Language and Symbolic Systems

by Yuen Ren Chao

This is an introduction to the study of language for the non-specialist or beginner in linguistics. Professor Chao covers the whole field of language and of modern developments in linguistics, with particular emphasis on those aspects which are likely to be most interesting to the layman. Professor Chao emphasises the relationship between language and other aspects of human culture and discusses systems of writing, minority languages and problems of translation in this context. An important part of the book reviews symbolic systems in language, writing and modern communication technology, with applications such as automatic speech, machine translation and related topics. Professor Chao laid the foundations of modern linguistics in China and has been associated with a number of important linguistic projects both in China and in the USA where he has taught for many years. In this book he approaches his subject with clarity, warmth and humour.

Genres: Linguistics

256 pages, Paperback

First published April 1, 1968

Reviews

[Jeff · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is basically an introductory linguistics textbook, but there were two aspects of that made it much more interesting: It was written in 1968, and by a native speaker of Chinese. I found it interesting to see the ways in which nothing has changed since 1968 (e.g. "Yep, that's still true!"), and other areas where Chao really had no idea how things would change, especially in the areas of phonetics and CL. Sometimes he would make predictions that were spot on, and other times it was neat to see how he was mistaken. It was also neat to see how his non-Anglocentric view informed his view of language, and what is "normal". I think it's a perspective that more western linguists should hear.

There were lots of good one-liners, so I'll just share one here, from page 1: "Persons unused to foreign languages tend to find something perverse in the way foreigners talk."