Download or read book How to Talk Like a Local written by Susie Dent and published by Random House. This book was released on 2010-03-04 with total page 167 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'Susie Dent is a national treasure' RICHARD OSMAN 'Susie Dent is a one-off. She breathes life and fun into words and language' PAM AYRES __________________________________________ Would you be bewildered if someone described you as radgy? Do you know how to recognise a tittamatorter? And would you understand if someone called you a culchie? How to Talk Like a Local gathers together hundreds of words from all over the country and digs down to uncover their origins. From dardledumdue, which means daydreamer in East Anglia, through forkin robbins, the Yorkshire term for earwigs, to clemt, a Lancashire word that means hungry, it investigates an astonishingly rich variety of regional expressions, and provides a fascinating insight into the history of the English language. If you're intrigued by colourful words and phrases, if you're interested in how English is really spoken, or if you simply want to find out a bit more about the development of our language, How to Talk Like a Local is irresistible - and enlightening - reading. __________________________________________________ 'Nobody on earth knows more about the English language than Susie Dent and nobody writes about it more entertainingly' GYLES BRANDRETH 'It's an interesting and, at times, hilarious read. One for word-lovers' THE SUN

Download or read book Dent s Modern Tribes written by Susie Dent and published by John Murray. This book was released on 2016-10-20 with total page 336 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Did you know that . . . a soldier's biggest social blunder is called jack brew - making yourself a cuppa without making one for anyone else? That twitchers have an expression for a bird that can't be identified - LBJ (the letters stand for Little Brown Job)? Or that builders call plastering the ceiling doing Lionel Richie's dancefloor? Susie Dent does. Ever wondered why football managers all speak the same way, what a cabbie calls the Houses of Parliament, or how ticket inspectors discreetly request back-up? We are surrounded by hundreds of tribes, each speaking their own distinct slanguage of colourful words, jokes and phrases, honed through years of conversations on the battlefield, in A&E, backstage, or at ten-thousand feet in the air. Susie Dent has spent years interviewing hundreds of professionals, hobbyists and enthusiasts, and the result is an idiosyncratic phrasebook like no other. From the Freemason's handshake to the publican's banter, Dent's Modern Tribes takes us on a whirlwind tour of Britain, decoding its secret languages and, in the process, finds out what really makes us all tick.

Download or read book Word Perfect written by Susie Dent and published by John Murray. This book was released on 2020-10-15 with total page 356 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'Susie Dent is a one-off. She breathes life and fun into words and language' Pam Ayres 'Susie Dent is a national treasure' Richard Osman Welcome to a year of wonder with Susie Dent, lexicographer, logophile, and longtime queen of Countdown's Dictionary Corner. From the real Jack the Lad to the theatrically literal story behind stealing someone's thunder, from tartle (forgetting someone's name at the very moment you need it) to snaccident (the unintentional eating of an entire packet of biscuits), WORD PERFECT is a brilliant linguistic almanac full of unforgettable stories, fascinating facts, and surprising etymologies tied to every day of the year. You'll never be lost for words again.

Download or read book Susie Dent s Weird Words written by Susie Dent and published by Scholastic UK. This book was released on 2013-11-07 with total page 160 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A funny and entertaining way to discover more about the history and meaning of language. SUSIE DENT'S WEIRD WORDS takes children on a rip-roaring tour through some of the most astonishing and sometimes quite revolting origins of English words. As Susie Dent knows, even the most ordinary-sounding word can have the most extraordinary story behind it.

Download or read book What Made The Crocodile Cry written by Susie Dent and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2009-10-22 with total page 173 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Sparkling with insight and linguistic curiosity, this delightful compendium answers 101 of the most intriguing questions about the English language, from word origins and spelling to grammar and usage. Irresistible to anyone with an interest in the words around them.

