David Crystal's A Dictionary of Linguistics and Phonetics: includes in excess of 5,100 terms, grouped into over 3,000 entries; coverage reflects recommendations by a team of experts in phonetics, phonology, syntax, semantics, sociolinguistcs and psycholinguistic, making it exceptionally comprehenisve; incorporates new ideas stemming from the minimalist program; contains a separate table of abbreviations and table of symbols, along with an updated International Phonetic Alphabet; and updates entries to reflect the way established terms are now perceived in light of changes in the field, providing a unique insight into the historical development of linguistcs.
David Crystal works from his home in Holyhead, North Wales, as a writer, editor, lecturer, and broadcaster. Born in Lisburn, Northern Ireland in 1941, he spent his early years in Holyhead. His family moved to Liverpool in 1951, and he received his secondary schooling at St Mary's College. He read English at University College London (1959-62), specialised in English language studies, did some research there at the Survey of English Usage under Randolph Quirk (1962-3), then joined academic life as a lecturer in linguistics, first at Bangor, then at Reading. He published the first of his 100 or so books in 1964, and became known chiefly for his research work in English language studies, in such fields as intonation and stylistics, and in the application of linguistics to religious, educational and clinical contexts, notably in the development of a range of linguistic profiling techniques for diagnostic and therapeutic purposes. He held a chair at the University of Reading for 10 years, and is now Honorary Professor of Linguistics at the University of Wales, Bangor. These days he divides his time between work on language and work on internet applications.
A very useful book for me: A dictionary of linguistic and phonetic terms which actually works in both directions and contains explanations of the terms as well. The original is by David Crystal. There's also an IPA chart at the beginning, and a Chinese-English index at the back. The book itself is English-Chinese, followed by short explanations of the terms. I am sure this will be very helpful for me when reading Chinese publications in linguistics, or when wanting to discuss linguistics in Chinese.
This is an excellent resource for anyone working with technical terminology in the area of linguistics and grammar. Often people can get confused in what linguistic terms mean, and here David Crystal helps standardize the field and its vocabulary. The sixth edition has seen many improvements and is worth having as a quick reference.
Do you refer to a particular null copula as gapped or elliptical? This dictionary should be your first stop for understanding such terminology.
I bought this while I was getting my Bachelor's in linguistics since they were throwing so many new terms/jargon my way and this really helped. The definitions were easy to understand. Though, I will admit to not having read through a whole dictionary reference book, just what I did read through for my needs I liked.
This dictionary is so useful. The outstanding linguist, David Crystal, always makes me taste and benefit from every book he writes. I totally aggree with those who say: "This dictionary is the bible of linguistic lovers.