Weeds in the garden of words : further observations on the tangled history of the English language

Blooming English #2

by Kate Burridge

People who love English - the way words are used and put together to create meaning; the arcane rules and infuriating exceptions; the vital, living history of the way the language has changed through the centuries to create a richness and depth that exceeds that of many other languages - are often very passionate about how it is used and how it is changing and about all its little tricky eccentricitiesWeeds in the Garden of Words is the perfect book for people who love English.Professor Kate Burridge's book is approachable, entertaining and fun - designed to browse through and find oneself hooked by fascinating pieces on such topics as why verbs move to nouns and vice versa, why pronunciation may differ from place to place, why regionalisms develop and the creative way of slang and jargon. Weeds in the Garden of Words is filled with the joys of the eccentric, unruly, rich and complex language that is English.

Genres: Language, Nonfiction, Linguistics, History

272 pages, Paperback

First published October 28, 2004

Reviews

[Stefania · Rating 4 out of 5]

Let’s start by saying that I’d never imagined I’d enjoy this book.
Mostly because it was given to me by my morphology professor, and I don’t get along very well with morphology (no, not the teacher).

I can sum up its perks essentially in 2 points:

1. The style. Maybe you can already guess it by the creative title, but this book is not exactly a textbook with linguistic jargon, weird and unreadable symbols or things of this sort. It’s actually pretty straight-forward and clear. I’d say that almost everybody could read it without any particular problem (except boredom for the ones not interested in the topic).

2. The topic. Not 100% of the content was totally engaging, but I have to admit that the author comes up with several curiosities I had never thought about before but that should definitely tackled more in class. The part about political correctness was particularly illuminating, and I’ll likely dive deeper into the matter.
Anyway, even when the subject of the chapter wasn’t exactly the most entertaining past-time ever, the light tone and the frequent jokes of the writer made it much more bearable.

Is there anything that prevented me from rating it 5 stars? Yes, two main reasons:

1. Probably the sillier between the two, I found terribly annoying to read things like “sho” instead of ʃʊ. I’m aware that the book is meant for a wider public and therefore the author avoided the IPA, but for me it was terribly confusing.

2. The author would probably laugh at me for this (considering all the paragraphs about taboos), but I seriously think that she exaggerated a bit with all those references about sex. I’m perfectly aware that it shouldn’t be considered a taboo anymore, but I have the terrible feeling that she exploited the topic just to make her book “more involving”.

[John Fredrickson · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another look at the English language from numerous vantage-points: slang, euphemisms, word origins, use in advertising, and grammatical considerations.

One thing I struggled with in the early parts of the book is that it appears to be written for an Australian audience, addressing things that an Australian would be familiar with, but not necessarily an American. Nonetheless, at some level, English is English, and Burridge covers many aspects of our use (/misuse) of the language in many interesting ways.

[Ashley Lambert-Maberly · Rating 2 out of 5]

All a bit random. It's this word and that word and this other word, rather than the language as a whole. That was fine for about one chapter, but the rest seemed to promise more of the same. Perhaps if I'd read the first one first. Oh well.

(Note: I'm a writer, so I suffer when I offer fewer than five stars. But these aren't ratings of quality, they're a subjective account of how much I liked the book: 5* = an unalloyed pleasure from start to
finish, 4* = enjoyed it, 3* = readable but not thrilling, 2* = disappointing, and 1* = hated it.)

[Phil Suggs · Rating 4 out of 5]

Enjoyed the audio version and learned a lot but the voice was robotic and annoying. No space or breath between chapters and subtitles of sections.

[Mark A.]

""

[Belle · Rating 1 out of 5]

This was a thoroughly disappointing book. Even Wuthering Heights was better.
I approached this book somewhat optimistically, hoping for some new metalanguage, a bit more insight into the English language and social interaction, but alas! It was not so.
Ms Burridge, although she creates a casually conversational tone to the book, does nothing more than observe basic features of our language. I was almost hopeful when she began discussing whether the 'apostrophe-s' was a clitic or diacritic - however, there was no side-taking. No thought or debate was incited - which was remarkably unfortunate.
I learnt nothing from this book, besides two or three tiny anecdotes.
Even those with the most basic knowledge or our language or linguistics will find this nearly unbearable.
I cannot even decipher what the point of this book was.
On the other hand, teachers of VCE (and presumable HSC) English should delight in this book. Perhaps younger secondary students may read it.
But for academic reading, I would suggest avoiding this book.
Read something else instead.

[Sophie · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting book about what are perceived as incorrect or sloppy grammar and spelling in the English language. Turns out most of them can actually be traced back hundreds of years, and are often the more "authentic" or earlier version. Written in a chatty, fairly informal style (the book was put together from radio segments) it's a great book to dip into.

[Shayne Power · Rating 4 out of 5]

Fascinating book, though the one-bit-at-time presentation made it a little hard to get in to.

I think I might have to be less of a snob when it comes to spelling/pronunciation after reading it, given how it seems the whole thing is mostly random anyway.