Read Books Online and Download eBooks, EPub, PDF, Mobi, Kindle, Text Full Free.
Dont Sleep There Are Snakes
Download Dont Sleep There Are Snakes full books in PDF, epub, and Kindle. Read online Dont Sleep There Are Snakes ebook anywhere anytime directly on your device. Fast Download speed and no annoying ads. We cannot guarantee that every ebooks is available!
Book Synopsis Don't Sleep, There are Snakes by : Daniel Everett
Download or read book Don't Sleep, There are Snakes written by Daniel Everett and published by Profile Books. This book was released on 2010-07-09 with total page 327 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Although Daniel Everett was a missionary, far from converting the Pirahs, they converted him. He shows the slow, meticulous steps by which he gradually mastered their language and his gradual realisation that its unusual nature closely reflected its speakers' startlingly original perceptions of the world. Everett describes how he began to realise that his discoveries about the Pirah language opened up a new way of understanding how language works in our minds and in our lives, and that this way was utterly at odds with Noam Chomsky's universally accepted linguistic theories. The perils of passionate academic opposition were then swiftly conjoined to those of the Amazon in a debate whose outcome has yet to be won. Everett's views are most recently discussed in Tom Wolfe's bestselling The Kingdom of Speech. Adventure, personal enlightenment and the makings of a scientific revolution proceed together in this vivid, funny and moving book.
Download or read book Language written by Daniel L. Everett and published by Vintage. This book was released on 2012-03-13 with total page 356 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A bold and provocative study that presents language not as an innate component of the brain—as most linguists do—but as an essential tool unique to each culture worldwide. For years, the prevailing opinion among academics has been that language is embedded in our genes, existing as an innate and instinctual part of us. But linguist Daniel Everett argues that, like other tools, language was invented by humans and can be reinvented or lost. He shows how the evolution of different language forms—that is, different grammar—reflects how language is influenced by human societies and experiences, and how it expresses their great variety. For example, the Amazonian Pirahã put words together in ways that violate our long-held under-standing of how language works, and Pirahã grammar expresses complex ideas very differently than English grammar does. Drawing on the Wari’ language of Brazil, Everett explains that speakers of all languages, in constructing their stories, omit things that all members of the culture understand. In addition, Everett discusses how some cultures can get by without words for numbers or counting, without verbs for “to say” or “to give,” illustrating how the very nature of what’s important in a language is culturally determined. Combining anthropology, primatology, computer science, philosophy, linguistics, psychology, and his own pioneering—and adventurous—research with the Amazonian Pirahã, and using insights from many different languages and cultures, Everett gives us an unprecedented elucidation of this society-defined nature of language. In doing so, he also gives us a new understanding of how we think and who we are.
Book Synopsis How Language Began: The Story of Humanity's Greatest Invention by : Daniel L. Everett
Download or read book How Language Began: The Story of Humanity's Greatest Invention written by Daniel L. Everett and published by Liveright Publishing. This book was released on 2017-11-07 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How Language Began revolutionizes our understanding of the one tool that has allowed us to become the "lords of the planet." Mankind has a distinct advantage over other terrestrial species: we talk to one another. But how did we acquire the most advanced form of communication on Earth? Daniel L. Everett, a “bombshell” linguist and “instant folk hero” (Tom Wolfe, Harper’s), provides in this sweeping history a comprehensive examination of the evolutionary story of language, from the earliest speaking attempts by hominids to the more than seven thousand languages that exist today. Although fossil hunters and linguists have brought us closer to unearthing the true origins of language, Daniel Everett’s discoveries have upended the contemporary linguistic world, reverberating far beyond academic circles. While conducting field research in the Amazonian rainforest, Everett came across an age-old language nestled amongst a tribe of hunter-gatherers. Challenging long-standing principles in the field, Everett now builds on the theory that language was not intrinsic to our species. In order to truly understand its origins, a more interdisciplinary approach is needed—one that accounts as much for our propensity for culture as it does our biological makeup. Language began, Everett theorizes, with Homo Erectus, who catalyzed words through culturally invented symbols. Early humans, as their brains grew larger, incorporated gestures and voice intonations to communicate, all of which built on each other for 60,000 generations. Tracing crucial shifts and developments across the ages, Everett breaks down every component of speech, from harnessing control of more than a hundred respiratory muscles in the larynx and diaphragm, to mastering the use of the tongue. Moving on from biology to execution, Everett explores why elements such as grammar and storytelling are not nearly as critical to language as one might suspect. In the book’s final section, Cultural Evolution of Language, Everett takes the ever-debated “language gap” to task, delving into the chasm that separates “us” from “the animals.” He approaches the subject from various disciplines, including anthropology, neuroscience, and archaeology, to reveal that it was social complexity, as well as cultural, physiological, and neurological superiority, that allowed humans—with our clawless hands, breakable bones, and soft skin—to become the apex predator. How Language Began ultimately explains what we know, what we’d like to know, and what we likely never will know about how humans went from mere communication to language. Based on nearly forty years of fieldwork, Everett debunks long-held theories by some of history’s greatest thinkers, from Plato to Chomsky. The result is an invaluable study of what makes us human.
