Key Terms in Language and Culture

Rating:
Summary: Pretty good (preliminary) source
Review: A unique book for its field, Duranti et al.'s volume contains a good number of roughly 1000 word entries, a decent number of which have been written by well-known and respected linguistic anthropologists; the size constraint on the individual articles has, of course, both its upsides and downsides- the former being, for instance, a concise analytic precision not always found in anthropology monographs, the latter being then the obverse of that coin, a certain lack of feel for the subject due to the lack of narrative, fieldwork, etc. For one willing to follow up the various bibliographies, this book can go a long way in making up for that defect, however. Best for the reader with an intermediate knowledge of the subject, I'd say, though useful for almost anyone simply because it contains so much up-to-date received knowledge- not to mention that, no matter where one's interests in linguistic anthropology lie, one will most likely find via the bibliographies some previously unknown source bearing on them. Also good, I would presume, at socializing one into the field, helping one to start talking like a scholar of language and culture, at least about some of the theoretical issues involved. A bit expensive, I think, for what it is, but all in all a quite useful book to have lying around.