No se como comentar un ensayo sobre un tema del que no se nada más allá de lo leído en el propio ensayo. Baste decir que el libro me ha parecido apasionante y absorbente. Si te interesa el tema del lenguaje y alguna vez te has planteado como este ha evolucionado y porque existen tantos idiomas diferentes esta es una lectura que disfrutarás. Además está escrito con sencillez y claridad. ( )

This guy is the Darwin of Language - the major difference being that no one's ever heard of him. He lays out his theory with enthusiasm and wit, and though it's all unprovable in a sense, it's so elegant and sensible that you just know it must be right. Be warned that although he writes with great clarity for the non-specialist, you will still need every IQ point you can muster to get your head round some of what he says. ( )

Explains why languages appear to be getting progressively simpler, but actually are not. In reality, it is a continuous process of change, as words become longer, and constructions more complex, simplifying forces then reduce them in size.

Fascinating book! I've given a good deal of thought to how language would've looked like in its earlier (hypotehtical) "Me Tarzan" stage and how it evolved through there. This is just what Deutscher talks about in this book. At first, I was worried that he'd go at things with a generativist bent, but no. His theory of linguistic evolution is based on the need to communicate efficiently, the desire to be more expressive and a few general cognitive principles (like a natural craving for order). Very nice stuff.

He really presents his theory (technically, speculation, but this *is* historical linguistics we're talking about) in a coherent and accessible way. So accessible that I would definitely recommend this book to non-linguists with even a passing interest in language. ( )

So far, it's extremely interesting and fascinating. ( )

I very much enjoyed this book. I love language and I was constantly dazzled by Guy's wonderful descriptions on how it is formed. Very readable. ( )

By Linguistics, out of Detective Story.

Before reading this book I naively thought that language changed with new technical words and borrowings from foreign languages.
Quite wrong. Deutscher shows that it has been undergoing fast evolution in its basic elements from the earliest times, and he traces the changes using written texts from 5000 year old Sumerian cuneiform to the present day.
Evolution involves destruction and differential survival with the constant creation of new words. He shows convincingly how people have always looked for the easiest (most lazy) way to speak, giving a language of ever shorter words. Fortunately language is saved by a counterbalancing "word inflation" involving the stringing together of separate words to give more emphasis. He gives a good example of the erosion / inflation process with the French for "today": LATIN... hoc die > hodie > hui > OLD FRENCH... au jour d'hui MODERN FRENCH... aujourd'hui > aujour d'aujourd'hui.
It's also interesting that traditional and newer expressions co-exist (compete?) until one or the other fades out, eg. "I haven't got anything" vs "I haven't got nothing" or the way a simple idea like the "s" for plural in English eg. duck - ducks, can overwhelm earlier variants.
The book isn't an easy read but it's changed the way I look at language. ( )

Fascinating book showing how grammatical complexity evolves through creation and destruction, starting with just basic action and object words. Great section on Semitic verb templates. ( )

Wow. Astonishingly good!

This is the book on linguistics I've been looking for my entire life.
Rather than get sidetracked with details, the author talks about what is known about how languages change over time, not just sound changes but changes in grammar and meaning. From this information he creates a picture of how language, which seems too perfect to have arisen from nothing, could have evolved over time from the simplest stages (presumably a few concrete nouns and verbs) to the sophistication of prepositions and tenses, declensions and conjugations and subordinate clauses. Along the way we learn many man many fascinating things. This is basically The Origin of Species for languages.
And, to top it all, it's easy to read.

I cannot recommend this book enough.

As an aside, I imagine there are probably linguists out there who are already fuming at what the author has to say. Linguistics seems to breed a kind of small-minded pettiness that is astonishing to any normal scientist; witness the insane anger with which they treat the issue of grouping Native American languages together pace Joseph Greenberg. However for those of us interested in the big picture, I suspect this is a book that will be brought up fondly in many people's memories years from now. ( )

http://www.americanscientist.org/temp... ( )