Book picks similar to
500 Common Chinese Proverbs and Colloquial Expressions: An Annotated Frequency Dictionary by Liwei Jiao
language-and-linguistics
language-learning
languages
中文
Hangeul Master
TalkToMeInKorean - 2014
Go from being a novice to a Hangeul Master in a short time with this book! Hangeul Master is chock-full of everything you need to know about Hangeul!-Short History of Hangeul-Quick Guide to Writing Hangeul-Basic Pronunciation of Hangeul-Fun Facts-How to Read Handwritten and Stylized Korean
Interpersonal Communication: Everyday Encounters
Julia T. Wood - 1995
This text shows how interpersonal communication theory and skills pertain to students' daily encounters with others.
Word Power Made Easy
Norman Lewis - 1949
As you complete the exercises in this book, you will learn how to tell if you’re using the right word as well as how to pronounce and spell it. You will also learn how to avoid illiterate expressions and how to speak grammatically, without making embarrassing mistakes.A complete handbook for building a superior vocabulary, Word Power Made Easy will teach you how to speak and write with confidence as well as how to read more effectively and efficiently. It will help you to learn more quickly, develop social contacts, and increase your earning power.Each chapter ends with review. Each section ends with a progressive check. Numerous tests will help you increase and retain the knowledge you acquired. Word Power Made Easy does more than just add words to your vocabulary; it teaches ideas and a method of broadening knowledge as an integral part of the vocabulary building process.
Japanese Sentence Patterns for Effective Communication: A Self-Study Course and Reference
Taeko Kamiya - 2005
Designed specifically for native-English speakers approaching Japanese as a second language, this book presents 142 essential Japanese sentence patterns, first by giving equivalents in English, then following with Japanese translations. Each pattern is accompanied by a concise, easy-to-follow explanation and several Japanese example sentences that demonstrate its usage. In addition, practice sections for each pattern allow the student to test his or her understanding of the material presented.Japanese Sentence Patterns for Effective Communication is organized into twelve chapters according to communicative function, including such tasks as making simple, declarative statements about people and things in the world; making comparisons; talking about events in the past, present and future; expressing desire, conjecture and intention;stating causes or reasons; making requests; asking and giving permission; and using the passive and causative-passive voices. Extensive charts at the back of the book outline the rules for inflecting and conjugating adjectives and verbs-essential to fluent communication.
Mandarin Chinese-English Bilingual Visual Dictionary
D.K. Publishing - 2008
The Mandarin Chinese-English Bilingual Visual Dictionary introduces a range of useful current vocabulary in thematic order, using full-color photographs and artworks to display and label all the elements of everyday life — from the home and office to sport, music, nature, and the countries of the world — with panel features on key nouns, verbs, and useful phrases.The Mandarin Chinese-English Bilingual Visual Dictionary features:A quick and intuitive way to learn and remember thousands of words. A complete range of illustrated objects and scenes from everyday life. Fast and effective learning for any situation, from home and office to shopping and dining out. Detailed index for instant reference. Handy size ideal for travel. The illustrations in the Mandarin Chinese-English Bilingual Visual Dictionary provide a quick and intuitive route to learning a language, defining the words visually so it is easier to remember them and creating a colorful and stimulating learning resource for the foreign-language and EFL/ESL student.
Unspeak: How Words Become Weapons, How Weapons Become a Message, and How That Message Becomes Reality
Steven Poole - 2005
Words and phrases that function in this special way go by many names. Some writers call them “evaluative-descriptive terms.” Others talk of “terministic screens” or discuss the way debates are “framed.” Author Steven Poole calls them Unspeak. Unspeak represents an attempt by politicians, interest groups, and business corporations to say something without saying it, without getting into an argument and so having to justify itself. At the same time, it tries to unspeak — in the sense of erasing or silencing — any possible opposing point of view by laying a claim right at the start to only one way of looking at a problem. Recalling the vocabulary of George Orwell’s 1984, as an Unspeak phrase becomes a widely used term of public debate, it saturates the mind with one viewpoint while simultaneously makes an opposing view ever more difficult to enunciate. In this fascinating book, Poole traces modern Unspeak and reveals how the evolution of language changes the way we think.
An Exaltation of Larks: The Ultimate Edition
James Lipton - 1968
Lipton in the Books of Venery that were the constant study of anyone who aspired to the title of gentleman in the fifteenth century. When Mr. Lipton's painstaking research revealed that five hundred years ago the terms of venery had already been turned into the Game of Venery, he embarked on an odyssey that has given us a "slouch of models," a "shrivel of critics," an "unction of undertakers," a "blur of Impressionists," a "score of bachelors," and a "pocket of quarterbacks." This ultimate edition of An Exaltation of Larks is Mr. Lipton's brilliant answer to the assault on language and literacy in the last decades of the twentieth century. In it you will find more than 1,100 resurrected or newly minted contributions to that most endangered of all species, our language, in a setting of 250 witty, beautiful, and remarkably apt engravings.
Greek Grammar
Herbert Weir Smyth - 1956
All necessary corrections have been made, and the book retains the form which has long made it the most complete and valuable work of its kind. In this descriptive grammar the author offers a treatment of Greek syntax which is exceptionally rich as well subtle and varied.
