Words and Rules : The Ingredients of Language

from _Greg

If Steven Pinker's excellent books "The Language Instinct" and "How the Mind Works" inspires you to read more linguistics, this is a good book to read next. This one is more technical and specialized, yet still accessible. Read the other ones first.

from TJWilson

Easy at times; rough at times. Definitely a better read than a lot of other popular science books but still difficult as far as understanding the minuteness of grammatical detail involved. In the end, Pinker provides a wonderful and convincing new perspective on human thought and language. A nove...

from INeilC

An interesting history of language. Pinker generally writes in a very engaging way, if at times the technical details.obscure what he is trying to say.,

from Schmerguls

i found some things in this erudite book of interest, but most of it was not well comprehended by me. The blurbs for the book talk about 'a delicious romp through everything interesting about words,' but I did not find it delicious very often, though some of the discussion was of interest. I was ...

from hippietrail

As long as you're aware that this book is for a more linguistics-specific audience than Pinker's other well-known works, Words and Rules is enlightening and well written.