The Story of Human Language
Author: Professor John McWhorter
Publisher: The Teaching Company
Publication date: 2004
Format / Quality: MP3 (32kB/s) + PDF
Size: 246.5 MB
«I never met a person who is not interested in language,» wrote the bestselling author and psychologist Steven Pinker. There are good reasons that language fascinates us so. It not only defines humans as a species, placing us head and shoulders above even the most proficient animal communicators, but it also beguiles us with its endless mysteries. For example:
* How did different languages come to be?
* Why isn’t there just a single language?
* How does a language change, and when it does, is that change indicative of decay or growth?
* How does a language become extinct?
Dr. John McWhorter, one of America’s leading linguists and a frequent commentator on network television and National Public Radio, addresses these and other questions as he takes you on an in-depth, 36-lecture tour of the development of human language, showing how a single tongue spoken 150,000 years ago has evolved into the estimated 6,000 languages used around the world today.