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An Exhibit on Language

Words of the People

A Comparative Grammar of the Gaudian Lan... (by Hoernle, August Frederich Rudolf)
Selections from Chaucer's Canterbury Tal... (by Chaucer, Geoffrey)
The Science Of Language Vol I (by F. Max Muller K. M.)
The Principles of the International Phon... (by International Phonetic Association)
The Tower of Babel, A Poetical Drama (by Alfred Austin)
The Canterbury Tales (by Chaucer, Geoffrey)
Psychology and Pathology of Speech Devel... (by Conradi, Edward)
National Symposium on Learning Disabilit... (by Department of Education)

The Words of the People: An Exhibit on Language

From the oldest forms of writings with pictographs and Cuneiform in 3500 B.C. to the generation of the first alphabet; of all the strides that we have made in technology, Language has been the single most important "invention" since the dawn of man. In fact, language defies time. Language is the greatest man-made achievement. Tone, intonation, inflection, the tongue, the throat, the breath and the brain: all lifeforms have some form of communication. The proceeding Collections in "The Words of the People: An Exhibit on Language" includes the most significant books on the subject of language.

Language, Literature, Children's Literature, Hawaiiana, Poetry and more.

Language and Learning

The root of the word language comes from the Latin term lingua, meaning "tongue." This definition’s attention to the human tongue highlights this muscle as the primary tool used by the body to shape combinations of uttered sounds to form the words of a spoken language. However, we can examine how languages also have a life of their own beyond an individual body. The “Words of the People: An Exhibit on Language" illustrates how language can be studied through its human biological and cognitive properties, as well as through its temporal and relational nature.

Language depends upon social customs and the ability for other humans to learn and adapt to social stimuli. The Science of Language Volume I, details theories on how early humans created words through vocalizations with the speech organs such as the throat, nose, tongue, palate, teeth, and lips, producing thousands of sounds. However, a typical language group utilizes only a limited number of sounds, usually between 10 and 60, which are interpreted aurally (The Science of Language, Volume 1, K.M. Max Muller).

In The National Symposium on Learning Disabilities in English Language Learners, proffers that the capacity to learn a language is based on individual factors, such as neurobiology, and contextual factors, such as environmental and social support (U.S. Department of Education, The National Symposium on Learning Disabilities in English Language Learners, U.S. Department of Education). Edward Conradi, a Professor of Psychology, wrote a thesis titled Psychology and Pathology of Speech Development of the Child. In this work, Conradi details how the various sounds a child makes after birth becomes the foundation for learning his mother tongue (Conradi, Psychology and Pathology of Speech Development of the Child, Edward Conradi). Later, the author became the President of the Florida State College of Women, the first women’s college in the south approved by the Association of American Universities (“Edward Conradi,” World Heritage Encyclopedia). Perhaps it was through his studies in child psychology that Conradi believed all people should be given the opportunity to develop their language, and contribute to their culture and society.

Language Across Time

Writing allowed particular languages to be remembered for longer periods of time. The oldest writing is traced to the Sumerians, whose records go back to at least 3500 B.C. They used a form of picture writing that told a story or gave a message. The use of pictures as a writing style became so highly developed that it could express abstract ideas. Many present-day Asian countries such as China continue to use this form of writing (“Language,” World Heritage Encyclopedia and "The History of the Alphabet," World Heritage Encyclopedia).

However, alphabetic systems of writing differ from picture writing because they are not static. Alphabetic writing is comprised of symbols, such as letters of the alphabet, that represent a vocalized sound (“Language”). Alphabetic writing changes to reflect the evolution of spoken language (“Language,” World Heritage Encyclopedia and "Letter Alphabet," World Heritage Encyclopedia). The Canterbury Tales was told by storyteller and poet Geoffrey Chaucer is an example, The original writing of this work used different spellings, reflecting pronunciations of words according to the vernacular of Chaucer’s time. However, when the work was written in later editions, the spellings of words changed to reflect pronunciations during those times (The Canterbury Tales, Geoffrey Chaucer). The International Phonetic Association (IPA) has transcribed words in this book, using symbols to demarcate specific speech sounds. The Principles of the International Phonetic Association, 1912 chronicles the history of the IPA, creating a tool often used in dictionaries to assist readers in the pronunciation of words as they are spoken in their contexts (The Principles of the International Phonetic Association, International Phonetic Association).

The Great Vowel Shift

Before Modern English, there were "Old English" and Middle English." In 1550 A.D., a documented event called "The Great Vowel Shift occurred.

