Albert C. BaughReseñas

An excellent reference for advancing stuff learned in class.

Nice hefty tome. Troilus and Cressida is worth every minute spent reading it.

Thanks, Julie, for the most excellent Christmas gift! Now I can read it aloud and have a vague idea of what I'm saying (not uncommon in my usual banter). But I'll be having fun and sounding beautiful (insert moment here). I'll brush up on my prologue.

This was a good book; I wish I had the latest edition rather than this edition from the early 1990's. The language has changed since the introduction of the Internet and texting which wasn't an issue at the time this version came out. I think I may have had this version since it was new, though. I just now got around to reading it in it's entirety.

Very informative. Some chapters were more interesting than others. I liked the chapters on Old English and also on American English.

Always something to learn, so I keep expanding my knowledge of my own langauge. Languages are alive and amazing.

Have you ever wondered how grammar and vocabulary have evolved over time? This book is for those (like me) who wish to understand the history of the English language. This textbook is perhaps the greatest work of its kind. It covers the evolution from Old English to Middle English, from the Renaissance to modern usage worldwide.

Baugh and Cable’s tale is not simple, but then again, neither is English’s. The language, rooted in the British isles, borrowed heavily from French after the Norman Invasion in 1066. Under the influence of academic scholarship in conversation with the European continent, it also borrowed heavily from Latin. More recently, worldwide, post-colonial use in far-flung places like America, India, and Egypt have decentralized use so that each region borrows from the other. (In other words, there is currently no one group, even in England, that can claim to hold “true English” usage.)

There are several nuggets that I found interesting in this book. Many of the regional differences in American pronunciation stem from where in England colonists immigrated from. English dialects vary more dramatically from region to region than do American dialects – presumably because Americans interact with each other more and migrate more often. Spelling reforms continued until into the twentieth century and were seen as a form of efficiency. English is known for having a liberal policy towards vocabulary but conservative towards grammar. No matter how much they are hated, language purists seem to haunt every age in every region.

Because it is written as a critical historical examination, this work is most used pedagogically as a textbook in classrooms. Only the occasional lifelong student would read this book cover-to-cover for mere self-education. Nonetheless, it reads well and breaks down the subject matter into short numbered sections in each chapter. This work has helped me make sense of the diverse world that the English language provides to us in literature and over the Internet.

Excellent mix of history and the technical evolution of the English language. The accompanying workbook provided helpful exercises to understand the linguistic aspect of the language.

This thorough and informative history of our language is an excellent choice for those interested in the topic, fitting the history of the language into the context of the history of its speakers. It is academically solid, with copious notes and extensive bibliographies: in fact, it would be an excellent text for a course in the history of English. But this is also a useful book for the general reader with an interest in the topic. It is clear, jargon free, and interesting to read. For me, the most interesting part of the book were the sections on Old English and Middle English, where the author shows very clearly how the entry of various words into English reflected a changing political climate.

It gives a really in-depth view of all the cultural and political influences that shaped the English language to what it is today. Kind of nice to read if you have the time and interest for these kind of things.

It gives a really in-depth view of all the cultural and political influences that shaped the English language to what it is today. Kind of nice to read if you have the time and interest for these kind of things.½

It's interesting that the contemporary linguist David Crystal names this history third among his top ten books on the English language. This is from http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2006/sep/20/top10s.english.language, posted 20 September 2006:


This book just goes on and on. I used its second (1957) edition when I was an undergraduate and was fascinated by both the range of its coverage and the depth of its treatment. It manages to pack an enormous amount of illustrative detail into its 450 or so pages. Numerous other histories of the language have since been written, but this one holds a special place for its balanced views and accessible scholarship.

Easy to understand, but lightweight on the actual progression of changes in the English language. Rather, Baugh and Cable emphasize the historical context and its influence on the language.

Nice edition

08/30/00 -- I have the 1963 edition, which I used in my Old English Class at Ohio State, (though I hasten to say that I was not yet at OSU in 1963!) I finally read it all the way through in 2000. At the time, I thought that I was probably the only person on the planet who was reading it. I see from LT however, that it has been regularly reissued and updated. Thus my review, written in 2000, has a few misconceptions:
"I suspect that I am the only person on the planet currently reading this book. I was struck from the beginning by what a classic example this is of old-style learning and transmission of knowledge.
The author is probably dead now, and, as this is a serviceable, not a scintillating work, I do not imagine it has a life anywhere but on the shelves of older professors and literati.
It' not badly done, and certainly exhaustive reading went into it as evidenced by the bibliographies at the end of each chapter.
My over-riding impression was of an antique - interesting now for its reflection of its era and culture, rather than for its information."
Obviously, I was wrong in my judgment, as this has been reissued as recently as 2000.

Very nice treatise on the history of the English language.

A very accessible means to understanding language transition.

One of the books I re-read with pleasure to see the contingent nature of the development of language

I bought this massive book for a class at Boston College from the same wonderful prof who did the "Literature of the 1920s" that I loved *so* much.

Listening to him read the Middle English was great fun, if only because he enjoyed it so much. Me, not so much -- but when I was in England, I still went slavishly to Canterbury.

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