Download or read book The Hanging Tree written by Ben Aaronovitch and published by Astra Publishing House. This book was released on 2017-01-31 with total page 306 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Ben Aaronovitch's bestselling Rivers of London urban fantasy series • “The perfect blend of CSI and Harry Potter.” —io9 Suspicious deaths are not usually the concern of Police Constable Peter Grant or the Folly—London’s police department for supernatural cases—even when they happen at an exclusive party in one of the flats of the most expensive apartment blocks in London. But the daughter of Lady Ty, influential goddess of the Tyburn river, was there, and Peter owes Lady Ty a favor. Plunged into the alien world of the super-rich, where the basements are bigger than the houses, where the law is something bought and sold on the open market, a sensible young copper would keep his head down and his nose clean. But this is Peter Grant we’re talking about. He’s been given an unparalleled opportunity to alienate old friends and create new enemies at the point where the world of magic and that of privilege intersect. Assuming he survives the week…

Download or read book Hidden Histories A Spotter s Guide to the British Landscape written by Mary-Ann Ochota and published by Frances Lincoln. This book was released on 2018-04-05 with total page 291 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For the times when you’re driving past a lumpy, bumpy field and you wonder what made the lumps and bumps; for when you’re walking between two lines of grand trees, wondering when and why they were planted; for when you see a brown heritage sign pointing to a ‘tumulus’ but you don’t know what to look for… Entertaining and factually rigorous, Hidden Histories will help you decipher the story of our landscape through the features you can see around you. This Spotter’s Guide arms the amateur explorer with the crucial information needed to ‘read’ the landscape and spot the human activities that have shaped our green and pleasant land. Photographs and diagrams point out specific details and typical examples to help the curious Spotter ‘get their eye in’ and understand what they’re looking at, or looking for. Specially commissioned illustrations bring to life the processes that shaped the landscape - from medieval ploughing to Roman road building - and stand-alone capsules explore interesting aspects of history such as the Highland Clearances or the coming of Christianity. This unique guide uncovers the hidden stories behind the country's landscape, making it the perfect companion for an exploration of our green and pleasant land.

Download or read book Prairie Fire written by Julie Courtwright and published by University Press of Kansas. This book was released on 2023-01-13 with total page 288 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Prairie fires have always been a spectacular and dangerous part of the Great Plains. Nineteenth-century settlers sometimes lost their lives to uncontrolled blazes, and today ranchers such as those in the Flint Hills of Kansas manage the grasslands through controlled burning. Even small fires, overlooked by history, changed lives-destroyed someone's property, threatened someone's safety, or simply made someone's breath catch because of their astounding beauty. Julie Courtwright, who was born and raised in the tallgrass prairie of Butler County, Kansas, knows prairie fires well. In this first comprehensive environmental history of her subject, Courtwright vividly recounts how fire-setting it, fighting it, watching it, fearing it-has bound Plains people to each other and to the prairies themselves for centuries. She traces the history of both natural and intentional fires from Native American practices to the current use of controlled burns as an effective land management tool, along the way sharing the personal accounts of people whose lives have been touched by fire. The book ranges from Texas to the Dakotas and from the 1500s to modern times. It tells how Native Americans learned how to replicate the effects of natural lightning fires, thus maintaining the prairie ecosystem. Native peoples fired the prairie to aid in the hunt, and also as a weapon in war. White settlers learned from them that burns renewed the grasslands for grazing; but as more towns developed, settlers began to suppress fires-now viewed as a threat to their property and safety. Fire suppression had as dramatic an environmental impact as fire application. Suppression allowed the growth of water-wasting trees and caused a thick growth of old grass to build up over time, creating a dangerous environment for accidental fires. Courtwright calls on a wide range of sources: diary entries and oral histories from survivors, colorful newspaper accounts, military weather records, and artifacts of popular culture from Gene Autry stories to country song lyrics to Little House on the Prairie. Through this multiplicity of voices, she shows us how prairie fires have always been a significant part of the Great Plains experience-and how each fire that burned across the prairies over hundreds of years is part of someone's life story. By unfolding these personal narratives while looking at the bigger environmental picture, Courtwright blends poetic prose with careful scholarship to fashion a thoughtful paean to prairie fire. It will enlighten environmental and Western historians and renew a sense of wonder in the people of the Plains.

