Africa’s language diversity is alive and kicking in a way that’s rare in the rest of the world, with the result that speaking 2-3 is the norm and in some regions, ordinary people speak easily half a dozen or more—from small local languages to regional lingua francas to a European language or two—without thinking much of it. It was amusing to me to see the author cite countries like Cameroon as the places where people really speak a lot of languages—he’s Dutch, and I’ve always thought of them as being particularly prolific in that regard (which he clearly is, apparently fluent in at least 5 and having studied several more).

French: Has undergone aggressive campaigns to make everyone in France speak it. At the time of the French Revolution, only a minority did (by one estimate, 1 in 8 citizens spoke it, while 1 in 4 could understand). The government determined to stamp this out, and even today, the French language has a very aggressive academy passing on what’s right and wrong in the language and causing many native speakers to feel that they “speak bad French.”

Bengali: Is written in an abugida! As it turns out, there are four different types of scripts for languages where writing symbolizes speech: alphabets (a letter symbolizes a sound), syllabaries (a letter symbolizes a whole syllable; Cherokee for instance does this), abjads (only consonants get letters, with vowels either eliminated or optionally marked; Arabic and Hebrew do this), and abugidas, which are sort of halfway between alphabets and abjads, with small vowel signs. Bengali and Hindi use different abugidas, as do many other languages in West Bengal, where having a unique script is seen as a sign of a real, grown-up language.

Hindi/Urdu: Are actually mutually comprehensible, but treated as different languages for nationalistic reasons. As the divide between Hindus and Muslims has grown, the divide between these dialects has widened too: Hindus have tried to adopt more Sanskrit words while purging the Arabic and Persian ones, while Muslims have done the opposite. Previously, there was one language which different religious groups just each wrote in their own script. The Hindi script, once called Nagari, has also been renamed Devanagari to emphasize its divine nature.

Mandarin: Actually does feature some clues to pronunciation in the writing, but these can be pretty obscure: for instance, one part of a character indicating meaning while another is a sound-alike. This gets even more messy when some of the same characters are used in Japanese, where they don’t sound alike. (Japanese utilizes multiple scripts, having rejected getting rid of symbols entirely in favor of an alphabet like Korean.)

English: Is much more difficult to learn than we native speakers give it credit for. For instance, we have an unusually high number of vowel sounds (over 20), and to make things more challenging, the relationship of pronunciation to spelling is whimsical at best. (I always like to share this poem for this one.) Just the fact that we have spelling bees, and that native speakers find spelling words in our own language so difficult and impressive, should tell you something. This essay is particularly interesting coming from an author who learned English later in life, though its effect is somewhat diminished by coming right after the bit on the Chinese and Japanese writing systems—at least our writing bears some resemblance to pronunciation!

At any rate, some of the essays are a bit more interesting than others—the German one, for instance, is mostly taken up by discussion of a system of rating the “weirdness” of languages, which has little to do in the end with how difficult they are to learn—but as an enjoyable and informative survey of the world’s most spoken languages, I thought this book was great. It’s easily digestible and written with humor and nerdy charm. There’s also a fun little chart at the beginning of each chapter laying out the basics of the languages themselves—sounds, grammar, scripts, loanwords and exports, fun factoids. Definitely recommended for those curious about modern languages and their histories and foibles!

[Katie · Rating 3 out of 5]

Babel is an ambitious undertaking by linguist Gaston Dorren to explore the top twenty languages spoken in the world from the #20 to #1 spoken language (in which this review is written). As a native English speaker who has difficulty becoming more than monolingual, I enjoyed learning new things about the history and grammar of these different languages. However, I felt that at some time the book became too technical about linguistics and at other times would go off on tangents. It felt like the author was trying to pour all of his knowledge out of his head into one book. The chapter were in such different styles that the book lacked unity. Overall, I am glad I read it.

Thanks to NetGalley, Grove Atlantic, and the author Gaston Dorren for an electronic review copy.

[Anastasia · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was excited to be reading this book. It introduced many linguistic concepts with which I was not familiar –from differences in writing systems, scripts, tonality and so on; it prompted sporadic research (that admittedly didn’t go further a Wikipedia page) on more interesting topics; and above all reminded how diverse and infinitely rich our common human heritage of language is.

I liked it that the book was written as neither a grammar book with an overview of all languages’ grammar structure, nor as a history textbook, interweaving history and linguistics.
Each chapter was an individual endeavour and highlighted the aspects that neither of the two previous book concepts would have done. For example, while in Farsi chapter I had a pleasure of learning the rise and development of Persian Empire, in the Bengali one I got a good (albeit brief) introduction to script systems. While in Arabic and Japanese chapters I learnt about different writing systems, the French chapter provided more of a socio-cultural aspect of the language.
(Truth be told, I found some chapters being charged with a task that proved to be more than they could chew. In the Portuguese one, I saw an attempt to reduce the whole history of colonialism to just a handful pages. The ultimate question in that chapter – as to why Portuguese caught on in former territories while Dutch didn’t, - was not, - and I believe could not – be answered in so few pages).

I noticed that some of the comments of the book point out at this lack of homogeneity as a major drawback; I personally find it a witty tool to make the book entertaining enough to keep reading it as a collection of short stories. Written with ultimate cultural sensitivity, wit and ingenuity, I am happy to recommend this book.

