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LANGUAGE

Name: LANGUAGE
Author: Daniel L. Everett
ISBN: 978-0-307-37853-8

THE CULTURAL TOOL

by Daniel L. Everett ‧ RELEASE DATE: March 13, 2012

Readers’ eyes will sometimes sparkle with new insight, sometimes glaze at the dense exposition.

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Everett (Dean of Arts and Sciences/Bentley Univ.; Don’t Sleep, There Are Snakes: Life and Language in the Amazon Jungle, 2008, etc.) challenges Noam Chomsky, arguing that grammar and language are learned.

The author begins and ends with images of fire, calling language “the cognitive fire.” After some obligatory comments about how he intends to be fair with his opponents, he soars off into his thesis about how language is a tool—one that we acquire rather than inherit genetically, rather like a bow and arrow. Throughout, Everett endeavors to leaven his otherwise heavy narrative with anecdotes (especially about his years living with the Amazonian Pirahã) and with allusions to music and to popular culture—among others, he looks at Phil Spector, George Carlin, Richard Pryor, Mick Jagger and the Lone Ranger and Tonto. The author dismisses the idea that there’s a “language gene,” and he explains linguistic terms like Zipf’s Law, discreteness, contingency and recursion. He finds ways to chip chinks in Chomsky’s armor and dives gleefully into the controversy surrounding Benjamin Whorf, who maintained that our languages circumscribe our thoughts. Everett closely examines the Pirahã, noting that they have no words for numbers or colors, but mothers nonetheless know how many children they have. He pauses now and then for more extensive explanations of related topics, like cross-cultural ideas of kinship, noting that our (American) terms for first and second cousin (and the notion of “removed”) are disappearing because we no longer use them. The author grieves at the loss of any language, takes a shot or two at public schools for their failure to teach about dialects and notes how each language makes its speakers happy.

Readers’ eyes will sometimes sparkle with new insight, sometimes glaze at the dense exposition.

Pub Date: March 13, 2012

ISBN: 978-0-307-37853-8

Page Count: 352

Publisher: Pantheon

Review Posted Online: Dec. 27, 2011

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Jan. 15, 2012

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
HOW LANGUAGE BEGAN
by Daniel L. Everett

- BOOK REVIEW
DON’T SLEEP, THERE ARE SNAKES
by Daniel L. Everett

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NUTCRACKER

by E.T.A. Hoffmann ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 28, 1996

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This is not the Nutcracker sweet, as passed on by Tchaikovsky and Marius Petipa. No, this is the original Hoffmann tale of 1816, in which the froth of Christmas revelry occasionally parts to let the dark underside of childhood fantasies and fears peek through. The boundaries between dream and reality fade, just as Godfather Drosselmeier, the Nutcracker's creator, is seen as alternately sinister and jolly. And Italian artist Roberto Innocenti gives an errily realistic air to Marie's dreams, in richly detailed illustrations touched by a mysterious light. A beautiful version of this classic tale, which will captivate adults and children alike. (Nutcracker; $35.00; Oct. 28, 1996; 136 pp.; 0-15-100227-4)

Pub Date: Oct. 28, 1996

ISBN: 0-15-100227-4

Page Count: 136

Publisher: Harcourt

Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Aug. 15, 1996

Categories:

GENERAL NONFICTION

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER AND THE MOUSE KING
by E.T.A. Hoffmann ; adapted by Natalie Andrewson ; illustrated by Natalie Andrewson

- BOOK REVIEW
THE NUTCRACKER
by E.T.A. Hoffmann & illustrated by Julie Paschkis

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TO THE ONE I LOVE THE BEST

EPISODES FROM THE LIFE OF LADY MENDL (ELSIE DE WOLFE)

by Ludwig Bemelmans ‧ RELEASE DATE: Feb. 23, 1955

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An extravaganza in Bemelmans' inimitable vein, but written almost dead pan, with sly, amusing, sometimes biting undertones, breaking through. For Bemelmans was "the man who came to cocktails". And his hostess was Lady Mendl (Elsie de Wolfe), arbiter of American decorating taste over a generation. Lady Mendl was an incredible person,- self-made in proper American tradition on the one hand, for she had been haunted by the poverty of her childhood, and the years of struggle up from its ugliness,- until she became synonymous with the exotic, exquisite, worshipper at beauty's whrine. Bemelmans draws a portrait in extremes, through apt descriptions, through hilarious anecdote, through surprisingly sympathetic and understanding bits of appreciation. The scene shifts from Hollywood to the home she loved the best in Versailles. One meets in passing a vast roster of famous figures of the international and artistic set. And always one feels Bemelmans, slightly offstage, observing, recording, commenting, illustrated.