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Linguistics: a brilliant and fascinating exploration of the basic weapon by which man has advanced from savagery to civilization.
—Mario Pei
If you have never experienced one of the following, please don't read this book:
A: You speak some English
B: You speak Chinese quite well, or
C: You plan to improve your English
This course book is about the basics of linguistics, including the main concepts and aspects of language studies. You'll see the names of some great thinkers who have influenced the 20 th century humanity studies, and other names in brackets who have made linguistics an enlightening field of research. More important, you will arrive at the end of the book feeling you didn't actually know the things you thought you knew and already know more than some of the things the book talks about.
To know grammar and to know about grammar—how much difference is there between the two skills? What does it mean to study a language? What are the characteristics of different languages, and of the English language in particular? And then there is the difference between studying the structure of a language (e. g. its grammar, pronunciation, vocabulary) and the cultural aspects of language use (e. g. its social and regional variations). ... But to start with, let us take a quick look at how the subject of study came into being.