Reddit mentions: The best etymology books

I'm currently reading a really excellent collection of articles by Elizabeth Gordon called Living Language: Exploring Kiwitalk. It's (obviously) heavily focused on New Zealand English, but there's a lot of general English stuff there too (For example, one article outlines all the different countries of origin of different food words).

Letter Perfect is an easy read about the history of the written alphabet.

I'm seconding Mother Tongue already mentioned, though be warned he gets a few things wrong.

In that vein (of people being wrong) , Word Myths is a collection of dubunked language myths (such as "Eskimos have 1000 words for snow") that still persevere through culture.

If you're interested in anything about how language works in development/the mind, I urge you to check out any of Steven Pinker's books on the subject. They are among the most accessible linguistic work I've ever read. (I highly recommend starting with The Language Instinct. The Blank Slate is by far my favourite but quite removed from language proper).

Advanced/Reference/Kinda boring:

The Dictionary of Word Origins is an excellent reference, if not actually something you can just sit down and read.

A Short History of Linguistics is pretty dry, but it sheds some light on why we adopt so many Greek and Latin word forms. I'd call it advanced because you need a pretty firm grasp of grammar. This book is also great for dealing with some of the interesting theory oppositions through history. Technically this is a short history of Western/Germanic linguistics, but still very good.

If you're interested in the how along with the actual histories, I really have to recommend Lyle Campbell's Historical Linguistics, especially the chapters on semantic change (skip the whole part on sound change. It's tedious and unnecessary). His examples are numerous, clear and usually entertaining. But be aware there are a lot of errors in special character printing.

Finally, some Links!!

The Language Log

A walk in the woRds

The Eggcorn database (sound change in action!)


I wish this hadn't been posted when I was in the middle of a move. I went to check my (ridiculous) bookshelf for other titles on the subject only to be greeted by a pile of boxes.

TLDR; I love language

> "from now on, don't refer to me by 'him', instead use 'his utmost almighty holiness", would it be reasonable for me to expect you to call me that?

Just like with non-binary identifying people, coming off as pompous isn't going to get anyone to use your preferred pronoun. For someone that insists on being knowledgable about the English language, you seem to be ignorant of the fact language evolves over time. Here is a book that can introduce you to that concept:

Words On The Move - Amazon

> Language is always changing -- but we tend not to like it. We understand that new words must be created for new things, but the way English is spoken today rubs many of us the wrong way. Whether it’s the use of literally to mean “figuratively” rather than “by the letter,” or the way young people use LOL and like, or business jargon like What’s the ask? -- it often seems as if the language is deteriorating before our eyes.

> But the truth is different and a lot less scary, as John McWhorter shows in this delightful and eye-opening exploration of how English has always been in motion and continues to evolve today. Drawing examples from everyday life and employing a generous helping of humor, he shows that these shifts are a natural process common to all languages, and that we should embrace and appreciate these changes, not condemn them.

> 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?

> McWhorter encourages us to marvel at the dynamism and resilience of the English language, and his book offers a lively journey through which we discover that words are ever on the move and our lives are all the richer for it.

Enjoy!

As someone who also recently got into Linguistics at the university level, I can sympathize. Since my degree isn't Linguistics I didn't need to take a language for two years, but I would (personally) go for either Sanskrit or Greek.

General Advice: As someone else said, definitely work on IPA and sentence diagraming/sentence trees. Both are (in my opinion) extremely fun and interesting. I give this link to anyone asking for help with IPA. A TA of mine sent it to me, and it has been invaluable. Sentence diagramming can be tricky to pick up. One of the textbooks I used was the Longman Student Grammar and it is packed with information on various parts of English syntax. For 30 bucks on Amazon, it's definitely worth it (unless one of your classes uses a similar text, in which case, I would suggest waiting because textbooks are way too expensive).

