Monday Feb 3—Finally made it out of Social Sciences into Language. What a relief to go from all of the problems in the world to all (or some) of the languages in the world. It was nice to be back with some big fat dictionaries. And here’s someone who had a lot of time on his hands: Ammon Shea, author of Reading the OED: One Man, One Year, 21,730 Pages. I don’t know whether to be envious or simply annoyed. Maybe I should try reading the book. There were quite a few teach-yourself language books. Of course, a large shelf of Spanish books. But there was also Czech, Indonesian, Swahili, Turkish, Finnish, Welsh, Icelandic, Cambodian, and Hindi, in addition to the ones we might expect. I’m not sure what’s with learning Japanese while driving, but Learn in Your Car Japanese and Drive Time: Learn Japanese in your Car suggest that Japanese is best studied while negotiating traffic. Most disgusting title: Chineasy. The fact is, the library offers free online language courses through Pronunciator, so these self-help books are a bit moot. Still, you can check them out and take them to Vietnam or Portugal or Greece or wherever it is you’re going. The library does have a 1963 edition of Wheelock’s Latin Grammar. Well who doesn’t? I’m tempted to buy the latest edition for the library, not that it will be a great departure from the 1963 version. There don’t seem to be many up-and-coming writers of Latin these days. And who knew that Bill Bryson was such a prolific writer? The Mother Tongue, Made in America, Bryson’s Dictionary of Troublesome Words were all in the Language section. And then, when I left the 400s and moved into the 500s—Science—there he was again with A Short History of Everything and Seeing Further. So many books, so little time, as they say. The 500s are more interesting than I thought they would be. For one thing, those mathematicians are a lot funnier than Mrs. Beresford was in eighth-grade geometry. She had no sense of humor. I can't see her coming up with the titles they use: The Grapes of Math, The Joy of X, How to Bake π and so on. A bite of π would have helped the geometry go down. Coming up next: The Hidden Danger of Health Foods !! Comments are closed.
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Author Rebecca Moore is Professor Emerita of Religious Studies at San Diego State University. She is currently Reviews Editor for Nova Religio: The Journal of Alternative and Emergent Religions and Co-Director of The Jonestown Institute. Archives
December 2021
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