Book Synopsis Linguistic Fieldwork by : Jeanette Sakel
Download or read book Linguistic Fieldwork written by Jeanette Sakel and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2012-02-02 with total page 193 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A handy beginner's guide to linguistic fieldwork - from the preparation of the work to the presentation of the results.
Book Synopsis Encounters at the Heart of the World by : Elizabeth A. Fenn
Download or read book Encounters at the Heart of the World written by Elizabeth A. Fenn and published by Macmillan + ORM. This book was released on 2014-03-11 with total page 518 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Winner of the 2015 Pulitzer Prize for History Encounters at the Heart of the World concerns the Mandan Indians, iconic Plains people whose teeming, busy towns on the upper Missouri River were for centuries at the center of the North American universe. We know of them mostly because Lewis and Clark spent the winter of 1804-1805 with them, but why don't we know more? Who were they really? In this extraordinary book, Elizabeth A. Fenn retrieves their history by piecing together important new discoveries in archaeology, anthropology, geology, climatology, epidemiology, and nutritional science. Her boldly original interpretation of these diverse research findings offers us a new perspective on early American history, a new interpretation of the American past. By 1500, more than twelve thousand Mandans were established on the northern Plains, and their commercial prowess, agricultural skills, and reputation for hospitality became famous. Recent archaeological discoveries show how these Native American people thrived, and then how they collapsed. The damage wrought by imported diseases like smallpox and the havoc caused by the arrival of horses and steamboats were tragic for the Mandans, yet, as Fenn makes clear, their sense of themselves as a people with distinctive traditions endured. A riveting account of Mandan history, landscapes, and people, Fenn's narrative is enriched and enlivened not only by science and research but by her own encounters at the heart of the world.
Book Synopsis The Kingdom of Speech by : Tom Wolfe
Download or read book The Kingdom of Speech written by Tom Wolfe and published by Little, Brown. This book was released on 2016-08-30 with total page 123 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The maestro storyteller and reporter provocatively argues that what we think we know about speech and human evolution is wrong. Tom Wolfe, whose legend began in journalism, takes us on an eye-opening journey that is sure to arouse widespread debate. The Kingdom of Speech is a captivating, paradigm-shifting argument that speech -- not evolution -- is responsible for humanity's complex societies and achievements. From Alfred Russel Wallace, the Englishman who beat Darwin to the theory of natural selection but later renounced it, and through the controversial work of modern-day anthropologist Daniel Everett, who defies the current wisdom that language is hard-wired in humans, Wolfe examines the solemn, long-faced, laugh-out-loud zig-zags of Darwinism, old and Neo, and finds it irrelevant here in the Kingdom of Speech.
Book Synopsis Light at the Edge of the World by : Wade Davis
Download or read book Light at the Edge of the World written by Wade Davis and published by D & M Publishers. This book was released on 2009-12-01 with total page 224 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For more than 30 years, renowned anthropologist Wade Davis has traveled the globe, studying the mysteries of sacred plants and celebrating the world’s traditional cultures. His passion as an ethnobotanist has brought him to the very center of indigenous life in places as remote and diverse as the Canadian Arctic, the deserts of North Africa, the rain forests of Borneo, the mountains of Tibet, and the surreal cultural landscape of Haiti. In Light at the Edge of the World, Davis explores the idea that these distinct cultures represent unique visions of life itself and have much to teach the rest of the world about different ways of living and thinking. As he investigates the dark undercurrents tearing people from their past and propelling them into an uncertain future, Davis reiterates that the threats faced by indigenous cultures endanger and diminish all cultures.