Other than that, my only other suggestion is to get to know your Linguistics professors. Applied Linguistics is such a huge field (I assume most of your professors will belong to it), and each one of them I guarantee has a different specialty. Two of my professors specialize in speech pathology, one specializes in corpus research, another in syntax, and there are more that I won't list. Figure out what you really enjoy doing since it's so broad, and try to focus in on that (while obviously getting a broad knowledge of the other fields). Best of luck!

edit: I also meant to say, try to get involved in an internship with the department at some point in your college career. Much of linguistics is research, and having a research assistant internship on a future resume would stand out.

I haven't read /u/BuiltLikeTaft's suggestion, but I have read A Writer's Grammar by C. Beth Burch and I thought that was pretty good. It was for a class on traditional English grammar at my uni, so I did have an instructor who was able to help with some of the difficult aspects. Still, this would be my top recommendation. I actually laughed out loud where some of the example sentences get a bit... strange. It is almost as if the author was slowly losing their mind while writing this book.

I have also read English Syntax (2nd Ed.) by C. L. Baker, and while I did not like that one as much as the previous, it had a lot of useful information. Again, it was read as part of a course on modern grammar, so the instructor was extremely helpful.

While not exactly what you're after (and it sounds like the CGEL might already fit this role), I have a smallish Oxford Dictionary of English Grammar for reference that is pretty helpful.

I agree with the previous posters; talk with her (in simple sentences until you can figure out her level) and find out about her interests. Using her interests for discussion/activities will help break the ice and make the time more interesting. It may be helpful to have several kinds of activities since your lessons will be so long; a "warmup" game or free talk in the beginning, short reading activity with questions, phonics practice for letters she has problems with, showing her some common idioms and asking her what she thinks they mean (and then explaining), doing a mock-interview to help her practice answering questions, etc. Collocations are something that my Japanese students have problems with because their textbooks don't usually teach them which words sound natural together. You could even buy a book about idioms or collocations if you are so inclined-- this book looks good (http://www.amazon.com/Essential-Idioms-English-Phrasal-Collocations/dp/0131411764/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1311644804&sr=8-5).
I am using a different book
(http://www.amazon.com/Essential-Idioms-English-Phrasal-Collocations/dp/0131411764/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1311644804&sr=8-5)
with my adult class and I choose which lessons to cover based on their interests. It's rather high-level, though.

Good luck, and don't worry too much. Even if you just chat for the entire two hours, you're giving the girl the chance to actually use and further develop her English skills. If she walks away with more confidence speaking English, it's a win.

If I could go back in time as a senior in high school, above all, I would just do more reading, and I would read widely. I did not start on the path to English teaching until I was 26, and although I did great in college and I feel that I am a successful teacher now, my weakness is my reading background. I would suggest using an app like Goodreads so that you can track your progress as you chip away at the literary canon, work by work. The texts that are going to help you the most and serve you for the rest of your career are the ones that most authors allude to, so, I would suggest that at some point you familiarize yourself with these from a literary standpoint:

• The Bible
  
• Homer's The Iliad and The Odyssey
  
• Virgil's Aenid
  
• Ovid's Metamorphoses
  
• As many Shakespeare plays as you can read (and I just want to mention that the Cambridge School editions are the best for teaching)
  
  As far as resources that will give you a head start, I suggest:
  
  
• Shmoop (but only after you've exhausted your own abilities with a text)
  
• How to Read Literature Like a Professor
  
• How Literature Works
  
• Any Introductory Textbook to Critical Theory
  
  Considering pedagogy resources, by the time you are in an education program, there will be new research and new buzzwords, so I won't waste my time here, but these are my favorite resources when it comes to inspiring my teaching:
  
  
• Rick Wormeli (Seriously, this guy is amazing)
  
• Teach Like a Pirate
  
• Reading in the Wild
  
  Lastly, if you go into an English education program with a near-perfect understanding of grammar, your life will be so much easier. I suggest these three resources for brushing up:
  
  
• No Red Ink
  
• Teaching Grammar Through Writing
  
• Language Exploration and Awareness
  
  Good luck, and let me know if you have questions! If you do anything on this list, just read!

