John Algeo
American linguist
WORDS ABOUT WORDS
A community is known by the language it keeps, and its words chronicle the times. Every aspect of the life of a people is reflected in the words they use to talk about themselves and the world around them. As their world changes — through invention, discovery, revolution, evolution, or personal transformation — so does their language. Like the growth rings of a tree, our vocabulary bears witness to our past.
—John Algeo, American linguist, Fifty Years Among the New Words, 1991
Posted on October 27, 1999 at 6:04 AM
WORDS ABOUT WORDS
As our culture changes the language changes. We are in an extremely active and volatile period in our cultural history, particularly in technology, and this inevitably produces a change in the way we talk about things.
—John Algeo, American linguist, The Christian Science Monitor, November 23, 1994
Posted on November 17, 1999 at 10:06 AM
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