The Story of English in 100 Words
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The Story of English in 100 Words
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Narrado por:
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Professor David Crystal
Acerca de esta escucha
In this unique new history of the world's most ubiquitous language, linguistics expert David Crystal draws on words that best illustrate the huge variety of sources, influences and events that have helped to shape our vernacular since the first definitively English word was written down in the fifth century ('roe', in case you are wondering).
Featuring Latinate and Celtic words, weasel words and nonce-words, ancient words ('loaf') to cutting edge ('twittersphere') and spanning the indispensable words that shape our tongue ('and', 'what') to the more fanciful ('fopdoodle'), Crystal takes us along the winding byways of language via the rude, the obscure and the downright surprising.
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Historia4.5 out of 5 stars 3,414
E. H. Gombrich's world history, an international best seller now available in English for the first time, is a text dominated not by dates and facts but by the sweep of experience across the centuries, a guide to humanity's achievements, and an acute witness to its frailties.
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5 out of 5 stars
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an enlightening book; very well read
- De A.B.Oxford en 06-03-06
De: E. H. Gombrich
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The Prodigal Tongue
- The Love-Hate Relationship Between American and British English
- De: Lynne Murphy
- Narrado por: Pam Ward
- Duración: 11 h y 38 m
- Versión completa
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General4.5 out of 5 stars 54
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Narración:4.5 out of 5 stars 47
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Historia4.5 out of 5 stars 45
"If Shakespeare were alive today, he'd sound like an American." "English accents are the sexiest." "Americans have ruined the English language." "Technology means everyone will have to speak the same English." Such claims about the English language are often repeated but rarely examined. Professor Lynne Murphy is on the linguistic front line. In The Prodigal Tongue she explores the fiction and reality of the special relationship between British and American English.
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2 out of 5 stars
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TOO MUCH BITTERNESS
- De Tina en 08-27-20
De: Lynne Murphy
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Words on the Move
- Why English Won't - and Can't - Sit Still (Like, Literally)
- De: John McWhorter
- Narrado por: John McWhorter
- Duración: 7 h y 2 m
- Versión completa
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General4.5 out of 5 stars 1,415
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Narración:4.5 out of 5 stars 1,275
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Historia4.5 out of 5 stars 1,267
Words on the Move opens our eyes to the surprising backstories to the words and expressions we use every day. Did you know that silly once meant "blessed"? Or that ought was the original past tense of owe? Or that the suffix -ly in adverbs is actually a remnant of the word like? And have you ever wondered why some people from New Orleans sound as if they come from Brooklyn?
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5 out of 5 stars
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Review By a Fan
- De Margaret en 09-25-16
De: John McWhorter
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The Glamour of Grammar
- De: Roy Peter Clark
- Narrado por: Roy Peter Clark
- Duración: 8 h y 55 m
- Versión completa
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General4 out of 5 stars 59
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Narración:4.5 out of 5 stars 42
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Historia4 out of 5 stars 40
Early in the history of English, glamour and grammar were the same word, linked to enchantment and magical spells. Now grammar brings to mind language bullies and bored-out-of-their-skulls students. Roy Peter Clark, one of America’s most influential writing teachers, wants to change that by putting the glamour back into grammar.
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1 out of 5 stars
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Wasteful
- De ABID en 12-05-13
De: Roy Peter Clark
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The Pun Also Rises
- How the Humble Pun Revolutionized Language, Changed History, and Made Wordplay More Than Some Antics
- De: John Pollack
- Narrado por: Pete Larkin
- Duración: 4 h y 57 m
- Versión completa
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General4 out of 5 stars 61
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Narración:4 out of 5 stars 56
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Historia4 out of 5 stars 54
The Pun Also Rises is an authoritative yet playful exploration of a practice that is common, in one form or another, to virtually every language on earth. At once entertaining and educational, this engaging book answers fundamental questions: Just what is a pun, and why do people make them? How did punning impact the development of human language, and how did that drive creativity and progress? And why, after centuries of decline, does the pun still matter?