[Nasia · Rating 5 out of 5]

Να ένα βιβλίο που με ενθουσίασε απο την πρώτη στιγμή! Όσ@ με ξέρετε, γνωρίζετε την βαθιά αγάπη που έχω για τις ξένες γλώσσες και να μαθαίνω πράγματα μέσω αυτών για τον πολιτισμό των εκάστοτε εθνών που τις μιλάνε.
Αυτό το βιβλίο δεν θα μπορούσε να είναι πιο επεξηγηματικό ως προς το κομμάτι αυτό. Οι 20 πιο δημοφιλείς γλώσσες του κόσμου μέσα από τα μάτια του γλωσσολόγου Gaston Dorren, με διαφορετική προσέγγιση σε κάθε γλώσσα ως προς τα στοιχεία που μας μεταφέρει, κάθε φορά τα στοιχεία που κάνουν μεγαλύτερη εντύπωση στον συγγραφέα είτε με την ιδιότητα του γλωσσολόγου είτε με την ιδιότητα ενός απλού ατόμου που μαθαίνει μια ξένη γλώσσα.
Έμαθα αυτό το βιβλίο από τον Γιάννη Σσρακατσάνη στο youtube και πραγματικά δεν θα μπορούσε να είναι καλύτερη πρόταση για μένα !
Αποκόμισα πάρα πολλά πράγματα απο το βιβλίο και τολμώ να πω ότι η όρεξη μου να μάθω και άλλες ξένες γλώσσες έγινε ακόμα μεγαλύτερη μετά από αυτό

[Ed Erwin · Rating 5 out of 5]

I had great fun reading this. Some reviews here complain that it approaches each of the 20 languages from a different angle, based on what the writer finds most interesting to say about them, and sometimes even venturing into talk of other languages. For example, the discussion of Javanese spends a lot of time on the distinction between levels of formality. The discussion of Hindu/Urdu talks about the unique scripts used only in Indian languages. For Punjabi, much time is given to the fact that the language uses tones to convey meaning, but that most of its speakers are unaware of this. The chapter on Spanish discusses the difference between the two forms of the verb "to be" (ser and estar) and broadens out into how different types of "being" are handled in many languages.

I, on the contrary, enjoyed the diversity of approaches. Applying the same lens to each language could get pretty boring. If you want that, go read original research articles or wikipedia.

The 5 stars is, as usual, a reflection of my enjoyment, not an objective measure. I'm enough of a language nerd to have noticed two of the mistakes in the script on the advance-reader copy cover, so take that as a hint that I enjoy this stuff more than most. (I did not use the advance reader. I just saw the cover here on this site: . For the record, I noticed the mistakes in the Bangla and Hindi text. The Japanese and Russian was also wrong but I didn't know it.)

[Φώτης Καραμπεσίνης · Rating 4 out of 5]

Όταν ως νεαρός φοιτητής στο Πανεπιστήμιο κλήθηκα να επιλέξω κατεύθυνση, χωρίς δεύτερη κουβέντα απέρριψα τον τομέα Γλωσσολογίας και ακολούθησα εκείνον της Λογοτεχνίας. Λογικό, καθότι η προτίμησή μου, βασιζόταν στην αγάπη μου για τη λογοτεχνία με τις άπειρες μορφές της, τις ανοιχτές αναγνώσεις της και τον αφηρημένο χαρακτήρα της. Ο άλλος τομέας, σαφώς πιο οριοθετημένος, περισσότερο «μαθηματικός», απαιτούσε δύο πράγματα, εκ των οποίων το ένα δεν το διέθετα σε επάρκεια, σε αντίθεση με το άλλο που αφθονούσε: το πρώτο ήταν μια κάποιας μορφής ευφυία. Όσον αφορά το δεύτερο, οι παλιότεροι περιέγραφαν εκείνον που το κατείχε ως «οπαδό της ολιγοτέρας οδύνης», κοινώς οκνηρό.

Βεβαίως, το γεγονός ότι με «κέρδισε» η λογοτεχνία είναι κάτι που το πληρώνουμε όλοι μας πλέον. Αν όμως είχα επιλέξει ή έστω ενδιαφερθεί περισσότερο για τη Γλωσσολογία, θα είχα κερδίσει σε πολλαπλά επίπεδα. Ένα εξ αυτών θα ήταν να απολαύσω ακόμα περισσότερο αυτό το εξαιρετικό βιβλίο.

Μην φανταστείτε ότι πρόκειται για κάποια ενδελεχή, εις βάθος μελέτη του γλωσσικού αντικειμένου, με ορολογία, αναφορές, βιβλιογραφία και τα συναφή. Ο συγγραφέας του προσφέρει σε εκλαϊκευμένη μορφή και μικρή έκταση μια σύνοψη των 20 πλέον διαδεδομένων γλωσσών του πλανήτη. Στέκεται βεβαίως σε αρκετές ιδιαιτερότητές τους, αλλά με τρόπο κατανοητό, ακραγγίζοντας και ψηλαφώντας όπου είναι απαραίτητο, αλλά διανθίζοντας το αμιγώς γλωσσολογικό με παραδείγματα, αλλά και έξυπνες συγκρίσεις με κοινές αναφορές όπως τα αγγλικά. Το αποτέλεσμα είναι ότι το βιβλίο παραμένει ενδιαφέρον χωρίς να γίνεται διδακτικό (κυριολεκτικά) ούτε ακαδημαϊκό. Είναι όμως προφανές ότι όσο καλύτερα γνωρίζει ή θυμάται κάποιος όρους (εδώ βοηθάει και η γραμματική που ξεχάσαμε, αν δεν έχουμε παιδιά στο σχολείο να ανοίξουμε κανά ρημάδι βιβλίο) όπως φυλόλεκτος, μουσικοτονική γλώσσα, ταξινομητές, αυτάρκη ουσιαστικά, ιδεόφωνα, προθήματα, ενθήματα, επιθήματα, παγκόσμιο άτλαντα γλωσσικών δομών (WALS) και τέτοιες ομορφιές, τόσο καλύτερα θα απολαύσει τον μεγαλειώδη κόσμο των γλωσσών.

Κατά τα λοιπά, η «Βαβέλ» ξεκινάει αντίστροφα από τα βιετναμέζικα για να καταλήξει στα αγγλικά, ως τη γλώσσα με τους περισσότερους ομιλητές στον κόσμο. Δεν πρόκειται εδώ να περιγράψω τι και πώς, αλλά σίγουρα υπάρχουν εξαιρετικά ενδιαφέροντα σημεία. Για παράδειγμα, γιατί τα ιαπωνικά έχουν το πιο εκούσια περίπλοκο σύστημα γραφής, γιατί τα ρωσικά έχουν περισσότερη συνάφεια με τα αγγλικά από όσο νομίζουμε, γιατί τα γερμανικά είναι μια στριφνή γλώσσα, γιατί τα γαλλικά είναι μια επιτηδευμένη γλώσσα, γιατί τα ισπανικά έχουν 6-7 τρόπους για το «είναι» (ser ή estar) εκεί που στα αγγλικά έχουμε απλά το «is», και τέλος γιατί τα αγγλικά (hail!) τους πάτησαν κάτω όλους ως η lingua franca του παρόντος και πιθανότατα του μέλλοντος (αν δεν μας φάνε όλους τα κινέζικα);