Download or read book Nutrition and Physical Degeneration A Comparison of Primitive and Modern Diets and Their Effects written by Weston A. Price and published by EnCognitive.com. This book was released on 2016-01-08 with total page 1740 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The answers for perfect teeth, unblemished skin, and pristine hair are in this book. Dr. Price was 75 years ahead of his time. In this book, he demonstrates that isolated groups of people living in accordance with Nature have the best overall physical and mental health. Diseases inflicting “modern” humans are unheard of in most of these study groups. Dr. Weston Andrew Price, DDS, was called the “Isaac Newton of Nutrition” and the “Darwin of Nutrition.” This edition of Dr. Price’s classic is modernized with the epub format. It is easier to read on smartphones and tablets. It also includes updated statistics and additional images. Dr. Price shows that illness, disease, behavior, criminality, anemia, voice, and even cheek-line, are all within the domain of Nutrition. “If civilized man is to survive, he must incorporate the fundamentals of primitive nutritional wisdom into his modern lifestyle.” —Dr. Weston A. Price, DDS

Download or read book Rework written by Jason Fried and published by Crown Currency. This book was released on 2010-03-09 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Rework shows you a better, faster, easier way to succeed in business. Most business books give you the same old advice: Write a business plan, study the competition, seek investors, yadda yadda. If you're looking for a book like that, put this one back on the shelf. Read it and you'll know why plans are actually harmful, why you don't need outside investors, and why you're better off ignoring the competition. The truth is, you need less than you think. You don't need to be a workaholic. You don't need to staff up. You don't need to waste time on paperwork or meetings. You don't even need an office. Those are all just excuses. What you really need to do is stop talking and start working. This book shows you the way. You'll learn how to be more productive, how to get exposure without breaking the bank, and tons more counterintuitive ideas that will inspire and provoke you. With its straightforward language and easy-is-better approach, Rework is the perfect playbook for anyone who’s ever dreamed of doing it on their own. Hardcore entrepreneurs, small-business owners, people stuck in day jobs they hate, victims of "downsizing," and artists who don’t want to starve anymore will all find valuable guidance in these pages.

Download or read book Navajo English Dictionary written by C. Leon Wall and published by [Phoenix, Ariz.] : United States Department of the Interior, Division of Education, Bureau of Indian Affairs. This book was released on 1958 with total page 86 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In response to a recent surge of interest in Native American history, culture, and lore, Hippocrene brings you a concise and straightforward dictionary of the Navajo tongue. The dictionary is designed to aid Navajos learning English as well as English speakers interested in acquiring knowledge of Navajo. The largest of all the Native American tribes, the Navajo number about 125,000 and live mostly on reservations in Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah. Over 9,000 entries; A detailed section on Navajo pronunciation; A comprehensive, modern vocabulary; Useful, everyday expressions.

Download or read book The Prodigal Tongue written by Lynne Murphy and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2018-04-10 with total page 368 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: CHOSEN BY THE ECONOMIST AS A BEST BOOK OF THE YEAR An American linguist teaching in England explores the sibling rivalry between British and American English “English accents are the sexiest.” “Americans have ruined the English language.” Such claims about the English language are often repeated but rarely examined. Professor Lynne Murphy is on the linguistic front line. In The Prodigal Tongue she explores the fiction and reality of the special relationship between British and American English. By examining the causes and symptoms of American Verbal Inferiority Complex and its flipside, British Verbal Superiority Complex, Murphy unravels the prejudices, stereotypes and insecurities that shape our attitudes to our own language. With great humo(u)r and new insights, Lynne Murphy looks at the social, political and linguistic forces that have driven American and British English in different directions: how Americans got from centre to center, why British accents are growing away from American ones, and what different things we mean when we say estate, frown, or middle class. Is anyone winning this war of the words? Will Yanks and Brits ever really understand each other?

Download or read book At Sixes and Sevens How to Understand Numbers and Make Maths Easy written by Rachel Riley and published by HarperCollins. This book was released on 2021-10-28 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An engaging, accessible introduction into how numbers work and why we shouldn’t be afraid of them, from maths expert Rachel Riley.

