My First Book Review

          I wanted to find a way to recommend some of the books that I have read and used, of course, in my work.  I thought for a long time about which one I would choose to recommend first.  After all of my exposure to literacy materials, I came back to the work that first caused me to sort of say "Wow!" For me that work is a small book by an British linguist; David Crystal.  I would suspect that many of you who might read this blog probably don't know David Crystal.  I had never heard of him myself. His book caught my eye while I was browsing around the Harvard bookstore a couple years ago.  I snapped it up and have enjoyed it ever since that time.  I constantly go back to it and just refresh my thoughts.

          Hmm ..., I guess you are probably wondering the name of the book?

Crystal, D. (2002). The English language. London: Penguin.

          I don't want to spend too much time laboring over the minutia of the book, but I want to highlight a few of the parts that I have found exciting and just give an overall picture of the book to those who might be interested in picking it up for themselves.

          First, it is a short book; just over 300 pages, cover to cover.  I think once you start to read it you will find yourself continually rereading parts as you absorb the particular sections.  The book is structured with a short introduction and three main sections, each of about five chapters or roughly 100 pages. I find that the short sections and chapters make for a really relaxing read.

          The introduction covers current English, or at least current for 2002.  It is interesting because it covers pidgins and creoles.  From there the three sections cover the structure, use and history of English.

          The section on structure covers exactly what one would expect; grammar, pronunciation, vocabulary, and spelling.  I really like the pronunciation chapter as it completely wrecks the idea of phonics.  Crystal also speaks to the quirkiness of our spelling.  It makes me laugh as spelling is always confuses my ELL students.  They just don't get the silent letters and multiple spellings of words that sound exactly the same (homonyms).

          The second section covers fun language like "truckers slang" and other subsets of professional language.  It is also noteworthy in that it includes a chapter on the effects of technology on English. Obviously this is even more relevant now in 2017.

          The third section goes through the history and evolution of English,  This will certainly enlighten those who wonder where some of our words and spelling rules come from.  It ends with a brief look into Crystal's thoughts on the future of our language.  Again, in this section he talks a bit about how technology has affected our language.  He speaks to a trend towards simplicity as technology limits our language.  He is writing before the explosion of some current social media platforms, but his thoughts bring to mind twitter's character limit.

          Overall, I want to encourage all literacy professional to take a look at this little gem of a book.  I think you will find it sort of  tour guide to English.