Προφανώς αυτά είναι ελάχιστα μόνο από τα ερωτήματα με τα οποία ασχολείται η «Βαβέλ» και είναι εκείνα που το δικό μου το οκνηρό μυαλό κατόρθωσε να προσεγγίσει και να αναφέρει. Είπαμε, ο περιορισμένος αριθμός των απαντήσεων είναι ανάλογος με εκείνον των ερωτήσεων. Αν σας ενδιαφέρει πάντως το θέμα των γλωσσών, της εξέλιξής τους και της συνάφειάς τους, διαβάστε αυτό το βιβλίο. Αλλιώς, περιμένετε στην ουρά για το… Βαβελόψαρο (αναφορά στον αγαπημένο μας Douglas Adams που έφυγε τόσο νωρίς).

[Anna · Rating 5 out of 5]

Od dawna szukałam takiej książki. Uwielbiam czytać o językach, analizować różnice, porównywać je i wreszcie się ich uczyć. Autor opisał dwadzieścia największych języków świata, z których płynnie znam trzy, uczyłam się kolejnych dwóch, a delikatnie liznęłam jeszcze jeden. Co więcej wśród tej dwudziestki jest język, którego zamierzam się uczyć. Przy takich założeniach musiała to być świetna lektura.

Dorren swoją książką trochę oszukuje. Każdy rozdział rozpoczyna się tak samo - metryczką języka, zawierającą informacje o użytkownikach, nazwie, gramatyce, fonetyce, ciekawostkach. Pierwszym opisywanym językiem jest wietnamski, którego autor się uczy(ł). Mnóstwo tu więc informacji o fonetyce, gramatyce, trudnościach, na jakie trafia uczeń, zwłaszcza ten wychodzący z zupełnie innego kontekstu językowego. Uwielbiam takie teksty, więc cieszyłam się na podobne podejście w kolejnych rozdziałach, a tu klapa! Dorren napisał bowiem o każdym języku z innego punktu widzenia.

Jeśli jest to tamilski, to na tapetę wziął konflikt na Sri Lance w dużej części bazujący na kwestii językowej. Niemiecki ma opinię bycia niezwykle trudnym - autor rozprawia się więc z tą kwestią. Przeważająca większość użytkowników języka portugalskiego mieszka poza Portugalią, więc autor skoncentrował się na kolonializmie i porównaniu portugalskiego i niderlandzkiego. Oba z nich jako języki kolonizatorów miały szansę na tak ogromne rozprzestrzenienie się w świecie, ale udało się to tylko portugalskiemu. Na przykładzie jawajskiego dowiadujemy się jak wielką rolę w języku mogą odgrywać formy grzecznościowe. Języki takie jak japoński, hindi czy urdu to przyczynek to skoncentrowania się na różnych rodzajach pisma. Każdy rozdział to inna dawka informacji, nie tylko stricte językowych, ale także historycznych, socjologicznych czy politycznych. Takie podejście czyni książkę niezwykle różnorodną.

Ciąg dalszy: https://przeczytalamksiazke.blogspot....

[K.J. Charles]

Not so much a book as a collection of essays or possibly tweaked blogposts on the twenty most widely spoken languages. Some very interesting, as in how France has enforced linguistic uniformity on itself, or the intricacies of Vietnamese; others feel very 'will this do?' internet-researched. (All he could think of to discuss re Arabic was a list of words that come up in English? Really?) I ended up skipping about half, which was a shame.

[Mina · Rating 3 out of 5]

Der Titel ist in diesem populärwissenschaftlichen Sachbuch Programm: Gaston Dorren geht darin den 20 meistgesprochenen Sprachen der Welt auf den Grund. Dabei erhält jede Sprache ein Kapitel, in dem er ihre nennenswerten Eigenheiten herausstellt - von schwierigen Aussprachen über verästelte Entstehungsgeschichten bis zu einzigartigen Schriftzeichen. Er bringt dabei vereinzelt eigene Lernerfahrungen ein, bleibt jedoch vornehmlich bei einer objektiven, wissenschaftlichen Betrachtungsweise.

Für mich als Sprachenliebhaberin war es zunächst an manchen Stellen schade, dass nur auf einen Aspekt, eine Besonderheit der Sprache eingegangen wurde. Wenn ich nur etwas über die Entstehungsgeschichte erfahre, aber gar keinen Eindruck von der Sprache selbst bekam, hat mir etwas gefehlt. Der kleine Steckbrief am Anfang jedes Kapitels konnte diesen Eindruck leider auch nicht wettmachen. Insgesamt fühlten sich die Texte etwas zufällig an, etwas chaotisch. Ich denke, dass es für viele Menschen so gut funktioniert, aber mein Gehirn lernt besser mit etwas mehr Struktur und vor allem etwas mehr Schaubildern. Das Buch ist zwar illustriert, jedoch hätten an einigen Stellen Landkarten oder andere simple Veranschaulichungen gut getan und vor allem dabei geholfen, sich die vielen Fakten zu merken.

Abgesehen von diesen “Wermutstropfen” war die Lektüre für mich eine Bereicherung. Die Sprachenvielfalt dieser Welt ist unglaublich faszinierend und was man bereits beim Erlernen einer Fremdsprache erfährt wird nach diesen Texten umso deutlicher: Es gibt unzählige Arten, Sprache und Schrift zu denken und was wir als selbstverständlich und logisch erachten, ist andernorts mitnichten der Status Quo. Was uns dagegen seltsam und kompliziert erscheint, funktioniert im uns fremden Kosmos wunderbar.

Zahlreiche sprachliche Reformen zeugen davon, dass eine gewisse Lenkung möglich ist, aber wie und was gesprochen wird, hängt vor allem von den gesellschaftlichen und politischen Entwicklungen ab - und die können unter Umständen sehr chaotisch und komplex sein. Gaston Dorren bricht diese verwirrenden Dynamiken sehr gut für Nicht-Sprachwissenschaftler herunter und versucht auch durch kleine Exkurse aus den 20 Hauptthemen des Buchs heraus alle relevanten Themenfelder abklopfen, die im Zusammenhang mit Sprache interessant sein könnten und die den Blick gegebenenfalls noch mehr weiten für die große sprachliche Landschaft dieser Welt.