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3 out of 5 stars
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Punderful Little Book
- De B. Lane en 01-10-13
De: John Pollack
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How to Write Short
- Word Craft for Fast Times
- De: Roy Peter Clark
- Narrado por: Roy Peter Clark
- Duración: 5 h y 20 m
- Versión completa
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General4.5 out of 5 stars 82
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Narración:4.5 out of 5 stars 74
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Historia4 out of 5 stars 73
In How to Write Short , Roy Peter Clark turns his attention to the art of painting a thousand pictures with just a few words. Short forms of writing have always existed - from ship logs and telegrams to prayers and haikus. But in this ever-changing Internet age, short-form writing has become an essential skill. Clark covers how to write effective and powerful titles, headlines, essays, sales pitches, Tweets, letters, and even self-descriptions for online dating services.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Ironically long
- De Amazon Customer en 03-14-16
De: Roy Peter Clark
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You Say Potato: A Book About Accents
- De: Ben Crystal, David Crystal
- Narrado por: David Crystal, Ben Crystal, Jane Savage, y otros
- Duración: 7 h y 5 m
- Versión completa
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General4.5 out of 5 stars 76
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Narración:5 out of 5 stars 71
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Historia4.5 out of 5 stars 70
Some people say 'sconn' while others say 'schown'. He says 'bath' while she says 'bahth'. You say 'potayto'. I say 'potahto'. And - wait a second, no one says 'potahto'. No one's ever said 'potahto'. Have they? From reconstructing Shakespeare's accent to the rise and fall of received pronunciation, actor Ben Crystal and his linguist father, David, travel the world in search of the stories of spoken English.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Wish there were more native recordings.
- De Matt Dobler en 07-01-16
De: Ben Crystal, y otros
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Memory Craft
- Improve Your Memory with the Most Powerful Methods in History
- De: Lynne Kelly
- Narrado por: Nancy Linari
- Duración: 8 h y 18 m
- Versión completa
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General4.5 out of 5 stars 36
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Narración:5 out of 5 stars 31
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Historia4.5 out of 5 stars 31
Groundbreaking anthropologist and memory champion Lynne Kelly reveals how we can use ancient and traditional mnemonic methods to enhance and expand our memory.
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5 out of 5 stars
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So grateful this is on Audible!
- De happy_reader en 02-19-22
De: Lynne Kelly
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The Art of Language Invention
- From Horse-Lords to Dark Elves, the Words Behind World-Building
- De: David J. Peterson
- Narrado por: David J. Peterson
- Duración: 10 h y 26 m
- Versión completa
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General4.5 out of 5 stars 101
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Narración:4.5 out of 5 stars 92
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Historia4.5 out of 5 stars 89
An insider’s tour through the construction of invented languages from the bestselling author and creator of languages for Legendary's Dune, the HBO series Game of Thrones and the Syfy series Defiance.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Great resource, but not conducive to audiobook
- De Ashley T. en 04-18-16
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Made in America
- De: Bill Bryson
- Narrado por: William Roberts
- Duración: 18 h y 10 m
- Versión completa
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General4.5 out of 5 stars 1,547
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Narración:4.5 out of 5 stars 1,278
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Historia4.5 out of 5 stars 1,276
In Made in America, Bryson de-mythologizes his native land, explaining how a dusty hamlet with neither woods nor holly became Hollywood, how the Wild West wasn't won, why Americans say 'lootenant' and 'Toosday', how Americans were eating junk food long before the word itself was cooked up, as well as exposing the true origins of the G-string, the original $64,000 question, and Dr Kellogg of cornflakes fame.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Bryson Not Reading Makes For a Rare Fail
- De John en 02-28-14
De: Bill Bryson
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The Riddle of the Labyrinth
- The Quest to Crack an Ancient Code
- De: Margalit Fox
- Narrado por: Pam Ward
- Duración: 7 h y 44 m
- Versión completa
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General4 out of 5 stars 147
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Narración:4.5 out of 5 stars 133
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Historia4 out of 5 stars 132
In the tradition of Simon Winchester and Dava Sobel, The Riddle of the Labyrinth: The Quest to Crack an Ancient Code tells one of the most intriguing stories in the history of language, masterfully blending history, linguistics, and cryptology with an elegantly wrought narrative. When famed archaeologist Arthur Evans unearthed the ruins of a sophisticated Bronze Age civilization that flowered on Crete 1,000 years before Greece's Classical Age, he discovered a cache of ancient tablets, Europe's earliest written records.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Discovery and Translation of Linear B Script
- De Sires en 01-11-14
De: Margalit Fox
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How to Speak and Write Correctly
- De: Joseph Devlin
- Narrado por: Shawn Grisden
- Duración: 4 h y 27 m
- Versión completa
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General4 out of 5 stars 44
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Narración:4.5 out of 5 stars 36
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Historia4.5 out of 5 stars 36
This book has no pretension about it whatever -- it is neither a Manual of Rhetoric, expatiating on the dogmas of style, nor a Grammar full of arbitrary rules and exceptions. It is merely an effort to help ordinary, everyday people to express themselves in ordinary, everyday language, in a proper manner.