Language Families

The Tower of Babel: A Poetical Drama by Alfred Austin is a dramatization of a biblical story that tells us that all languages were at once one. However, a heavenly intervention confused people’s languages and scattered them around the world (Tower of Babel, Alfred Austin). Despite the differences of today, it is possible to examine the relationships between languages. One way to classify these relations are through the concept of language families, or a group of languages that are related through descent from a common ancestor, or proto-language. Language families can be divided into smaller phylogenetic units, or branches of the language family. For example, the Celtic, Germanic, Slavic, Romance and Indo-Iranian languages are phylogenetic units of the indo-European language family (“Tower of Babel,” World Heritage Encyclopedia).

Different languages can also transform one another when they come into contact. These are called "Sprachbund." The book, A Comparative Grammar of the Gaudian Languages, With Special Reference to the Eastern Hindi, Accompanied by a Language-Map and a Table of Alphabets details how the Indian Subcontinent is a Sprachbund, or "...a geographical region that has several languages that feature common linguistic structures due to language contact and not common origin..." (A Comparative Grammar of the Gaudian Languages, With Special Reference to the Eastern Hindi, Accompanied by a Language-Map and a Table of Alphabets, August Frederich Rudolf Hoernle). "Language Isolates" are languages that have no known relatives, such as the Basque language (“Basque Language,” World Heritage Encyclopedia). "Contact Languages" are created when languages that do not come from a single ancestor come into contact to create "mixed" or Creole languages (“Language,” World Heritage Encyclopedia). Hawaiian Pidgin, for instance, is an example of a Creole. Of note: Hawaiian Pidgin is the only known language in history to be created by children. On pineapple, coffee and sugar cane plantations in Hawaii, there was such a diversity of workers that the children (in order to be able to socialize together) unconsciously created a Creole that is still spoken widely in the State of Hawaii. Hawaiian Creole is a mixture of "loanwords" and phrases from over a dozen languages, including Hawaiian, Modern English, Japanese, Chinese, Filipino and Portuguese.

Debates on the study of language revealed its multi-dimensionality. Language has been studied biologically and cognitively, as an action of the vocal chords to create sounds with the use of the tongue. Languages function as organisms that survive over time through becoming a written language, or a spoken language that endures as a descendant of a proto-language. Spoken language can also dynamically transform by taking on the properties of other languages it is in contact with. The “Words of People: An Exhibit" on Language” features language as a multi-dimensional subject that covers the biological, historical and cultural aspects of human communication.

Works Cited

Austin, Alfred. The Tower of Babel, A Poetical Drama. Edinburgh: William Blackwood and Sons, 1874.

"Basque Language." World Heritage Encyclopedia. WorldLibrary.org. Web. 2014.

Chaucer, Geoffrey. The Canterbury Tales. New York: Macmillan, 1910.

Conradi, Edward. Psychology and Pathology of Speech Development of the Child. Volume 11. Pedagogical Seminary, September, 1904.

Department of Education. The National Symposium on Learning, Disabilities in English Language Learners. Office of Special Education and Rehabilitation Services, U.S. Department of Education, 2003.

"Edward Conradi." World Heritage Encyclopedia. WorldLibrary.org. Web. 2014.

"The History of the Alphabet." World Heritage Encyclopedia. WorldLibrary.org. Web. 2014.

Hoernle, August Frederich Rudolf. A Comparative Grammar of the Gaudian Languages, With Special Reference to the Eastern Hindi, Accompanied by a Language-Map and a Table of Alphabets. London: Trubner and Co., 1880.

International Phonetic Association. The Principles of the International Phonetic Association. Paris: Association Phonétique Internationale, 1912.

"Language." World Heritage Encyclopedia. WorldLibrary.org. Web. 2014.

"Letter Alphabet." World Heritage Encyclopedia. WorldLibrary.org. Web. 2014.

Muller K.M. Max. The Science of Language. Volume 1. London: Longmans, Green and Co., 1899.

"Tower of Babel." World Heritage Encyclopedia. WorldLibrary.org. Web. 2014.

Language Collections

Learn more about the evolving nature of languages in these collections:

Top 100 books on Language

The Trial (by Kafka, Franz)
The Canterbury Tales (by Geoffrey Chaucer)
Around the World in Eighty Days (by Verne, Jules)
North and South (by Gaskell, Elizabeth Cleghorn)
Esperanto Teacher, The (by Fryer, Helen)
Cassell's Latin Dictionary : Latin-Engli... (by Marchant, James Robert Vernam)
The Age of Innocence (by Wharton, Edith)
Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and P... (by Peter Mark Roget)
Middlemarch (by Eliot, George)
The Tale of Genji (by Murasaki Shikibu)
The Iliad (by Butler, Samuel)
Familiar Quotations : A Collection of Pa... (by John Bartlett)
L'Innocente
Shakespeare's Sonnets (by Shakespeare, William)
A manual of style, containing typographi... (by University of Chicago. Press)