Dabei geht der Autor auch gerne ins Detail und gibt uns Wort- und Satzbeispiele aus den jeweiligen Sprachen, nicht ohne diese in Kontext zu setzen, wörtliche Übersetzungen zu liefern oder Vergleiche zu anderen Sprachen zu ziehen. Juliane Cromme leistet hier eine bemerkenswerte Übersetzungsarbeit, da ich davon ausgehe, dass die Vergleichsbeispiele in der Originalversion aus der englischen Sprache kommen. Cromme gelingt es, passende grammatikalische Konstruktionen der deutschen Sprache zu finden, ohne dass der Inhalt verloren geht. Zum Glück sind Deutsch und Englisch recht ähnlich, sonst hätte das Buch für die Deutschen wohl zur Hälfte umgeschrieben werden müssen :)

Dorren hat in vielerlei Hinsicht meine Begeisterung für andere Sprachen noch mehr befeuert und mich dazu inspiriert, mich weiter mit der Entstehungsgeschichte meiner eigenen Muttersprache zu beschäftigen. Schon immer war ich fasziniert davon, was Sprachen miteinander verbindet und was sie unterscheidet und habe durch die Lektüre nochmals einen Anstoß bekommen, etwas tiefer in die deutsche bzw. die indoeuropäische Sprachhistorie zu blicken. Das Kapitel zu Russisch hat mich hier besonders gefangen genommen, indem dort die Parallelen der russischen zur deutschen und englischen Sprache aufgezeigt werden.

Die Sprache ist gleichzeitig der Schlüssel zu einer anderen Kultur und wenn sich noch mehr Menschen dazu bilden - auch außerhalb der bequemen eurozentrischen Denkweise -, glaube ich, dass auch Toleranz und Respekt füreinander wachsen werden. Dieses Buch könnte ein Anfang sein.

[Nauris Lukševics · Rating 4 out of 5]

Līdzīga "Lingo", kurā bija apskatītas visas Eiropas valodas, bet šoreiz tās ir 20 visplašāk izmantotākās valodas pasaulē (starp kurām 14 nav Eiropas valodas). Samērā interesanti, bet diezgan bieži nācās saraut uzacis - ne gluži neizpratnē, drīzāk nepiekrītot dažām lietām.
Bet ej nu iestāsti, ka japāņu rakstības sistēma patiesībā ir ļoti loģiska. Pamatā autoram ir tendence koncentrēties uz "šausmas, paskaties, cik šausmīgi grūta un neloģiska ir tā valoda", bet ne visam es piekrītu. Kaut gan autors nav angliski runājošs (viņš ir no Nīderlandes), dažreiz liekas, ka ir skatīts caur angļu valodas prizmu, bet galu galā ir iemesls (pat izskaidrots), kāpēc lielākā daļa angliski runājošie cilvēki (ja tā ir dzimtā valoda) runā tikai vienā valodā.
Vismaz atsvaidzinoši, ka tas pats "šausmas, paskaties, cik šausmīgi grūta un neloģiska valoda" tiek attiecināts arī uz angļu valodu. Un patiesībā tā jau arī ir taisnība.

Vēl viena lieta, kas drusku uzkrita uz nerviem ir tas, cik virspusēji ir apskatītas valodas, ar kurām autors nav saskāries pats. Nekad nevari zināt, vai nodaļā būs stāsts par pašu valodu un tās interesantākajām daļām, vai arī garš vēstures atstāsts par koloniālismu un faktiem par angļu valodu, kas pašu valodu skar minimāli.

Un jā, viņš uzskata, ka Baltijas valstis ir briesmīga vieta, kur apspiež visus krievus un nedod viņiem valsts valodas statusu.
Perspektīva, mans draugs, perspektīva.

[Swini · Rating 2 out of 5]

If you're a native speaker of English and don't have much familiarity with other languages or linguistics and want to learn a little bit about other widely spoken languages, this might be a good introduction. As someone with some background in linguistics who is a heritage speaker of a non-Indo-European language, I found it unscientific and scattered. Dorren has a Wikipedia-like list of some of the typological features of each language he covers at the beginning of each chapter, but the chapters themselves have no unifying theme and often have little linguistic content. Sometimes he covers words he finds interesting, sometimes the culture of the people who speak the language (with almost no reference to the language itself), and sometimes the history of the changes in the language during a certain time period. It reads like a collection of personal blog posts/travel essays rather than a coherent book about languages. The tone of the chapters of non-European languages as fascinating and alien is especially off-putting. I think he has a book about European languages, which may be a more worthwhile read.

[Klaudia_p · Rating 5 out of 5]

Mogłam skończyć już wcześniej, ale chciałam, by ta przyjemność trwała jak najdłużej, bo to nieprzyzwoicie dobra rzecz.

[Rafał Hetman · Rating 4 out of 5]

Trochę się bałem, że będzie to książka albo przeciążona analizami z zakresu lingwistyki stosowanej, albo lekka, łatwa i przyjemna publikacja, z której dowiem się, jak w dwudziestu językach powiedzieć słowo "kot" i niewiele z tej wiedzy wyniknie. Moje obawy się na szczęście nie sprawdziły i z czytania "Babel" miałem dużą frajdę.

Gaston Dorren w swojej książce opisuje 20 największych języków świata. Książka składa się z dwudziestu rozdziałów, numerowanych od tyłu, czyli od dwudziestego do pierwszego. Na początku każdego z rozdziałów czytelnik otrzymuje podstawowe informacje o opisywanym języku: nazwa, jaką sam siebie określa dany język; rodzina, z której pochodzi; pismo, jakim się posługują użytkownicy języka; informację o tym, z jakich języków czerpie opisywany język zapożyczenia oraz jakie wyrazy sam eksportuje w świat.

