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An Exhibit on Language

Words of the People

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

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

Litauisches Lesebuch, Mit Grammatik und ... (by Leskien, August)
Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and P... (by Peter Mark Roget)
The Secret Garden (by Burnett, Frances Hodgson)
Selections from Chaucer's Canterbury Tal... (by Chaucer, Geoffrey)
Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus (by Wittgenstein, Ludwig)
A Woman of Thirty (by De Balzac, Honore)
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (by Twain, Mark)
From Ritual to Romance (by Weston, Jessie L.)
The Land That Time Forgot (by Burroughs, Edgar Rice)
Middlemarch (by Eliot, George)
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (by Anonymous)
A Woman of Thirty (by Seiffert, Marjorie Allen)
Beowulf (by Unknown)
The Mabinogion Volume: 3 (by Schreiber, Charlotte, Lady, 1812-1895)
The King's English (by Fowler, Henry Watson)

Top 100 books on Education

Jungle, The (by Sinclair, Upton)
Medea (by Euripides)
The Republic, Score Plato Rep (by Plato)
Call of the Wild, The (by London, Jack)
Anna Karenina (by Tolstoy, Leo)
Confucian Analects (by Confucius)
The Divine Comedy : Inferno (by Alighieri, Dante)
Two Treatises of Civil Government (by Locke, John)
A Modest Proposal (by Swift, Jonathan)
Meno, Score Plato Meno (by Plato)
The Four Socratic Dialogues of Plato (by Plato)
Sir Gawain and the Green Knight (by Anonymous)
New Hampshire : a poem with notes and gr... (by Frost, Robert)
Metamorphoses (by Ovidius Naso, Publius (Ovid))
The Odyssey (by Homer)

Top 100 books on Children's Early Learning

The Orbis Pictus of John Amos Comenius (by Comenius, Johann Amos)
Little Red Balloon (by Hofman, Caroline)
The Tale of Peter Rabbit (by Potter, Beatrix)
Original Poems, for Infant Minds (by Ann Taylor, Jane Taylor, O'Keeffe (Adelaide))
The Story of Ferdinand (by Leaf, Munro)
Little Mary; Or, The Picture-Book
Mother Earth's Children; The Frolics of ... (by Gordon, Elizabeth)
Jack and the Beanstalk (by Floyd, Grace C.)
Three Blind Mice (by Ivimey, John William)
The Story of Chicken Little: Rhymed and ... (by Kenneth Graham Duffield)
The National Nursery Book
The Arabian Nights Entertainments Comple... (by Anonymous)
Little Bo-Peep; A Nursery Rhyme Picture ...
Anne of Green Gables (by Montgomery, Lucy Maud)
Picture Book Garden

Top 100 books on Literature and Fiction

Crime and Punishment (by Dostoyevsky, Fyodor)
Black Beauty (by Sewell, Anna)
Beyond Good and Evil (by Nietzsche, Friedrich Wilhelm)
Emma (version 5) (by Austen, Jane)
Diary of a Nobody, The (by Grossmith, George)
Wonderful Wizard of Oz, The (by Baum, L. Frank)
The Idiot (by Dostoevsky, Fyodor)
Red Badge of Courage, The (by Crane, Stephen)
Bleak House (by Dickens, Charles)
The Odyssey (by Homer)
Paradise Lost (by Milton, John)
The Man in the Iron Mask (by Dumas, Pere Alexandre)
Siddhartha (by Hesse, Hermann)
Heart of Darkness (by Conrad, Joseph)
Iliad, The (by Homer)

Top 100 books on Classic Children's Literature

Ivanhoe (by Scott, Walter, Sir)
Children of the New Forest, The (by Marryat, Frederick)
The Tales of Mother Goose (by Perrault, Charles)
Andersen's Fairy Tales (by Andersen, Hans Christian)
Robinson Crusoe (by Defoe, Daniel)
The Tale of Peter Rabbit (by Potter, Beatrix)
Journey to the Interior of the Earth, A (by Verne, Jules)
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn (by Twain, Mark)
The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe (th... (by C. S. Lewis)
Anne of Green Gables (by Montgomery, Lucy Maud)
The Panchatantra (by Arthur W Ryder)
Happy Prince and Other Tales, The (by Wilde, Oscar)
White Fang (by London, Jack)
At the Back of the North Wind (by Macdonald, George)
The Tales of Peter Parley about America ... (by Goodrich, Samuel Griswold)

Top books on Shakespeare

The Tragedy of King Lear (by Shakespeare, William)
As You Like It the Pennsylvania State Un... (by Shakespeare, William)
King Lear (version 2) (by Shakespeare, William)
Much Ado about Nothing (by Shakespeare, William)
Two Gentlemen of Verona, The (by Shakespeare, William)
Timon of Athens (by Shakespeare, William)
Macbeth (by Shakespeare, William)
Measure for Measure (by Shakespeare)
The Merchant of Venice (by William Shakespeare)
Cymbeline (by Shakespeare, William)
The Taming of the Shrew by William Shake... (by Shakespeare, William)
The Comedy of Errors (by Shakespeare, William)
The Tempest (by Shakespeare, William)
Much Ado About Nothing (by Shakespeare)
As You Like It (by Shakespeare, William)