Book Synopsis The Butch and the Beautiful by : Kris Ripper
Download or read book The Butch and the Beautiful written by Kris Ripper and published by Kris Ripper. This book was released on 2018-12-19 with total page 260 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Jaq Cummings is a high school teacher who really wants a committed relationship—as long as it doesn’t keep her out late on school nights or interrupt Sunday mass with her dad. She is absolutely not about to fall for the hot-mess divorcée she hooks up with even if said hot mess pushes all her buttons. Jaq’s white knight days are over. But one hookup with Hannah becomes two, then coffee, then more incredibly hot sex. And unlike most of Jaq’s exes, Hannah’s not looking for someone to come on strong. In fact, Hannah comes on plenty strong enough for both of them. But she’s just out of a disastrous marriage, she’s in the process of moving across the state, and Jaq can’t take a chance on yet another relationship where she defaults to being a caregiver instead of a partner. Just when Jaq decides her relationship with Hannah is far too precarious, a crisis with a student reminds her of her priorities and makes it clear that sometimes, you have to take big risks to get what you really want.
Book Synopsis Dark Matter of the Mind by : Daniel L. Everett
Download or read book Dark Matter of the Mind written by Daniel L. Everett and published by University of Chicago Press. This book was released on 2017-11-06 with total page 395 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Is it in our nature to be altruistic, or evil, to make art, use tools, or create language? Is it in our nature to think in any particular way? For Daniel L. Everett, the answer is a resounding no: it isn’t in our nature to do any of these things because human nature does not exist—at least not as we usually think of it. Flying in the face of major trends in Evolutionary Psychology and related fields, he offers a provocative and compelling argument in this book that the only thing humans are hardwired for is freedom: freedom from evolutionary instinct and freedom to adapt to a variety of environmental and cultural contexts. Everett sketches a blank-slate picture of human cognition that focuses not on what is in the mind but, rather, what the mind is in—namely, culture. He draws on years of field research among the Amazonian people of the Pirahã in order to carefully scrutinize various theories of cognitive instinct, including Noam Chomsky’s foundational concept of universal grammar, Freud’s notions of unconscious forces, Adolf Bastian’s psychic unity of mankind, and works on massive modularity by evolutionary psychologists such as Leda Cosmides, John Tooby, Jerry Fodor, and Steven Pinker. Illuminating unique characteristics of the Pirahã language, he demonstrates just how differently various cultures can make us think and how vital culture is to our cognitive flexibility. Outlining the ways culture and individual psychology operate symbiotically, he posits a Buddhist-like conception of the cultural self as a set of experiences united by various apperceptions, episodic memories, ranked values, knowledge structures, and social roles—and not, in any shape or form, biological instinct. The result is fascinating portrait of the “dark matter of the mind,” one that shows that our greatest evolutionary adaptation is adaptability itself.
Book Synopsis The First Word by : Christine Kenneally
Download or read book The First Word written by Christine Kenneally and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2007-07-19 with total page 376 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An accessible exploration of a burgeoning new field: the incredible evolution of language The first popular book to recount the exciting, very recent developments in tracing the origins of language, The First Word is at the forefront of a controversial, compelling new field. Acclaimed science writer Christine Kenneally explains how a relatively small group of scientists that include Noam Chomsky and Steven Pinker assembled the astounding narrative of how the fundamental process of evolution produced a linguistic ape-in other words, us. Infused with the wonder of discovery, this vital and engrossing book offers us all a better understanding of the story of humankind.
Book Synopsis The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes (A Hunger Games Novel) by : Suzanne Collins
Download or read book The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes (A Hunger Games Novel) written by Suzanne Collins and published by Scholastic Inc.. This book was released on 2020-05-19 with total page 747 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ambition will fuel him. Competition will drive him. But power has its price. It is the morning of the reaping that will kick off the tenth annual Hunger Games. In the Capitol, eighteen-year-old Coriolanus Snow is preparing for his one shot at glory as a mentor in the Games. The once-mighty house of Snow has fallen on hard times, its fate hanging on the slender chance that Coriolanus will be able to outcharm, outwit, and outmaneuver his fellow students to mentor the winning tribute. The odds are against him. He's been given the humiliating assignment of mentoring the female tribute from District 12, the lowest of the low. Their fates are now completely intertwined - every choice Coriolanus makes could lead to favor or failure, triumph or ruin. Inside the arena, it will be a fight to the death. Outside the arena, Coriolanus starts to feel for his doomed tribute . . . and must weigh his need to follow the rules against his desire to survive no matter what it takes.
Book Synopsis I Don't Like Snakes by : Nicola Davies
Download or read book I Don't Like Snakes written by Nicola Davies and published by Candlewick Press (MA). This book was released on 2015 with total page 28 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A young girl learns facts about snakes, including their behavior, physical characteristics, and eating habits, to overcome her trepidation.