I na tym przewidywalna struktura książki się kończy, bo w poszczególnych rozdziałach Gaston Dorren opisuje języki w różny sposób – z różnych perspektyw czy też korzystając z różnych form. Na przykład w pierwszym rozdziale pisze dużo o gramatyce wietnamskiego i o tym, jak sam uczył się tego języka, natomiast tamilski opisuje niemal wyłącznie z perspektywy historycznej, skupiając się bardziej na historii kraju, niż na samym języku, czy jego gramatyce. Historię języka tureckiego opisuje z perspektywy politycznej, tłumacząc proces powstawania współczesnego tureckiego i próby ingerencji władz w tworzenie języka. A w przypadku hiszpańskiego to znów bardziej analiza gramatyczna języka i porównanie go do angielskiego.

Wygląda to w ten sposób, że kiedy Dorren sam nie zna lub nie uczył się opisywanego przez siebie języka, chętniej opisuje jego historię, ewolucję, a rzadziej skupia się na gramatyce i słowach. Piszę o tym, bo przez pierwszą część książki czyniłem mu z tego powodu zarzut. Spodziewałem się, że każdy rozdział w książce będzie miał taką samą strukturę, dzięki czemu czytelnik będzie miał możliwość porównania za każdym razem gramatyki, wyróżniających cech i historii opisywanych języków.

Tak nie jest. Ale teraz nie mam z tym zupełnego problemu. Dorren wybiera z poszczególnych języków to, co ciekawe i oryginalne. A przez to tę książkę się po prostu dobrze czyta.

Nie sposób opisać wszystkich wątków, jakie porusza w „Babel” holenderski lingwista, skupię się tylko na tych, które zainteresowały mnie najbardziej.

Po pierwsze, Dorren pokazuje, jak duży wpływ ma język na nasze życie. Okazuje się bowiem, że używanie konkretnego języka determinuje do pewnego stopnie sposób, w jaki funkcjonujemy w społeczeństwie. Język może na przykład stwarzać dystans, który krępuje swobodne życie. A chyba najjaskrawszym przykładem takiego skrępowania jest język jawajski.

Ten język posiada swoją bardzo formalną wersję, która mocno wpływa na życie używających go ludzi. Zacytuję fragment z książki, bo nie uwierzycie. Dorren pisze: „Jeśli formalny rejestr i przymus jego stosowania odbija się i umacnia hierarchię społeczną Jawy, to dlatego, że został zaprojektowany w tym celu przez tych, w których żywotnym interesie było jej podtrzymywanie i których wspomagała w tym procederze zewnętrzna siła dążąca do utrzymania status quo”. A więc stworzono formalną wersję języka i nakazano jej używać w formalnych sytuacjach, po to, żeby podkreślać, a tym samym umacniać hierarchię w społeczeństwie. Bardzo to ciekawe!

Ale co najlepsze, dziś przez tę opresyjność, wielu mieszkańców nie chce mówić po jawajsku i znów ma to swoje konsekwencje społeczne. Kolejny fragment: „(…) jawajski dąży obecnie do uzyskania statusu języka zagrożonego. Obawa, że język, którym posługuje się osiemdziesiąt do stu milionów ludzi, może stać się skamieliną, wydaje się czymś niedorzecznym, ale przetrwanie w dłuższej perspektywie nie zależy od aktualnego stanu liczebnego – wymaga sprawnego przekazywania go następnym pokoleniom. A jawajski ma z tym kłopot. Na początku pierwszej dekady XXI wieku tylko dwanaście procent matek z klasy średniej mówiło do swoich dzieci po jawajsku. Pozostałe osiemdziesiąt osiem procent dzieci ma nikłe szanse nabyć pełnych kompetencji rodzimych użytkowników tego języka. Na pytanie, dlaczego w domu wolą rozmawiać w języku indonezyjskim, kobiety odpowiadały, że w ich odczuciu umożliwia on większą poufałość. (…) indonezyjski cieszy się opinią bardziej >>wyluzowanego<< i >>otwartego<< na nowych użytkowników”.

Przeciekawe są te wątki lingwistyczno-społeczne. To głównie ze względu na nie polecam przeczytać tę książkę.

Ale ta książka opowiada również inną bardzo ciekawą, choć niewypowiedzianą bezpośrednio, historię. Przypomina, że języki stale ewoluują, że zmiana jest nieodłącznym elementem języka. Widać to za każdym razem na początku rozdziałów, kiedy Dorren przedstawia język i informuje, skąd najczęściej bierze on zapożyczenia i jakie wyrazy sam pożycza innym.

O tych zmianach języka lingwista pisze nie raz. A mój ulubiony fragment pojawił się w rozdziale o języku tureckim (BTW historia formowania języka tureckiego przez władzę też jest niezwykle interesująca). Dorren pisze: "Kiedy gramatyczni pedanci, semantyczni krytykanci, poprawiacze wymowy i inni idealistyczni miłośnicy języka podnoszą wrzawę, że językoznawcy nie postarali się wystarczająco, by powstrzymać >>degenerację<< angielskiego, niemieckiego, francuskiego czy jakiegokolwiek innego języka, instynktowna odpowiedź tych drugich jest taka, że nie mogą rozmyślnie kierować języka w tę czy inną stronę. Akademicy zazwyczaj wierzą, że >>nauka opisuje to, jakie rzeczy są, a nie jakie być powinny<<, ale lingwiści idą krok dalej i twierdzą, że próby ingerencji są z góry skazane na porażkę. Wspólnota użytkowników języka jest suwerenna, jak mówią, i się nie podporządkuje".

Polecam wszystkim, którzy oburzają się na „influencerów”, „spoilery” czy „content”.

A tak już zupełnie na marginesie. Chętnie posłuchałbym o tym, jak ta książka była tłumaczona na polski. To musiało być wyzwanie! Wystarczy spojrzeć na listę osób, które konsultowały polskie wydanie.