I'm assuming you're being tongue-in-cheek, but this is a world that interests me deeply so I thought I'd offer a proper response.

There are four points to your argument: 1) OK is an initialism, 2) initialisms aren't allowed, and 3) the proper spelling of OK is all capitalized, and 4) capitalized words shouldn't be allowed. I'll address each one in turn.

1. The etymology of OK is not settled. Some candidates include the Finnish word for "correct" (oikea) and a Scottish variant of "ah, yes" (och aye). If the current thinking around the word is of interest to you, I recommend Allan Metcalf's 2012 book OK: The Improbable Story of America's Greatest Word.
   
   
2. Initialisms are not categorically banned in the Scrabble dictionary. True, if a word is strictly an initialism, it is not permitted by Scrabble rules. However, "strictly" is a bit harder to pin down than one might think. AWOL was once a military jargon initialism, for example. It has since become a standard English word that doesn't need capitalization. The same is true for RADAR and SONAR, to name a few. Additionally, some initialisms happen to be standard English words; consider SAT or ACT.
   
   
3. The spelling of OK is up for contention, too. Merriam-Webster lists three valid spellings: OK, okay, and ok. Collins offers OK, O.K., and okay. The Scrabble dictionary is best thought of as a lowest common denominator. If even one reputable dictionary includes the word, so should Scrabble.
   
   
4. And finally, should capitalized words be allowed? Again, the Scrabble rules forbid proper nouns, but language does not care about strict logic. Countless proper nouns have become common nouns: TIMOTHY, MADONNA, HENRY, JAPAN, EINSTEIN, ALEXANDER, BRAZIL, FRENCH, ALASKA, OXFORD,...
   
   Language is neither cut-and-dry, nor is it stagnant. The spelling, denotation, connotation, and pronunciation of words are never fixed and are always subject to any one person's understanding and interpretation.

This is awesome! I think I've used both (rabble/rebel), but I love history of words and phrases like this. Even have a whole book on it, great coffee table book! Thanks for sharing, and I'll be sure to use the correct wording next time!

>I've tended to see Middle English as more of an Old English/Norman French Creole.

Yes, I think that's definitely the case. John McWhorter makes a couple of really interesting points in his book Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue (good read btw, and link to bonus /r/linguistics discussion of the book), namely that the influence of Norman French probably began well before the Norman Conquest of 1066, because the Brits and the Normans were probably trading and visiting and whatnot for centuries anyway. (He also has a really interesting theory that Norse/Viking invaders contributed to the simplification of Old English's incredibly complex grammar structure, but that's somewhat unrelated!) But the point is that yes, Middle English is less the "next phase" of English, and more a combination of Norman French and Old English.

>Considering how standardized spelling went out the window in the Middle English period

Just a small point, here - there was no standardized spelling until about the 1800s, when we started printing dictionaries 1755, with Samuel Johnson's very popular "A Dictionary of the English Language". Up until then, it was sort of a free-for-all (Shakespeare himself was pretty liberal with the spelling of his own name!). But yes, there was definitely an overhaul of government when the Normans arrived, so we do see a lot of leftover Norman vocabulary and phrases ("law and order" and other "x and y" phrases come from that period of Norman rule). We're left with a lot of divisive vocabulary from that time as well, like "pork" and "pig" - the former refers to the food, the final product, and is from French, because the ruling Normans would've seen that final product, but the latter is from Old English, because the lower class would've been the ones in charge of the animals and the cooking.

This language and grammar are subjects which I find endlessly fascinating. As a child, I was endlessly pestered by my pedantic relatives. As an adult, I discovered that English, and all other languages, evolve naturally over time. Attempting to stamp one particular version of English as standard and hold it static for eternity, is folly (look at French, Italian, or German). That's not to say that there aren't places where standardization and precision in language are not important (law, science, etc.), but for day to day communication, relax; live a little!

