Describing Prescriptivism Usage Guides and Usage Problems in British and American English

Describing Prescriptivism provides a topical and thought-provoking analysis of linguistic prescriptivism in British and American English, from a historical as well as present-day perspective.

Folklinguistics and social meaning in Australian English

Folklinguistics and Social Meaning in Australian English presents an original study of Australian English and, via this, insights into Australian society. Utilising folklinguistic accounts, it uncovers everyday understandings of contemporary Australian English through variations across linguistic systems (sounds, words, discourse and grammar).

Making Sense of Why is it that some ways of using English are considered "good" and others are considered "bad"? Why are certain forms of language termed elegant, eloquent or refined, whereas others are deemed uneducated, coarse, or inappropriate? Making Sense of "Bad English" is an accessible introduction to attitudes and ideologies towards the use of English in different settings around the world.

Don't Believe a Word: The Surprising Truth About Language

Over the past few decades, we have reached new frontiers of linguistic knowledge. Linguists can now explain how and why language changes, describe its structures, and map its activity in the brain. We imagine a word’s origin is it’s “true” meaning, that foreign languages are full of “untranslatable” words, or that grammatical mistakes undermine English. In Don’t Believe A Word, linguist David Shariatmadari takes us on a mind-boggling journey through the science of language, urging us to abandon our prejudices in a bid to uncover the (far more interesting) truth about what we do with words.

Swearing is Good for You: The Amazing Science of Bad Language

In a sparkling debut in the entertaining pop science vein of Mary Roach, scientist Emma Byrne examines the latest research to show how swearing can be good for you. She reveals how swearing has been around since the earliest humans began to communicate, and has been shown to reduce physical pain, to lower anxiety, to prevent physical violence, to help trauma victims recover language, and to promote human cooperation. Packed with the results of unlikely and often hilarious scientific studies, Swearing Is Good for You presents a lighthearted but convincing case for the foulmouthed.