Top 100 books on Education

Confucian Analects (by Confucius)
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (by Anonymous)
Washington Irving's the Legend of Sleepy... (by Irving, Washington)
Catullus (by Gaius Valerius Catullus)
Two Treatises of Civil Government (by Locke, John)
The Legend of Sleepy Hollow (by Irving, Washington, 1783-1859)
The New England Primer, Score Chr Nep (by Cornhill, Boston)
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (by Baum, Lyman Frank)
Medea (by Euripides)
Vocational education and guidance of you... (by Robison, Emily)
The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin, ... (by Franklin, Benjamin)
The Organization and Administration of a... (by Lefevre, Arthur)
King Henry Iv. A Tragedy. In Five Acts (by Shakespeare, William)
Riders of the Purple Sage (by Grey, Zane)
Herodotus' Histories Vol 1 (by Herodotus of Halicarnassus)

Top 100 books on Children's Early Learning

Harry's Ladder to Learning
The Hey Diddle Diddle Picture Book (by Caldecott, Randolph)
Raggedy Andy Stories (by Gruelle, Johnny)
A Apple Pie (by Greenaway, Kate)
Aesop's Fables (by Aesop)
Jack and the Beanstalk and Other Stories
The Little Engine That Could (by Lenski, Lois L.)
The Tale of Peter Rabbit (by Potter, Beatrix)
The Story of Little Jane and Me (by Blatchford, Mary E)
Raggedy Ann stories (by Gruelle, Johnny)
The History of the Fairchild Family : Or... (by Mary Martha Sherwood)
Just So Stories (by Kipling, Rudyard)
Three Little Pigs
The Children's Book of Stars; (by Mitton, Gerldine Edith)
The Adventures of Pinocchio (by Collodi, C.)

Top 100 books on Literature and Fiction

Mansfield Park (by Austen, Jane)
The Idiot (by Dostoevsky, Fyodor)
Beyond Good and Evil (by Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm)
Gulliver's Travels. (by Jonathan Swift)
Das Kapital (by Karl Marx)
Pickwick Papers, The Version 2 (by Dickens, Charles)
Scarlet Letter, The (by Hawthorne, Nathaniel)
The Pilgrim's Progress (by Bunyan, John)
The Canterbury Tales (by Geoffrey Chaucer)
Christmas Carol, A (dramatic reading) (by Dickens, Charles)
Tanglewood Tales for Girls and Boys: Bei... (by Nathaniel Hawthorne)
Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Cour... (by Twain, Mark)
The Pickwick Papers (by Dickens, Charles)
Fortunes and Misfortunes of the Famous M... (by Defoe, Daniel)
Metamorphosis (by Kafka, Franz)

Top 100 books on Classic Children's Literature

Red Badge of Courage, The (by Crane, Stephen)
Velveteen Rabbit, The (by Williams, Margery)
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (Tom ... (by Twain, Mark)
Hans Brinker or The Silver Skates (by Dodge, Mary Mapes)
The Tale of Ferdinand Frog (by Bailey, Arthur Scott)
Peter and Wendy (by James Matthew Barrie)
Seven Little Australians (by Turner, Ethel)
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, The (by Twain, Mark)
The Railway Children (by Nesbit, Edith)
Beauty and the Beast (by Crane, Walter)
Hans Brinker; Or, The Silver Skates : A ... (by Dodge, Mary Mapes)
The Swiss Family Robinson (by Johann David Wyss)
The Wide, Wide World (by Warner, Susan)
Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea (by Verne, Jules)
Pollyanna (by Porter, Eleanor Hodgman)

Top books on Shakespeare

Comedy of Errors (by Shakespeare)
Taming of the Shrew, The (by Shakespeare, William)
As You Like It (by Shakespeare, William)
Coriolanus (by William Shakespeare)
Much Ado About Nothing (by Shakespeare, William)
Timon of Athens (by Shakespeare, William)
Cymbeline (by Shakespeare, William)
Hamlet (by Shakespeare, William)
Richard III (by Shakespeare, William)
The Two Noble Kinsmen (by Shakespeare, William)
Measure for Measure (by Shakespeare)
Pericles, Prince of Tyre (by Shakespeare, William)
Much Ado About Nothing (by Shakespeare)
Antony and Cleopatra (by Shakespeare, William)
William Shakespeares King Henry Iv, Part... (by Shakespeare, William)