There's a great BBC documentary available on youtube about the history of the English language. It is as entertaining as it is fascinating (if you're into such things).

Also, there's a fun little book by Jeremy Butterfield, titled Damp Squid: The English Language Laid Bare, which looks at the history of the language, and issues such as standardization.

I guess if you're a Grammar Nazi, that makes me a member of the Grammar Résistance (I'll have to run out for a béret and a baguette).

Ok here are a few ideas.

I would suggest this Yale course on Literary Theory as a good introduction from the humanities angle.

The major focus of literary analysis these days usually seems to be some variant of "close reading"

For a general overview of linguistics the wiki page is pretty decent. Martin Hilpert's Introductory Linguistics and Congnitive Linguistics courses on youtube are pretty good.

I don't know how much or what type of grammar is covered in an English degree but I would pick up a book on syntax such as:

Carnie - Syntax

A more traditional take:

Traditional Diagramming

Alerternatively, you can find a free book on Syntax here

Being able to parse a sentence into it's constituent pieces is useful for analysis. After that, major fields to look into are:

• Semiotics
  
• Cognitive Linguistics
  
• Stylistics
  
• Rhetoric
  
  Some books and resources that fall under these catagories in general (I haven't read all of these):
  
  
• Metaphors We Live By
  
• Stylistics: A Resource Book for Students
  
• Exploring the Language of Poems, Plays and Prose
  
• Rhetorical Style
  
• Silva Rhetoricae
  
• Rhetoric Timeline
  
• Recommended Rhetoric Resources
  
• Figures of Speech
  
• Literal and Figurative Language
  
  And because we are learning about English, here is a cheesy documentary that's actually pretty decent.
  
  EDIT: Here is the reddit Linguistics wiki for reference.

• History of the German Language
  
  The book really helped me make sense of certain elements in German.
  
  
• The Uralic Languages
  
• Comparative Grammar of the Uralic Languages
  
• Fenno-Ugric Vocabulary
  
• A ​magyar nyelv történeti-etimológiai szótára I-IV.
  
  I started learning Hungarian when Netscape and Usenet ruled the internet, and also wanted to get a better sense of how and why Hungarian differed from the surrounding Indo-European languages. My university's research libraries were a goldmine for me to start figuring this out, and these books helped me not only to look increasingly at Hungarian on its own terms (or compare it to examples in Uralic languages rather than look for parallels in unrelated Indo-European languages), but when I eventually got around to learning Estonian, Finnish and Northern Saami, the knowledge gained from these books helped me to retain vocabulary and make sense of certain typological features in these three languages.
  
  
• The Slavonic Languages
  
• Introduction to the Phonological History of the Slavic Languages
  
• Common and Comparative Slavic Phonology and Inflection: Phonology and Inflection - with special attention to Russian, Polish, Czech, Serbo-Croatian, Bulgarian
  
• Guide to the Slavonic Languages
  
  These books really came in handy once I started to learn other Slavonic languages after having studied Polish and Slovak to a useful level.
  
  Nowadays you can get an overview of what I learned from these books on Uralic and Slavonic for free on Wikipedia articles and sometimes Wiktionary and online etymological dictionaries (e.g. Hungarian: Etimólogiai szótár, Russian: Этимологический словарь русского языка )

Sounds like you're looking for curriculum. So google grade level, common core ELA and see what you get. I usually use the California framework to skill build for my boarding kids. Definitely gunge your student's ability level and decide if there skills are at grade level. I've had kids like the one your describing come in a few grade levels below where they needed to be. One good tip is to do an essay and make a list of things to work on with your student so you can show them improvement over time. That way you can manage expectations. Anyhow, here's a list of resources I use:

