Empires of the Word: A Language History of the World
By Nicholas Ostler.
Description
An unusual and authoritative 'natural history of languages' that narrates the ways in which one language has superseded or outlasted another in the past, and what it is about - say - Greek, Sanskrit, Mandarin Chinese and English that has led to their supremacy at different times. If the history of languages has taught us anything, Nicholas Ostler argues, it is that no language - however populous its speakers, confident its culture and advanced its technology - has remained the linga franca indefinitely. As the technological and cultural dominance of America has consolidated the te...
ISBN(s)
0007118708, 9780007118700