[Ian D · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ως λάτρης των ξένων γλωσσών, θα πίστευε κανείς ότι ένα τέτοιο βιβλίο θα το είχα ξετρυπώσει άμα τη εμφανίσει αλλά - φευ - κι εγώ απ' το Σαρακατσάνη το έμαθα! 😜

Οι 20 γλώσσες με τους περισσότερους ομιλητές ανά τον κόσμο, λοιπόν, και ως εγχείρημα μοιάζει αρκετά δελεαστικό. Πολλές ιστορικές και γεωγραφικές λεπτομέρειες των χωρών της Ανατολικής Ασίας τις αγνοούσα, ένα μικρό σοκ από τον αριθμό των αραβικών λέξεων που χρησιμοποιούμε μέχρι και σήμερα το έπαθα, όμως πέρασα πολύ ευχάριστα μαζί του, γέλασα που κυκλοφορεί ο μύθος ότι τα γερμανικά για ένα ψήφο δεν έγιναν η επίσημη γλώσσα του νεοσύστατου αμερικανικού κράτους (τι μας θυμίζει;) κι ακόμα περισσότερο που ο συγγραφέας μοιάζει να μην έχει ξεπεράσει ακόμα που τα πορτογαλικά είναι στο τοπ 5 ενώ τα ολλανδικά όχι...

Στα πλην του βιβλίου, μια κάποια ανισότητα στην προσέγγιση κάθε γλώσσας και - αναπόφευκτα - μια μεγαλύτερη δυσκολία στην κατανόηση βασικών εννοιών στις γλώσσες που δεν ήξερα (και που δυστυχώς ήταν οι περισσότερες).
Το προτείνω σε όλους, παρόλα αυτά. 👍

[The Captain · Rating 1 out of 5]

Ahoy there me mateys!  I received this non-fiction eARC from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.  So here be me honest musings . . .

Even though English is the "world language," the fact of the matter is that most of the world doesn't speak it.  This book explores the idea that to speak fluently with half of the people in the world, ye would need to speak 20 languages.  This book set out to explore those 20.

The concept of this book be fascinating.  The execution was sadly not to me taste.  Part of the problem is that the book didn't feel like a cohesive whole.  The chapters varied in style and focus.  There were often long tangents, that while interesting, made following the arguments being made difficult.  Other parts went into details of linguistics which were frankly over me head.  In addition, the review copy that I received was missing dates and figures.

I do believe that the author was enthusiastic and I did find many of the facts, like the formation of Turkish, to be amazing.  I so wanted to love this book but the presentation was muddled.  It was irksome and so I only read up to 54%.  Other readers may find this style worthwhile so I hesitate to condemn the book altogether.  I do hope this book finds its proper audience.  I am just not it.

So lastly . . .

Thank you Grove Atlantic!

Side note: from Amazon - "Gaston Dorren is a linguist, journalist, and polyglot. He speaks Dutch, Limburgish, English, German, French, and Spanish, and reads nine more languages."  How awesome is that?

Check out me other reviews at https://thecaptainsquartersblog.wordp...

[Victor Sonkin · Rating 4 out of 5]

There's a very brief account of various grammatical and lexical features of the given language, and the following essay is different depending on the subject; in most cases, it describes the social and historical situation of the area where the language in question is spoken, but sometimes it's different — with Turkish, for instance, it is the history of the language's horrific zigzags of the recent century; with Vietnamese, which opens the book (the 20 most numerous languages are set in the order of small-to-large, and it's not the number of native speakers — because that would make Chinese no. 1 — but the number of total speakers, which makes English the first one), it's the author's account of his attempt to learn the language. Quite entertaining.

[X · Rating 2 out of 5]

Checked out from Libby and skimmed the sections I was interested in. Frankly I could have written this, in about the same amount of time this guy seems to have put into it.

Probably more enjoyable if you don’t know much about languages, but are only looking for a single anecdote/fun fact for each one.

[Mitch · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some interesting chapters, but many chapters are unintersting and appear to be research notes. Some chapters are well researched and others are remarkably close to a book report or synopsis of someone else's work.

[Steve Kimmins · Rating 4 out of 5]

A long review reflecting how interesting I found this book. If you have a general interest in how language varies in its structure, and it’s cultural significance, around the world then I think you’ll find this an excellent popular exposition even if your second language skills are poor, like mine. I found so much that was fascinating - once I’d become used to the slightly disorganised presentation.

The author takes you through twenty languages, chapter by chapter: thirteen are the mostly widely spoken from around the world (either as first or second tongues) and seven have been more arbitrarily selected because the author feels they have particularly interesting features. We start with Vietnamese, Korean, working through Tamil, Javanese, Japanese, etc. ending up with the ‘big three’; Spanish, Mandarin and English.

I had expected a standard approach or template to be used in each chapter to maybe present how the language is organised; something formal about its grammatical structure and maybe it’s history. Indeed, at the start of each chapter a brief one page summary is presented of some basic facts about the language.
But it’s more varied than that, with each language chapter usually considering a rather different theme from the previous one. For example, Vietnamese does tackle the language structure, the tonal nature of many words, formal and informal addressing (as for many East Asian languages). However, in the next chapter, Korean, the author primarily makes a point about how the sound of a word and the word’s meaning can have strong links, using Korean examples before moving onto other examples from around the world. Nothing about the general language structure which is a shame as I’d become interested in Korean as a language thanks to Kdramas on TV!
For Turkish we learn about how the language has been fundamentally restructured in the last 100 years; for Japanese, about the whole sector reserved for use by women; for Tamil, it’s cultural significance, and the role of nationalism in languages (also raised in other chapters); for French, the battle to maintain ‘language purity’; for Mandarin we return to the language script, and problems of the symbolic style script and its help or otherwise for meaning and pronunciation. Japanese is revisited in this chapter too, to see how they borrowed Chinese characters for their use.

Everything presented is very interesting indeed, often thought provoking, but sometimes in a chapter I felt we were missing out on the structure of the specific language, which I was most interested in, for more general points to be made about general language topics worldwide. I wondered whether a better structure might have been shorter technical chapters on each language and then distinct general chapters on comparisons between language features around the world, instead of having these all mixed together. But as my own language skills are poor (infrequently practised French as my one other language, which I blame on the excellent English of my French friends!) so it’s unfair of me to criticise an experienced linguist author for his choice of topics.

The author is Dutch and, like many people from the Netherlands I’ve met, his English skills and prose are better than mine. As he points out, if he wants a book to sell widely then it’s best written in the current world language! As English is his second tongue he can make a detached analysis of English, pointing out its lucky timing (thanks to American English driving our technically enhanced culture) for its prominent role rather than any special features about its construction. It’s certainly one of the awkward languages where its written form often doesn’t help with it’s pronunciation.
Of course, as the author is writing in English most of the comparisons, especially about perceived difficulties in understanding some languages and their special highlighted features, are from an English perspective. Obviously it doesn’t mean that the native speakers have those difficulties! Although some of these features must have a cultural significance that English native speakers would find hard to understand (such as the formal/informal manners of addressing people, far more complex in some languages such as Javanese than the simple Tu/Vous in French).