Use this one to build topical lessons: https://www.amazon.com/Writing-Academic-English-Third-Longman/dp/0201340542/ref=sr_1_1?keywords=oshima+writing+academic+english+3rd&qid=1562233499&s=gateway&sr=8-1

​

And this one to load up punctuation: https://www.amazon.com/Blue-Book-Grammar-Punctuation-Easy/dp/1118785568/ref=sr_1_2?keywords=blue+book+of+american+english+and+grammar&qid=1562233598&s=gateway&sr=8-2

​

This series is also awesome for building lessons: https://www.amazon.com/s?k=elements+of+literature&crid=3EMT7657D9UI&sprefix=elements+of+liter%2Caps%2C451&ref=nb_sb_noss_2

Go and buy these three books: The Language Construction Kit, Advanced Language Construction (don't worry, it's not that advanced), and The Conlanger's Lexipedia. And if your conlangs are designed for made-up worlds, then get [The Planet Construction Kit] (https://www.amazon.co.uk/Planet-Construction-Kit-Mark-Rosenfelder/dp/0984470034/ref=pd_bxgy_14_img_3?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=W79ND56BKPK8EKXT2VQZ) too. If you want to make cultures that are not European then I'd also suggest The China Construction Kit!

Of all of these I'd suggest that you definitely buy The Language Construction Kit and see how you get on. I'd also suggest buying some grammar books of languages you're interested in, and even go so far as to learn a second language if you don't speak one. Having knowledge of at least one other language will help you a great deal.

If you like learning new words, I'm actually reading a book right now called The Story of English in 100 Words. It's a great break from complicated stories (I like that sometimes!), and it's really interesting to see how some words fit together and/or where they came from.

For those choices, I would check out things like the Online Writing Laboratory (OWL) from Purdue University or English Language and Use or maybe Grammar Girl. One of the best books I've seen on grammar in general is The Longman Student Grammar of Spoken and Written English. However, that won't teach you general punctuation rules. Those can be found in the above links or good old Strunk and White. Alternatively, you could examine ESL materials geared toward literacy to better understand comma usage. This is all from a creative writing and linguistics nerd perspective.

The Insect That Stole Butter. Like a dictionary for the etymology of words and idioms and the like. Best part is you can stop anytime you like, perfect for a bathroom read.

If you have some cash to spare, I hightly recommend getting the Conlanger's Lexipedia, which goes into all sorts of details about creating vocabulary.

Other than that, there is a lot of creativity that goes into it. Thinking about the etymological histories of your words can help create more real vocab. As a cheap example from my own language, the words for "tea" "to boil" and "culinary/medicinal pine needles" are all related. Derivations are another useful strategy. Rather than just making a new root for a word you come across, ask yourself if you can derive it from a root you already have. Maybe "puppy" is just the diminutive of "dog", "table" might be derived from the word for "to eat".

And that's another thing to think about, the semantic space. In English, desk and table are separate words, but maybe in your language they're the same. Think about your people and what's important to them. A seafaring people living on a chain of tropical islands may have many different roots for types of marine life and nautical terminology. But a desert people may only have one term for "fish" that covers all marine life - "turtle", "Crab", "shark" "Whale" "trout" etc could all be the same word, possibly only distinguished by some adjective or other adverbial. The conlanger's thesaurus is a good resource to check out to get some ideas about dividing up your semantic space.

http://www.etymonline.com/index.php

One of my favorite websites.

Also any biological science majors would do well to own this book:

http://www.amazon.com/Bioscientific-Terminology-words-Latin-Greek/dp/0816503052

Knowing the root of the words in biology often tells you exactly what it is. It's helpful on exams if you forget something, for example epidermis, mesodermis and endodermis are pretty easy to get mixed up.