De: Joseph Devlin
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Babel No More
- The Search for the World's Most Extraordinary Language Learners
- De: Michael Erard
- Narrado por: Robert Blumenfeld
- Duración: 9 h y 3 m
- Versión completa
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General4 out of 5 stars 47
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Narración:4 out of 5 stars 44
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Historia4 out of 5 stars 45
We all learn at least one language as children. But what does it take to learn six languages...or seventy? In Babel No More, Michael Erard, "a monolingual with benefits," sets out on a quest to meet language superlearners and make sense of their mental powers. On the way he uncovers the secrets of historical figures like Italian cardinal Giuseppe Mezzofanti, who was said to speak seventy-two languages; Emil Krebs, a pugnacious German diplomat, who spoke sixty-eight languages; and Lomb Kat, a Hungarian who taught herself Russian by reading Russian romance novels.
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3 out of 5 stars
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Heavy on anecdote, light on science
- De S. Yates en 07-15-16
De: Michael Erard
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The Written World
- The Power of Stories to Shape People, History, Civilization
- De: Martin Puchner
- Narrado por: Arthur Morey
- Duración: 12 h y 3 m
- Versión completa
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General4.5 out of 5 stars 90
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Narración:4.5 out of 5 stars 80
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Historia4.5 out of 5 stars 79
Martin Puchner leads us on a remarkable journey through time and around the globe to reveal the powerful role stories and literature have played in creating the world we have today. Puchner introduces us to numerous visionaries as he explores 16 foundational texts selected from more than 4,000 years of world literature and reveals how writing has inspired the rise and fall of empires and nations, the spark of philosophical and political ideas, and the birth of religious beliefs. Indeed, literature has touched generations and changed the course of history.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Powerful and illuminating!
- De Gloria J. Petit-Clair en 12-04-17
De: Martin Puchner
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Words and Rules
- The Ingredients of Language
- De: Steven Pinker
- Narrado por: Arthur Morey
- Duración: 13 h y 59 m
- Versión completa
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General4 out of 5 stars 165
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Narración:4.5 out of 5 stars 141
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Historia4 out of 5 stars 145
First published in 2000, Words and Rules remains one of Pinker's most provocative and accessible books, illuminating the fascinating relationship between the brain, the mind, and how language makes us humans.
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5 out of 5 stars
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Amazing how much irregular verbs can teach.
- De Tristan en 04-10-16
De: Steven Pinker
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The Bonjour Effect
- The Secret Codes of French Conversation Revealed
- De: Julie Barlow, Jean-Benoit Nadeau
- Narrado por: Teri Schnaubelt
- Duración: 8 h y 37 m
- Versión completa
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General4.5 out of 5 stars 132
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Narración:4 out of 5 stars 112
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Historia4.5 out of 5 stars 111
Jean-Benoît Nadeau and Julie Barlow spent a decade traveling back and forth to Paris as well as living there. Yet one important lesson never seemed to sink in: how to communicate comfortably with the French, even when you speak their language. In The Bonjour Effect, Jean-Benoît and Julie chronicle the lessons they learned after they returned to France to live, for a year, with their twin daughters. They offer up all the lessons they learned and explain the most important aspect of all: the French don't communicate, they converse.
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4 out of 5 stars
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Terrible French pronunciation
- De CA en 01-24-19
De: Julie Barlow, y otros