Cross words, crass words, kind words, bad words, first words, rude words, new words, weazel words, teen words, rap words, power words, colour words, Indian words, Brit words, Blairwords, war words, ad words, p-c words, borrowed words, Shakespeare's amazing words, false words, fine words, wine words, American words, name words, last words, even lost for words - this book has them all.
Vivian Cook takes us on a series of excursions down the curious byways of word history and meaning, mingling the fare with games, lists, tests, and quotes. Discover the theojollylogical joys of infixation. Find out if you're a charva, what it means to be nithered, and how to hoy. Delve into the hidden nature of words. Consider how they're born, why they change, and how they die. Learn about the words that are never spoken and others that don't get written. Here's a book overflowing with words and about every kind and variety of word. It offers an irresistible cornucopia of information and entertainment.
- English
- ePUB (mobile friendly)
- Available on iOS & Android
eBook - ePub
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Table of contents
- Cover Page
- Title Page
- Copyright Page
- Contents
- Introduction
- 1. Thinking in Metaphors
- 2. Gassers and Slashers
- 3. Beatles versus Stones
- 4. Making Up Words
- 5. How Many Words Do You Know?
- 6. Car Names
- 7. Blair Speak
- 8. Whose Nickname is That?
- 9. Choosing the Right Adjective
- 10. Guessing Games with Words
- 11. Superheroes in Cyberspace
- 12. What Does a Word Mean?
- 13. Cooking with Words
- 14. Fardling Gwiks
- 15. Gender and First Name
- 16. Words with Many Meanings
- 17. Words in the Blender
- 18. Soft, Mellow, Fragrant and Sweet
- 19. Of Mice and Mouses
- 20. Common Words
- 21. Nicknames Rule!
- 22. Levels of Meaning
- 23. Proper Names to Words
- 24. The Shortest Word
- 25. Easytalk
- 26. Divided by the Atlantic
- 27. Indian Words in English
- 28. Written Words That are Seldom Spoken
- 29. Sex and Gender
- 30. Where in the World Do They Come From?
- 31. Atoms of Meaning
- 32. Word Games with Letter Arrangement
- 33. Stuff and Nonsense
- 34. Body Parts in Metaphors
- 35. English Names for Foreign Places
- 36. Did Jeeves Speak French?
- 37. Historian or Lawgiver
- 38. English Words in Japanese
- 39. Word Associations
- 40. Seeing Colours
- 41. Progenies of Learning
- 42. Hanky-panky with Igglepiggle
- 43. Is the Sea Blue or Do I Just See It as Blue?
- 44. At a Loss for Words
- 45. How Old are Your Words?
- 46. Birdiest Birds
- 47. Tasting the Worm
- 48. Tip of the Tongue Test
- 49. ‘Can the Can’ (Suzi Quatro)
- 50. Can Sounds and Letters Have Meaning in Themselves?
- 51. Concordancing
- 52. Apes and Words
- 53. Word Games with Restricted Production
- 54. Chaucer’s Words
- 55. Igpay Atinlay
- 56. Forming New Words
- 57. Which Words Change Historically?
- 58. Golly! What a Toothsome Lark
- 59. Proper English Food?
- 60. What Does Queen Elizabeth II Mean to You?
- 61. Stressed-out Nouns
- 62. Dr Johnson’s Definitions
- 63. Playing with Words
- 64. The Family Tree of English
- 65. Do You Understand Shakespeare?
- 66. A Standard History
- 67. Syllables
- 68. You Silly Politician!
- 69. Where Do English Words Come from?
- 70. Majestic Radiance
- 71. Changing Pronunciations and Spelling
- 72. Dialects of the British Isles
- 73. Quotations on Words
- 74. Words for Alleyways
- 75. Phrases with Prepositions
- 76. What is a Word?
- 77. The Folk Who Live on the Mere
- 78. One English or Many Englishes?
- 79. From TLV to IKA
- 80. Word Games with Sequences
- 81. Can You Talk Black?
- 82. Place Names around the English-speaking World
- 83. Children’s Mistakes
- 84. Four Hundred and Thirty Sets
- 85. Baby Talk across Languages
- 86. London Abbreviations
- 87. Night Night Moo
- 88. Ept and Chalant
- 89. More Up
- 90. Brown Blackbirds and Black Bluebottles
- 91. How Do Children Learn Words?
- 92. Choosing Words for Reading
- 93. How Do You Learn New Vocabulary?
- 94. Jazzin’ around
- 95. Seven Sieves for Learning a Language
- 96. The Visions of Passionate People
- 97. Guessing Words in Context
- 98. Basic English
- 99. How to Remember Ten New Words
- 100. General Semantics
- 101. Piggy in the Middle
- 102. Simplified Vocabularies
- 103. Schizophrenic
- 104. On First-Name Terms
- 105. Using Words in Odd Ways
- 106. Warning: Words Can Damage Your Health
- 107. How Do You Say ‘No’?
- 108. How Many Words Do You Know?
- 109. The Longest Word
- 110. Words for Mother and Father
- 111. From Pillar to Post
- 112. Breeze of the Death
- 113. Does a Méiguì Smell as Sweet as a Rose?
- 114. Addresses
- 115. Relatives
- 116. Pronouns
- 117. Metaphors in Different Languages
- 118. Pidgins and Creoles
- 119. Size Matters
- 120. Code-switching
- 121. The Basic Human Words
- Answers
- Sources
- References
- Index of Themes
- Acknowledgements
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Yes, you can access It's All in a Word by Vivian Cook in PDF and/or ePUB format, as well as other popular books in Languages & Linguistics & Historical & Comparative Linguistics. We have over 1.5 million books available in our catalogue for you to explore.