Top books on Contemporary Children's Literature

The Treasure : Preformed by Wally Amos (by Uri Shulevitz)
The Very Greedy Bee : Preformed by Wally... (by Steve Smallman)
Love You Forever : Preformed by Wally Am... (by Robert Munsch)
Giggle, Giggle, Quack : Preformed by Wal... (by Doreen Cronin)
How Rocket Learned to Read : Preformed b... (by Tad Hills)
Koala Lou : Preformed by Wally Amos (by Mem Fox)
The Cow Who Clucked : Preformed by Wally... (by Denise Fleming)
One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish ... (by Dr. Seuss)
Cows Can't Fly : Preformed by Wally Amos (by David Milgrim)
The Carrot Seed : Preformed by Wally Amo... (by Ruth Krauss)
The Wolf and the Lamb : Preformed by Wal... (by Eric Carle)
Click, Clack, Moo: Cows That Type : Pref... (by Doreen Cronin)
All the Places to Love : Preformed by Wa... (by Patricia MacLachlan)
Zomo the Rabbit : A Trickster Tale from ... (by Gerald McDermott)
Olivia...and the Missing Toy : Preformed... (by Ian Falconer)

Top 100 books on Hawaiiana

Ke Alakai O Ke Kanaka Hawaii (Part Iii) (by Joseph M. Poepoe)
Workmen's Compensation Act of the Territ... (by Hawaii)
Hawaiian Canoe-Building Traditions (by Naomi N. Y. Chun)
O Na Mole E Ke Anahonua (About the Roots... (by A. M. Legendre)
Ka Mo'Olelo O Lonoikamakahiki (by Abraham Fornander)
He Malaai Ka'U (by William H. Wilson)
The Hawaiian Language and Complete Gramm... (by Henry P. Judd)
Kane'Ohe : Where I Live (by Julie Stewart Williams)
He Moolelo No Kekahi Mau Koa Kaulana (A ... (by M. Goldberg)
Yankees in Paradise the New England Impa... (by Bradford Smith)
Moe 'O Makali'I (Makali'I Sleeps) (by Danielle Ululani Beirne-Keawe)
The Ks Impact : Increasing Access to Qua... (by State Department of Education)
An Historic Inventory of the Physical, S... (by Territorial Planning Board)
Hawaiian Dictionary (by Mary Kawena Pukui)
Lili'Uokalani (by Ru Hasegawa Lowe)

Top books on Poetry

The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunb... (by Paul Laurence Dunbar)
A Profeta Kertje (by Gibran, Khalil)
One Hundred Poems of Kabir, Tr. By Rabin... (by Kabir)
The Negro Speaks of Rivers (by Hughes, Langston)
The Collected Poems (by Yeats, William Butler)
Rhymes of a Red Cross Man (by Robert W. Service)
Poems by Currer, Ellis, And Acton Bell (... (by Bell, Acton)
The Raven (by Poe, Edgar Allan)
Songs of Innocence and of Experience and... (by Blake, William)
The Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shell... (by Percy Bysshe Shelley)
Poetical Works : Volume 1 (by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow)
Stray Birds (by Sir Rabindranath Tagore)
The Poems Of Robert Frost (by Frost, Robert.)
Leaves of Grass (by Whitman, Walt)
The Prelude Or, Growth of a Poets Mind (by Wordsworth, William)

Yiddish Book Center

Heymloze Men’Shn Roman (by Eromski, Stefan)
Lider, Dertseylungen, Dramaishe Pruvn (by Shafir, B.)
Sefer Ha-Me'Ushar Hoykhe Gedanken Vegen ... (by Goldberg, O)
A Gloybn Far Umgloybike (by Rivkin, B.)
Praktishe Lektsyonen in English a Naye M... (by Harkavy, Alexander)
Ale Verk Fun Avraham Reyzen in 12 Bender... Volume Vol. 2 (by Reisen, Abraham)
Azyaishe Dertseylungen (by Dayksel, Shemuel)
Di Tsukunf Fun Medines Yiroel an Ophandl... (by Green, Tovia)
Zyamele Matros (by Zeldin, Iashe)
Fun Eygene Un Fremde Kvaln a Zaml-Bukh F... (by Appelbaum, Jacob)
Yidish Un Yidishkey Eseyen (by Opatoshu, Joseph)
Yidish in Erts-Iroel Redes, Fakn, Dokume... (by League for Rights of Yiddish In Palestine)
Ertsehlung Vegen Ziben Gehangene (by Andreyev, Leonid)
Gazamele Dramen Hedda Gabler; Der Boymay... (by Ibsen, Henrik)
Megiles Yid Lider, Baladn, Poemen (by Knapheys, M.)