Tales of the Linguistically Unexpected

by David Crystal

After a lifetime of travelling the globe as a speaker on language and languages, and occasioned by his 80th birthday, David Crystal brings together a selection of the linguistic surprises he encountered along the way - and adds a few intriguing quizzes.

122 pages, Paperback

Published July 13, 2021

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

[abi fitzpatrick · Rating 4 out of 5]

A lot of these points were very interesting and it covered a lot of aspects of the english language. I liked the photos and how Crystal explored linguistics through real-life examples. I enjoyed the first half of this more than the second. It was well written and very easy to follow. It also only took an hour or so to finish.