Download or read book Words of the Year written by Susie Dent and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 2008 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: What's the difference between a retrosexual and a metrosexual? Have you heard the scientific evidence for Momnesia (a mother's forgetfulness after giving birth)? Which famous author coined the term embuggerance earlier this year? Are you nomophobic?Following the dramatic success of The Language Report, Susie Dent returns with Words of the Year - a fascinating A-Z collection of new and newly resurrected words that have been selected for their topicality and resonance in 2008. Highlighting why certain words have come into use through currentpreoccupations or events, Dent charts the very latest linguistic changes and the interesting stories behind them. Contains feature entries for words that are linked by context to a newly prominent word, for example, linked to sub-prime in a financial context are bullish, bear, and bankrupt. Dentbases her discoveries on the most authoritative, thorough, and up to date evidence available: the unparalleled resources of the Oxford English Dictionary reading programme and the Oxford English Corpus, the world's largest language databank.A truly witty and insightful snapshot of current language usage, Words of the Year highlights the words of our time and delves into captivating etymologies along the way. An essential read for all language enthusiasts.

Download or read book And West Is West written by Ron Childress and published by Algonquin Books. This book was released on 2016-07-05 with total page 337 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: “A calculated nail-biter that shines a dark light on life in the 21st century.” —The Washington Post “A story no one has ever written before, and one we all need to read . . . Impressive and keenly relevant to our time.” —Barbara Kingsolver When Jessica, a young Air Force drone pilot in Nevada, is tasked with launching a missile against a suspected terrorist halfway across the world, she has no choice but to comply, even if it means women and children will be killed too. Meanwhile, Ethan, a young Wall Street quant, develops an algorithm that enables his company’s clients to profit by exploiting the international financial instability caused by exactly this kind of antiterrorist strike. These two are only minor players, but their actions have global implications that tear lives apart--including their own, as they are cast out by a flawed system and forced to take the blame for the orders of their superiors. Award-winning author Ron Childress has crafted a powerful, politically charged, and terrifyingly real novel for our time. “Extraordinary.” —The Kansas City Star “This compelling debut novel . . . dramatically examines the insidious role unrestrained technology plays in the moral and ethical corruption of people, institutions, and government . . . An excellent story, well told, suspenseful, and tragic.” —Publishers Weekly “This powerful and morally chilling tale depicts the chasm modern technology can create between actions and consequences.” —Library Journal “A smart, satisfying work about real people navigating the uneasy compromises of today’s world. With sharp writing and likeable characters, Ron Childress has woven a very human story out of the tangle of conflicts--military, political, financial--that bind us together.” —Washington Independent Review of Books, “2015 Best Novels of the Year” “A master study in how people can emotionally detach themselves from the damage they cause in our computer-driven world.” —The Washington Post

Download or read book Contemporary Native American Architecture written by Carol Herselle Krinsky and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 1996 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Student's Book contains three authentic Cambridge Starters papers. These colourful test papers contain engaging activities and attractive illustrations to motivate young learners at this level. They also provide an excellent opportunity for children, parents and teachers alike to familiarise themselves with the format of the test. A Starters Audio CD (which contains the listening sections of the tests) and a Starters Answer Booklet are also available separately.

Download or read book American Spartan written by Ann Scott Tyson and published by Harper Collins. This book was released on 2014-03-25 with total page 377 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Lawrence of Arabia meets Sebastian Junger's War in this unique, incendiary, and dramatic true story of heroism and heartbreak in Afghanistan written by a Pulitzer Prize–nominated war correspondent. Army Special Forces Major Jim Gant changed the face of America’s war effort in Afghanistan. A decorated Green Beret who spent years in Afghanistan and Iraq training indigenous fighters, Gant argued for embedding autonomous units with tribes across Afghanistan to earn the Afghans’ trust and transform them into a reliable ally with whom we could defeat the Taliban and counter al-Qaeda networks. The military's top brass, including General David Petraeus, commander of U.S. Forces in Afghanistan, approved, and Gant was tasked with implementing his controversial strategy. Veteran war correspondent Ann Scott Tyson first spoke with Gant when he was awarded the Silver Star in 2007. Tyson soon came to share Gant’s vision, so she accompanied him to Afghanistan, risking her life to embed with the tribes and chronicle their experience. And then they fell in love. Illustrated with dozens of photographs, American Spartan is their remarkable story—one of the most riveting, emotional narratives of wartime ever published.