There were some especially interesting points explained that will stay with me.
Swahili is the only sub-Saharan African language covered. As part of that chapter the author pointed out how routine multilingualism is for ordinary Africans. One person may have their mother tongue, the language spoken in local villages; then a more general regional language (such as Swahili) and then a language chosen by the country as a neutral choice over all the competing rivalries of the many languages in that country (this usually being the language of the former colonial power, and often used in the government and legal sectors). So, three languages, at least in spoken form, are routine for Africans, and it’s possible for several more to be known too. This is contrasted with those in the more developed, ‘educated’, world most of whom can lazily manage their entire life with just one tongue!

The author expressed great respect for Indonesia, in its post colonial era, for choosing Malay as the national language in order to smooth over competing regional possibilities, which might have had more traditional/nationalistic support. And finding that this difficult choice had worked well for the country as a whole, when nationalistic language rivalries elsewhere in the world fuel conflict.

And even for world aware linguists, Chinese characters are difficult for those not brought up with them, especially when then used in Japanese in the way they borrowed them to model their quite different language…

Fascinating. Maybe just that reservation on how the book is structured.

[Nóri · Rating 5 out of 5]

As an amateur language enthusiast/wannabe polyglot, a book like this is heaven for me. I’m constantly in the mood for starting to learn a new language, and then I never actually do it, but I have plans, you see. Before reading this book, my plans were, in a nutshell: touch up (basically re-learn) my German and my Spanish, really lay into my Swedish (so that I won’t start forgetting it like the other two), and start either Welsh, Russian, French, Finnish, or maybe all of them at the same time, who cares, languages are fun! Then I read this book and basically it went like this:

Chapter 20: Oh hell Vietnamese seems really interesting! Sure all those diacritics look complicated as hell but it makes the language look so fun, and it would be way more unique to learn Vietnamese than Mandarin. Might give this a look later.

Chapter 19: I never in my life thought about learning Korean but now that I’m reading about it, I’m loving this concept of ’ideophones’ (basically words that imply their meaning just by how they sound, kind of like onomatopoeias but not exactly). Maybe it would be worth a try?

Chapter 17: Turkey and Hungary have a lot of history together, so I already knew that we have a lot of loanwords from Turkish, but somehow I never thought about how much easier that could make learning the whole language. Plus, I do want to go to Istanbul at one point, so maybe it’s not such a crazy idea.

Chapter 13: Japanese used to be on my list back when I was briefly really into anime (I know, typical), and I never completely lost my interest in the language, even though now I only occasionally watch anime. I never knew about this really werid distinction between male and female Japanese, however, and that seems like the kind of challenge I would like to take on. Maybe I should put it back on my list.

Chapter 8: Russian was already on my list but this chapter was one of my favourites. I love etymology, and this short breakdown of how some complicated-looking Russian words actually have cognates in English was brilliant, and it only reinforced my belief that I need to learn Russian one of these days.

Chapter 6: Both the look of Bengali and its system of indicating vowels by attaching different tiny marks onto its consonents remind me of Sindarin. If I ever bring myself to learn an Indian language, I’m now almost certain it’s gonna be Bengali.

Chapter 5: The chapter about Arabic was actually a short dictionary of loanwords that made it into English, but I made tons of notes about words that are even more apparent in Hungarian. For example, the Arabic word for parrot is apparently ’babagá’, which somehow morphed into ’popinjay’. But in Hungarian, parrot is actually ’papagáj’, which is much more similar. Same with kahwa – coffee – kávé, and a few others I can’t recall right now. Did I mention I love etymology?

Chapter 2: Yep, Mandarin is exactly as complicated as I suspected. But I got enamored by the part about compound characters, how one half of them is a clue about meaning and the other about pronunciation. It makes learning the characters a bit like solving riddles, and I love a good riddle.

So yeah. It was a journey, with a lot maybes and mights in there, and I know myself well enough to know that there’s a 90% chance nothing will ever come of this. But that doesn’t make my time reading this book any less meaningful or amazing. Even if I don’t actually learn any of these langauges, I sure learned a lot about them from Gaston Dorren’s Babel.

(Review cross-posted to my blog)

A thousand thanks to Edelweiss for my review copy!

[Katika · Rating 4 out of 5]

Język jako narzędzie podziałów klasowych (jawajski) lub płciowych (japoński), język jako lingua franca (angielski, suahili), język tonalny, pismo ideograficzne i inne - Gaston Dorren każdy z 20 największych języków świata przedstawia pod innym kątem. Zabiera nas w podróż dookoła świata, w której, jak u Verne'a, w każdym miejscu gościmy tylko przez chwilę. Chwytamy ogólny zarys, garść informacji, podstawowe fakty, jedną ciekawostkę i pędzimy dalej. Jeśli ktoś spodziewa się dogłębnej analizy lingwistycznej współczesnego świata, będzie rozczarowany. Czasem będzie nudnawo, czasem trochę obok tematu, będzie nierówno. Ale i każdy znajdzie tu coś dla siebie. Nie znam się na tonach, sylabach, głoskach, akutach, grawisach, dierezach, cedyllach i cyrkumfleksach (ale nazywają się wspaniale!), to, co mnie w języku interesuje bardziej to jego związek ze sferą społeczną, jego życie i użycie, odwzorowywanie i kształtowanie rzeczywistości, a także w wymiarze globalnym wzajemne wpływy i przenikanie się języków. "Babel" nie wyczerpuje tematu, ale jest ciekawą lekturą, która daje pole do dalszych poszukiwań na własną rękę.

