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Babel Around the World in Twenty Languages Gaston Dorren 9780802128799 Books

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Babel Around the World in Twenty Languages Gaston Dorren 9780802128799 Books

Gaston Dorren’s description of various features of the world’s twenty most spoken languages is anything but babbling. Although the book does not have a consistent theme, Dorren blends biographical, historical, and cultural material along with morphological descriptions of languages into something like a delicious cheesecake. There are no earth-shattering theses or discoveries, but the sparkling text and original material make the subject matter interesting, even for non-linguaphiles.

For example, one can learn facts as various as the history of the Indian subcontinent and how it shaped Hindi/Urdu/Bengali as well as that Chinese characters are often joined together as syllables to make words. Dorren further explains why Portuguese and not Dutch is one of the world’s major languages and why learning German is so difficult for English speakers—though they were the same language some twelve hundred years ago.

Throughout the text is marked by a welcome cosmopolitan approach to cultures and history. Dorren does not fall for the mistake of assuming that European culture has increasingly dominated the world and so the histories of non-European peoples before contact with Westerners are of little interest. Instead, the interaction between Aryans and Dravidians, the spread of Malay and the separation between Japan and China are all discussed. For someone who received a strongly Westernized approach to modern history in school, the lack of an overriding narrative was not fog-inducing but more like fresh air.

I wouldn't say that everybody should read this book or that the book contains something that is going to be culturally transformative but if one is looking for something relatively light that still goes beyond pop-culture this is an excellent choice. With the holiday season upon us, Babel is an ideal gift for polyglots or merely just aspiring ones. A pleasant read all around.


Tags : Babel: Around the World in Twenty Languages [Gaston Dorren] on Amazon.com. *FREE* shipping on qualifying offers. English is the world language, except that most of the world doesn’t speak it―only one in five people does. Dorren calculates that to speak fluently with half of the world’s 7.4 billion people in their mother tongues,Gaston Dorren,Babel: Around the World in Twenty Languages,Atlantic Monthly Press,0802128793,Historical linguistics,Language and languages,Language and languages.,GENERAL,General Adult,LANGUAGE ARTS & DISCIPLINES Linguistics General,LANGUAGE ARTS & DISCIPLINES Linguistics Historical & Comparative,LINGUISTICS (SPECIFIC ASPECTS),Language,Linguistics; Languages; Travel,Linguistics;Languages;Travel,Non-Fiction,United States

Babel Around the World in Twenty Languages Gaston Dorren 9780802128799 Books Reviews

I was absolutely taken by the premise of this book learn more about the world and the people in it by reflecting on the grammatical structure and cultural nuances of the top 20 languages in the world. As someone who has taken a few years each of French, Hindi, Persian, Arabic, and Chinese, I have some familiarity with language learning and the amazing opportunity to connect with people around the world literally *on their own terms*. I excitedly picked up this book looking for insight into the other top languages Vietnamese, Punjabi, etc.

Unfortunately I got a bad taste in my mouth in the very first chapter and had to put the book down-- while the author might think he is being funny in his condescending remarks about how opaque Vietnamese may be to him, it merely comes off as yet *another* entitled Westerner who faults the language he is learning and by extension the people he is learning from, rather than demonstrating humility in the face of another way of expressing ideas. As he rightly points out, language is highly political and often very sacred to people, it is a cherished means of expressing people's deepest hopes, fears, and insights into the world, and how they organize their ideas no doubt influences how they organize their intellectual, spiritual, and political lives. One would think that a well-traveled grammar-nerd would have an ounce of humility in this fascinating project, but it just reeks of Western supremacy from the first chapter.
Books about English language, such as those by John McWhorter and David Crystal are some of my favorites, and I also like the deep dive into other languages, such as the books about French and Spanish by Julie Barlow and Jean-Benoit Nadeau. Then there's the books that dip a toe into many languages, such as this one by Gaston Dorren. Babel looks at the twenty languages that are spoken by the greatest number of people in the world. Dorren starts with some statistics to get you grounded, how many native speakers, where spoken, etc., and then takes off on whatever interests him most about that language. He discusses his difficulties in learning to speak Vietnamese, talks about how Japanese is spoken differently by men and women, looks at the history of the written Turkish language and how politics is inextricably linked to its development. It's just fascinating and it touches on many topics. Even if you aren't interested in 20th century Turkish politics (but you might be surprised to find that it is quite interesting), for instance, you might very well find yourself captivated by the astonishing number of words in English that derive from Arabic.
(Thanks to Atlantic Monthly Press and NetGalley for a digital review copy.)
Good.
The descriptions of the languages were boring and/or difficult to understand.
My family loves languages and I was excited to find a book on this topic. The statistics about languages in the world are especially interesting and help to provide you with a better perspective on the languages you know, or want to learn. Many of the stories about the individual languages I had never heard before and were fascinating. However, I do think that the author needs a rethink on the way he organized the information. More than a survey on each language, with basic information shared on each one, this book gives you select, interesting facts about each language. Each chapter presents a language and sometimes he tells you about the grammar quirks, sometimes what it's like to learn the language, sometimes the history of the language, and sometimes how the language compares to others. But, there is no consistency from chapter to chapter. I recommend a rewrite using all the information he has, but fleshing out each language fully so you know all of these characteristics of it, and not just selected ones. I wanted to have my 15 year old read the book because she loves languages, but decided not to because of the organization of it.
Gaston Dorren’s description of various features of the world’s twenty most spoken languages is anything but babbling. Although the book does not have a consistent theme, Dorren blends biographical, historical, and cultural material along with morphological descriptions of languages into something like a delicious cheesecake. There are no earth-shattering theses or discoveries, but the sparkling text and original material make the subject matter interesting, even for non-linguaphiles.

For example, one can learn facts as various as the history of the Indian subcontinent and how it shaped Hindi/Urdu/Bengali as well as that Chinese characters are often joined together as syllables to make words. Dorren further explains why Portuguese and not Dutch is one of the world’s major languages and why learning German is so difficult for English speakers—though they were the same language some twelve hundred years ago.

Throughout the text is marked by a welcome cosmopolitan approach to cultures and history. Dorren does not fall for the mistake of assuming that European culture has increasingly dominated the world and so the histories of non-European peoples before contact with Westerners are of little interest. Instead, the interaction between Aryans and Dravidians, the spread of Malay and the separation between Japan and China are all discussed. For someone who received a strongly Westernized approach to modern history in school, the lack of an overriding narrative was not fog-inducing but more like fresh air.

I wouldn't say that everybody should read this book or that the book contains something that is going to be culturally transformative but if one is looking for something relatively light that still goes beyond pop-culture this is an excellent choice. With the holiday season upon us, Babel is an ideal gift for polyglots or merely just aspiring ones. A pleasant read all around.