I have been using this book with a friend and it's really good, kind of pricey but it has great examples and exercises.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0131849379/ref=oh_details_o04_s00_i01?ie=UTF8&psc=1

nut sure what do you mean by complete but The Blue Book of Grammar and Punctuation is pretty comorehensive in my opinion:

The Blue Book of Grammar and Punctuation: An Easy-to-Use Guide with Clear Rules, Real-World Examples, and Reproducible Quizzes https://www.amazon.de/dp/1118785568/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_i_-qISCbRT379VQ

It was the first word spoken on the Moon.

e: I'd like to also recommend the book OK: The Improbable Story of America's Greatest Word.

I recommend The Blue Book of Grammar and Punctuation: An Easy-to-Use Guide with Clear Rules, Real-World Examples, and Reproducible Quizzes: https://www.amazon.com/dp/1118785568/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_8k..BbTMSGQQY.

The instruction is straightforward, and the practice sets are very helpful.

You call it French, I call it a bastardized, stripped down regional Latin as spoken by semi-civilized Vikings.

And, while linguists aren't entirely in agreement on it, there's a great deal of evidence that a number of things having to do with word order and "meaningless do" in the present progressive are directly borrowed from English's Celtic neighbors. Personally, I am convinced. It's basically the old guard linguists who are still sticking to the narrative that has Britain's Celtic languages simply disappearing --with the obvious exceptions of Welsh and Cornish-- into a vacuum. "Our Magnificent Bastard Toungue" by John McWhorter is a pretty good recent book on the subject.

> With all of this being said, I'm very traditional in my grammar when writing academically, to the point of writing subject pronouns after "to be" verbs and the use of "be" in the present subjunctive rather than an indicative present conjugation.

Could you please provide us with a simple pair of contrasting examples that would show what you mean by 'the use of "be" in the present subjunctive rather than an indicative present conjugation'?

.

------

ADDED:

> While "them" as a singular object pronoun is often used conversationally, it isn't specified as a singular pronoun in books like The Blue Book of Grammar. Colleges and college professors often refer to books of grammar like these.

Is "The Blue Book of Grammar" the same book as the one by Jane Straus, The Blue Book of Grammar and Punctuation?

Sure chimp, everyone is Ph.D on an anonymous web forum. Yeah, you've got nothing of value or intelligence to offer. But I would suggest purchasing this, assuming you can afford it:

http://www.amazon.com/Basic-English-Grammar-Student-Answer/dp/0131849379/ref=sr_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1425236508&sr=8-2&keywords=basic+english+grammar

The First Word puts it pretty nicely. We are monkeys juggling symbols in our heads, not computers.

It's a good book. Christine Kenneally's The First Word is also good, and a bit more up-to-date.

The Blue Book of Grammar and Punctuation: An Easy-to-Use Guide with Clear Rules, Real-World Examples, and Reproducible Quizzes https://www.amazon.com/dp/1118785568/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_UP25BbNZXDEMR

This was addressed in a recent book, Our Magnificent Bastard Tongue: The Untold Story of English by John McWhorter

To Construct a Language: http://www.lulu.com/shop/dan-gaynes/to-construct-a-language/paperback/product-23167868.html

https://www.amazon.com/Art-Language-Invention-Horse-Lords-World-Building/dp/0143126466

https://www.amazon.com/Language-Construction-Kit-Mark-Rosenfelder/dp/098447000X

https://www.amazon.com/Advanced-Language-Construction-Mark-Rosenfelder-ebook/dp/B008XTOV8C

https://www.amazon.com/Conlangers-Lexipedia-Mark-Rosenfelder/dp/1493733001

There are also lots of conlang books at Lulu: https://www.lulu.com/shop/search.ep?keyWords=conlang&type=

Buy this

It's a line from The IT Crowd based on a common misinterpretation of the phrase. Apparently it's a book title too!

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Damp-Squid-English-Language-Laid/dp/019957409X

Or this...

You might find this book interesting:
http://www.amazon.com/OK-Improbable-Story-Americas-Greatest/dp/0199892539

Edit: Removed affiliate code. Not intended as spam; my bad.