[Esther · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was fun! 3.5 stars. Great introduction for those curious abt linguistics but don’t want to commit to a weightier text! Nice short chapters abt 20 most spoken languages, and each chapter follows a different theme, some hokier than others

[Yvonne (It's All About Books) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Finished reading: November 25th 2018


*** A copy of this book was kindly provided to me by Netgalley and Atlantic Monthly Press in exchange for an honest review. Thank you! ***



Some of you might already know I'm actually a philologist and linguistics has always been one of my favorite areas of study. Therefore I thought Babel would be perfect for me... I mean, traveling the world through twenty languages that together can make you communicate with at least half of the world population? Sounds like pretty much a dream topic for philologists to me. Sadly, this book failed to hit the mark completely for me. There were a lot of editing errors in my ARC copy, with not only spelling errors and words stuck together without hitting the space bar, but also more critical ones like all the missing numbers and facts that haven't been incorporated yet (hopefully they will in the future). This made it a lot harder to read and slowed down the pace considerably. Also, I felt I was missing out by not having all the fun facts, numbers and comparisons. Editing issues aside, I had also problems with the writing style in general. Both the tone and style of each chapter seemed to vary considerably and simply didn't feel consistent to me. From a memoir style approach to an informal interview style and a history lesson; I just didn't feel I was getting to know each language equally. Not every chapter was as pleasant to read either as some didn't flow that well and had quite a slow pace. There were some interesting facts as well of course and I think philologists and language fans in general will still be interested in the title. I just hope at least the editing issues will be dealt with so we get the full package of information and little fun facts.

P.S. Find more of my reviews here.

[Biblio Files (takingadayoff) · Rating 5 out of 5]

Books about English language, such as those by John McWhorter and David Crystal are some of my favorites, and I also like the "deep dive" into other languages, such as the books about French and Spanish by Julie Barlow and Jean-Benoit Nadeau. Then there's the books that dip a toe into many languages, such as this one by Gaston Dorren. Babel looks at the twenty languages that are spoken by the most people in the world. Dorren starts with some statistics to get you grounded, how many native speakers, where spoken, etc., and then takes off on whatever interests him most about that language. He discusses his difficulties in learning to speak Vietnamese, talks about how Japanese is spoken differently by men and women, looks at the history of the written Turkish language and how politics is inextricably linked to its development. It's just fascinating and it touches on many topics. Even if you aren't interested in 20th century Turkish politics (but you might be surprised to find that it is quite interesting), for instance, you might very well find yourself captivated by the astonishing number of words in English that derive from Arabic. (Thanks to Atlantic Monthly Press and NetGalley for a digital review copy.)

[Shrike58 · Rating 3 out of 5]

My interest in picking up this book was strictly light entertainment, particularly in regards to the foibles of English, though Dorren gives the same treatment to the other nineteen languages he examines. If there is a running theme below the mission of providing a snappy introduction into what makes each of these 20 languages interesting, it's how language can become a bone of contention. If you come away feeling that Dorren's treatment is too slight for your purposes, don't worry; he provides an extensive list of further reading.

Actual rating: 3.5.

[Ivana Krekáňová · Rating 5 out of 5]

Skvelá, skvelá, must-have kniha pre každého, koho aspoň trošku zaujímajú jazyky. Na začiatku každej kapitoly je síce informačné zhrnutie o príslušnom jazyku, ale nie je to nejaká nudná encyklopédia, to ani zďaleka. Pri každom z dvadsiatky jazykov sa totiž zaoberá niečím iným, zaujímavým aspektom jazyka, alebo historickými súvislosťami – sú to skôr také eseje, dalo by sa povedať, a navyše vtipné („lexikálne stonožky, ktoré tak obľubujú Nemci“ a keď som čítala, ako sa učil po vietnamsky, smiala som sa nahlas). (Ale koho to zaujíma, dozvie sa aj odbornejšie jazykovedné veci ako sú kognáty či viazané morfémy.)

Mám asi osem strán poznámok, vyberám úplne náhodne: pri mandarínčine vyvracia pomýlené dohady a polopravdy o čínskom písme, pri portugalčine sa venuje globálnej expanzii koloniálnych jazykov, pri francúzštine ide po stopách jazykového purizmu, pri bengálčine sa venuje mnohým podobám jazykového zápisu, pri swahilčine sa dozviete, že Kamerun je mekka africkej viacjazyčnosti, pri nemčine zas to, ako sa dá merať „čudnosť“ jazyka, perzštinu predstaví ako dialóg o dejinách Perzskej ríše, pri pandžábčine sa venuje tomu, čo so šepotom a spevom pri tónových jazykoch...

Perfektné čítanie, je tam toho mnoho, mimoriadne zaujímavá kniha – pri zložitom systéme rozlišovania formálnosti v jávčine (odpor voči krame!) som žasla – a preklad je výborný, skladám klobúk pred Milanom Kopeckým, lebo toto musel byť neuveriteľne náročný preklad (pri mnohých jazykoch musel napríklad anglické príklady nahrádzať slovenskými tak, aby vyjadrili to, čo chcel autor príkladom vyjadriť).

[David · Rating 4 out of 5]

Pretty nearly perfect reading for a nerd like me, as it turns out. Could be a good read for fans of Atlas Obscura. I saw a review of this just before Xmas, so when the inevitable question came ("what do you want..."), this was on my list. Hopefully some publisher is feeling justified right now because lots of other nerds like me did the same thing.

It's not a great book, in the sense that you absolutely need to read it for any reason. But it's a fun and fascinating read, which is all I was expecting, and it delivered. I enjoyed the way it wandered all over the landscape, as the author made various points about language and languages. Happy to have on my shelves, no doubt I'll dip back in to remind myself of one fact or another from time to time. Well worth a look, if your local library has it.

I'd love to meet the author, he seems like a great person. Wish I could study languages with him along to guide me!

[Mandy · Rating 4 out of 5]

If you love words, you’ll love this, and if you love languages, then you’ll love it even more. Dorren takes the 20 languages with the most speakers – out of the estimated 6000 languages that exist in the world today – and explores their origins and peculiarities. The expected ones are of course English, Arabic and Mandarin, but Tamil and Javanese are included in that 20 too – who’d have thought? Each chapter is devoted to a different language (although Japanese merits two) and the approach differs in each one, sometimes stressing the history, sometimes exploring tonality, sometimes exploring politics. It’s comprehensive and endlessly fascinating, and written in a clear and accessible (if sometimes random) way. I enjoyed it immensely. And I definitely won’t be deciding to learn Vietnamese….