The Search for the Perfect Language
Umberto Eco - 1993
This is an investigation into the history of this idea.
Schaum's Outline of French Grammar
Mary E. Coffman Crocker - 1973
The examples use the language of real-life situations. This new edition also makes difficult topics, like the difference between mood and tense, even easier to understand. Numerous fill-in-the-blank and other exercises with delayed answers help cut down the time it takes readers to gain proficiency and confidence communicating in French.
Bastard Tongues: A Trailblazing Linguist Finds Clues to Our Common Humanity in the World's Lowliest Languages
Derek Bickerton - 2008
The story focuses on languages so low in the pecking order that many people don't regard them as languages at all--Creole languages spoken by descendants of slaves and indentured laborers in plantation colonies all over the world. The story is told by Derek Bickerton, who has spent more than thirty years researching these languages on four continents and developing a controversial theory that explains why they are so similar to one another. A published novelist, Bickerton (once described as part scholar, part swashbuckling man of action) does not present his findings in the usual dry academic manner. Instead, you become a companion on his journey of discovery. You learn things as he learned them, share his disappointments and triumphs, explore the exotic locales where he worked, and meet the colorful characters he encountered along the way. The result is a unique blend of memoir, travelogue, history, and linguistics primer, appealing to anyone who has ever wondered how languages grow or what it's like to search the world for new knowledge.
Dirty Chinese: Everyday Slang from "What's Up?" to "F*%# Off!"
Brenden O'Kane - 2008
Qù tama, zánmen chuqù feng ba. •Who farted? Shéi fàng de pì?•Wanna try doggy-style? Yàobù zánliar shìshì gou cào shì?•Son of a bitch!Gouniángyang de!•I’m getting smashed. Wo ganjué heduo le.•I can’t eat this shit! Wo chi bù xià qù!
Reading and Writing Chinese: A Guide to the Chinese Writing System
William McNaughton - 1979
Reading and Writing Chinese has been the leading text for foreign students and teachers of the Chinese writing system since it was first published in 1978. This completely revised edition draws on the lessons learnt from the use of the book in classrooms so as to provide a more convenient and up–to–date introduction to the Chinese writing system. Over 1,100 new combinations of characters have been added, increasing the total vocabulary significantly to about 4,500 items. There are also new notes on usage to give students insight into the contemporary state of the language. The student's ability to read Chinese and write Chinese are reinforced throughout. For each of the basic 1,062 characters, the pronunciation, definition and derivation are given, with examples of the use of most words and a chart showing how to write each character. Memorization tips and cautionary cross–reference to look–alike characters are also provided, as well as notes to help clarify those overlooked aspects of the Chinese writing system. Key features of this book:-The Student's 1,020 List.-The Official 2,000 List.-Over 2,000 characters and 2,500 combinations.-Definitions and explanations. Standard Hanyu Pinyin romanization.-Memorization hints and stroke–order diagrams.-Hong Kong/Taiwan and China/Singapore forms.-Traditional and modern radical systems.
Grooming, Gossip, and the Evolution of Language
Robin I.M. Dunbar - 1997
It's an evolutionary riddle that at long last makes sense in this intriguing book about what gossip has done for our talkative species. Psychologist Robin Dunbar looks at gossip as an instrument of social order and cohesion--much like the endless grooming with which our primate cousins tend to their social relationships.Apes and monkeys, humanity's closest kin, differ from other animals in the intensity of these relationships. All their grooming is not so much about hygiene as it is about cementing bonds, making friends, and influencing fellow primates. But for early humans, grooming as a way to social success posed a problem: given their large social groups of 150 or so, our earliest ancestors would have had to spend almost half their time grooming one another--an impossible burden. What Dunbar suggests--and his research, whether in the realm of primatology or in that of gossip, confirms--is that humans developed language to serve the same purpose, but far more efficiently. It seems there is nothing idle about chatter, which holds together a diverse, dynamic group--whether of hunter-gatherers, soldiers, or workmates.Anthropologists have long assumed that language developed in relationships among males during activities such as hunting. Dunbar's original and extremely interesting studies suggest otherwise: that language in fact evolved in response to our need to keep up to date with friends and family. We needed conversation to stay in touch, and we still need it in ways that will not be satisfied by teleconferencing, email, or any other communication technology. As Dunbar shows, the impersonal world of cyberspace will not fulfill our primordial need for face-to-face contact.From the nit-picking of chimpanzees to our chats at coffee break, from neuroscience to paleoanthropology, Grooming, Gossip, and the Evolution of Language offers a provocative view of what makes us human, what holds us together, and what sets us apart.
How to Do Things with Words
J.L. Austin - 1955
Austin was one of the leading philosophers of the twentieth century. The William James Lectures presented Austin's conclusions in the field to which he directed his main efforts on a wide variety of philosophical problems. These talks became the classic How to Do Things with Words.For this second edition, the editors have returned to Austin's original lecture notes, amending the printed text where it seemed necessary. Students will find the new text clearer, and, at the same time, more faithful to the actual lectures. An appendix contains literal transcriptions of a number of marginal notes made by Austin but not included in the text. Comparison of the text with these annotations provides new dimensions to the study of Austin's work.