Language is a city to the building of which every human being brought a stone.
The process of a living language is like the motion of a broad river which flows with a slow, silent, irresistible current.
The study of word origins points to our common humanity.
While some dolphins are reported to have learned English — up to fifty words used in correct context – no human being has been reported to have learned dolphinese.
Language is the armory of the human mind; at once it contains the trophies of its past and the weapons of its future conquests.
If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his brain [head]. If you talk to him in his language, that goes to his heart.
Language is not an abstract construction of the learned, or of dictionary makers, but is something arising out of the work, needs, ties, joys, affections, tastes, of long generations of humanity, and has its bases broad and low, close to the ground.
Language is a city to which every human being brought a stone for the building of it.
Language is anonymous, collective, and unconscious, the result of the creativity of thousands of generations.
No man, or body of men, can dam the stream of language.
The great enemy of clear language is insincerity.
A living language is like a man suffering incessantly from small hemorrhages, and what it needs above all else is constant transactions of new blood from other tongues. (H.L. Mencken, U.S. writer, editor, and critic, 1880-1956Evolution: Non-violence leads to the highest ethics, which is the goal of all evolution. Until we stop harming all other living beings, we are still savages.
Language is an anonymous, collective, and unconscious art – the result of the creativity of thousands of generations. (Edward Sapir, U.S. anthropologist, linguist, 1884-1939Action: Better to light a candle than to sit and curse the dark.
Time changes all things: there is no reason why language should escape this universal law. (Ferdinand de Saussure, linguist, 1857-1913Maturity: You’ve got to do your own growing, no matter how tall your grandfather was.
Language is like soil. However rich, it is subject to erosion, and its fertility is constantly threatened by uses that exhaust its vitality. It needs constant reinvigoration if it is not to become arid and sterile. (Elizabeth Drew, U.S. political journalist and author, 1887-1965Consumerism: In a consumer society there are inevitably two kinds of slaves: the prisoners of addiction and the prisoners of envy.
The strength of a language does not lie in rejecting what is foreign but in assimilating it. (Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, German poet, dramatist, novelist, and philosopher, 1749-1832Flags: Flags are bits of colored cloth that governments use first to shrink-wrap people’s brains and then as ceremonial shrouds to bury the dead. (Arundhati Roy, Indian writer and activist, Born 1961U.S.A.: Our government has become a clearinghouse for corporations and plutocrats whose dollars grease the wheels for lucrative contracts and easy regulation.
When two languages bump into each other, they borrow stuff. We call it borrowing, except words don’t need to be returned. Sharing is what makes the world go round.
I am always sorry when any language is lost, because languages are the pedigrees of nations.
It’s haunting to realize that half of the languages of the world are teetering on the brink of extinction.
The great enemy of clear language is insincerity.
Language is anonymous, collective, and unconscious, the result of the creativity of thousands of generations.
Stability in language is synonymous with rigor mortis.
No man, or body of men, can dam the stream of language.
While some dolphins are reported to have learned English — up to fifty words used in correct context – no human being has been reported to have learned dolphinese.
Language is not an abstract construction of the learned, or of dictionary makers, but is something arising out of the work, needs, ties, joys, affections, tastes, of long generations of humanity, and has its bases broad and low, close to the ground.
If you talk to a man in a language he understands, that goes to his brain
Language is the armory of the human mind; at once it contains the trophies of its past and the weapons of its future conquests.
Language is a city to which every human being brought a stone for the building of it.
Language is the amber in which a thousand precious and subtle thoughts have been safely embedded and preserved.
You live a new life for every new language you speak.
Language is an anonymous, collective, and unconscious art – the result of the creativity of thousands of generations.
Language is like soil. However rich, it is subject to erosion, and its fertility is constantly threatened by uses that exhaust its vitality. It needs constant reinvigoration if it is not to become arid and sterile.
Time changes all things: there is no reason why language should escape this universal law.
A living language is like a man suffering incessantly from small hemorrhages, and what it needs above all else is constant transactions of new blood from other tongues.
Language is more fashion than science, and matters of usage, spelling, and pronunciation tend to wander around like hemlines.
The strength of a language does not lie in rejecting what is foreign but in assimilating it.
Modern English is the Wal-Mart of languages: convenient, huge, hard to avoid, superficially friendly, and devouring all rivals in its eagerness to expand.
The English language is rather like a monster accordion, stretchable or compressible at the whim of the editor.
A language is a dialect that has an army and a navy.
A different language is a different vision of life.
The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.
Language etches the grooves through which your thoughts must flow.
Nothing is so impenetrable as laughter in a language you don’t understand.
There are more people in China who speak English than there are in the U.S.
Language, as well as the faculty of speech, was the immediate gift of God.