Book Synopsis Please Don't Wake the Animals by : Mary Batten
Download or read book Please Don't Wake the Animals written by Mary Batten and published by Peachtree Publishing Company. This book was released on 2008 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: All people sleep. So do all other mammals. Birds sleep, too. Even snakes, fish, and insects have a way of sleeping. How different animals sleep on land, in water, and in the air-and the special ways they do it-is the subject of this fascinating book for young readers. Using accessible language and scientifically accurate terms, author Mary Batten shows how animals sleep in very different ways and for various lengths of time depending on their size, their physiology, and their habitat. From three-toed sloths hanging from tree branches to dolphins dozing near the ocean's surface, Batten presents a rich variety of wildlife and animal behavior. Additional information about the featured animals as well as simple explanations of terms such as hibernation and torpor are included in sidebars throughout the book. Enhancing the text are illustrator Higgins Bond's vivid, realistic wildlife illustrations feature animals in their natural environments.
Book Synopsis The Language Game by : Morten H. Christiansen
Download or read book The Language Game written by Morten H. Christiansen and published by Hachette UK. This book was released on 2022-02-22 with total page 268 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Forget the language instinct—this is the story of how we make up language as we go Language is perhaps humanity’s most astonishing capacity—and one that remains poorly understood. In The Language Game, cognitive scientists Morten H. Christiansen and Nick Chater show us where generations of scientists seeking the rules of language got it wrong. Language isn’t about hardwired grammars but about near-total freedom, something like a game of charades, with the only requirement being a desire to understand and be understood. From this new vantage point, Christiansen and Chater find compelling solutions to major mysteries like the origins of languages and how language learning is possible, and to long-running debates such as whether having two words for “blue” changes what we see. In the end, they show that the only real constraint on communication is our imagination.
Download or read book Serpent Mage written by Margaret Weis and published by Spectra. This book was released on 2009-02-19 with total page 465 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: After the four worlds Alfred has at last found his people on Chelstra, the realm of sea. But his travels have taught him to be cautious... and Alfred soon realizes his caution is justified, even among his own kind. The one person Alfred can trust is, strangely, Haplo the Patryn. But Haplo's lord has decreed all Sartan to be the enemy, and Haplo dares not go against his lord. Now the companions have arrived in a land where humans, elves, and dwarves have learned to live in peace. Unaware of an even greater threat to all the realms, it is Sartan and Patryn who will disrupt this alliance of the lesser races in their struggle to gain control of all four worlds. Only Alfred and Haplo realize that they have a much older -- and more powerful -- enemy than each other...
Book Synopsis Living Language by : Laura M. Ahearn
Download or read book Living Language written by Laura M. Ahearn and published by John Wiley & Sons. This book was released on 2016-10-06 with total page 394 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Revised and updated, the 2nd Edition of Living Language: An Introduction to Linguistic Anthropology presents an accessible introduction to the study of language in real-life social contexts around the world through the contemporary theory and practice of linguistic anthropology. Presents a highly accessible introduction to the study of language in real-life social contexts around the world Combines classic studies on language and cutting-edge contemporary scholarship and assumes no prior knowledge in linguistics or anthropology Features a series of updates and revisions for this new edition, including an all-new chapter on forms of nonverbal language Provides a unifying synthesis of current research and considers future directions for the field
Book Synopsis The Which Way Tree by : Elizabeth Crook
Download or read book The Which Way Tree written by Elizabeth Crook and published by Bedford Square Publishers. This book was released on 2024-02-15 with total page 206 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: When a panther attacks a family of homesteaders in the remote hill country of Texas, it leaves a young girl traumatised and scarred, and her mother dead. Samantha is determined to find and kill the animal and avenge her mother, and her half-brother Benjamin, helpless to make her see sense, joins her quest. Dragged into the panther hunters' crusade by the force and purity of Samantha's desire for revenge are a charismatic outlaw, a haunted, compassionate preacher, and an aged but relentless tracker dog. As the members of this unlikely posse hunt the giant panther, they in turn are pursued by a hapless, sadistic soldier with a score to settle. And Benjamin can only try to protect his sister from her own obsession, and tell her story in his uniquely vivid voice. The breathtaking saga of a steadfast girl's revenge against an implacable and unknowable beast, The Which Way Tree is a timeless tale full of warmth and humour, testament to the power of adventure and enduring love.