Top books on Contemporary Children's Literature

How Rocket Learned to Read : Preformed b... (by Tad Hills)
Love You Forever : Preformed by Wally Am... (by Robert Munsch)
All the Places to Love : Preformed by Wa... (by Patricia MacLachlan)
Giggle, Giggle, Quack : Preformed by Wal... (by Doreen Cronin)
The Paper Bag Princess : Preformed by Wa... (by Robert Munsch)
The Crayon Box that Talked : Preformed b... (by Shane DeRolf)
I'm A Caterpillar : Preformed by Wally A... (by Jean Marzollo)
The Rabbit and the Turtle : Preformed by... (by Eric Carle)
Green Eggs and Ham : Preformed by Wally ... (by Dr. Seuss)
Curious George and the Pizza : Preformed... (by Margret and H.A. Rey)
Click, Clack, Moo: Cows That Type : Pref... (by Doreen Cronin)
One Fish, Two Fish, Red Fish, Blue Fish ... (by Dr. Seuss)
Clifford and the Grouchy Neighbors : Pre... (by Norman Bridwell)
The Wolf and the Lamb : Preformed by Wal... (by Eric Carle)
The Treasure : Preformed by Wally Amos (by Uri Shulevitz)

Top 100 books on Hawaiiana

Mahalo E Ke Akua (by Na Kamalei Koolauloa Early Education Program)
Resource Units in Hawaiian Culture (by Kamehameha Schools)
The Ks Impact : Increasing Access to Qua... (by State Department of Education)
The Water of Kane (by Caroline Curtis)
Kumu Kou (by Larry Kimura)
Kamehameha the Great (by Julie Stewart Williams)
Kahea Loko (by The Pacific American Foundation)
Hawaiian Language Imprints (by Bernice Judd)
O Na Mole E Ke Anahonua (About the Roots... (by A. M. Legendre)
Pehea 'O Ia E Holo Ai (by Lilinoe Andrews)
Punia (by Lokahi Antonio)
Wai'Anae: Where I Live (by Julie Stewart Williams)
Na Mele Aimoku (by Hawaiian Historical Society)
He Mau Mele Kula Sabati (Sunday School S... (by Reverend Laiana)
Kamehameha III : Kauikeaouli (by Jean Iwata Cachola)

Top books on Poetry

Leaves of Grass (by Whitman, Walt)
Collected Poems of John Keats : Volume 5... (by Keats, John)
In Memoriam (by Tennyson, Alfred Lord)
Songs of Innocence and of Experience and... (by Blake, William)
The Poems Of Robert Frost (by Frost, Robert.)
The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunb... (by Paul Laurence Dunbar)
Rhymes of a Red Cross Man (by Robert W. Service)
A Masque of Poets : Including Guy Vernon... (by Emily Dickinson)
One Hundred Poems of Kabir, Tr. By Rabin... (by Kabir)
The Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shell... (by Percy Bysshe Shelley)
The Collected Poems (by Yeats, William Butler)
Poems by Currer, Ellis, And Acton Bell (... (by Bell, Acton)
When I Was King: Poems (by Henry Lawson)
The Prelude Or, Growth of a Poets Mind (by Wordsworth, William)
The Selected Poems of Rainer Maria Rilke (by Rilke, Rainer, Maria)

Yiddish Book Center

O Azoy Humoreskes, Stsenkes, Monologn (by Erlikh, H. (Haiman))
Der Finfyorplan Pyaileka (by Farbman, Michael)
Min Ponem Tsum Lebn Rayze-Ayndrukn (by Teitelboim, Dora)
Der Vayer Kuk Fun Alen Rov Ahisorishe Vu... (by Meza, Yehoshua)
Umesh in Mayelekh Far Kinder : Vol. 1 Volume Vol. 1 (by Spritzer, Victor)
Ri in der Nakh (by Rubin, Hadasa)
Oysgerisene Bleer (by Rapoport, O.)
Di Hilerisishe Poliik Fun Yidn-Farnikhun... Volume Vol. 2 (by Eisenbach, Artur)
Y. L. Perets Far der Shul Eynike Meodish... (by Iabrov, G)
Vort Un Klang Eseyen, Eseyen, Eseyekes, ... (by Yardeini, Mordecai)
Indyaner Zumer (by Rontsh, Yitshak Elhanan)
Dertseylungen (by Pinski, David)
Vovik Mayse-Lekh Fun a Bronzviler Hinele (by Chaver-Paver)
Geshikhe Fun der Frayland-Lige Un Funem ... Volume Vol. 2 (by Astour, Michael C)
Almanakh Yidishe Shrayber Fun Yerushelay... Volume Vol. 4