World Language Day

On the 21st February, World Language Day (International Mother Language Day) is observed globally, promoting the awareness and importance of linguistic and cultural diversity.

In recognition of UNESCO’s efforts and the importance of preserving languages around the globe, we’ve pulled twenty of the best language, literature and philology books to be published in the last few years across a wealth of international publishers.

Canada

Storie, Visioni e Sfide di un Laboratorio del Futuro

Paolo Quattrocchi, Giuliano Compagno

Il racconto di un Paese lontano e immenso, che gli italiani conoscono per sentito dire, per i suoi miti o per esserci emigrati. Il Canada come non lo avete mai letto, tra racconti di un viaggio che parte dai vicoli di Roma e termina dinanzi alla skyline mozzafiato di Vancouver.

9788857574813

Paperback

248 Pages

Mimesis International

The Hay Archive of Coptic Spells on Leather

A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Materiality of Magical Practice

Elisabeth O'Connell

This volume presents a new translation and analysis of the Hay manuscripts: an assemblage of seven leather sheets bearing Coptic ‘magical’ texts produced in the 8th/9th century AD. They contain a handbook, known as the ‘Hay cookbook’, and other formularies for protection, healing and cursing, some with an especially aggressive sexual character.

9780861592333

Paperback

192 Pages

British Museum

The Book of Kells

A Masterwork Revealed: Creators, Collaboration, and Campaigns

Dr Donncha MacGabhann

The Book of Kells is traditionally thought to have been made by an extensive team of scribes and artists. Using a novel paradigm and years of meticulous research, this book proposes that instead it was the work of only two Masters.

9789464261226

Paperback

326 Pages

Sidestone Press

Writing Around the Ancient Mediterranean

Practices and Adaptations

Philippa M. Steele, Philip J. Boyes

A range of innovative approaches to the practice and adaptation of early writing systems, focusing on societies in and around the eastern half of the Mediterranean area.

9781789258509

Hardcover

320 Pages

Oxbow Books

Stories of the Past

Viewing History through Fiction

Dr Chris Green

Using a number of case studies of English novels of the period from 1800 to 1930, this study shows how literary fiction can be used as a historical resource.

9789464280333

Paperback

250 Pages

Sidestone Press

Literary memory and new voices in the ancient novel

Marília Futre Pinheiro, J.R. Morgan

The papers in this volume discuss, from various perspectives, the engagement of the ancient novels with their predecessors and aim to identify and interpret the resonances, of different degrees of closeness, of those texts as elements of an intertextual and metadiscursive play.

9789493194465

Hardcover

173 Pages

Barkhuis

Dynamic Epigraphy

New Approaches to Inscriptions

Eleri H. Cousins

Explores creative new approaches to epigraphy aiming to push the boundaries of the discipline and demonstrate the analytical fruits of interdisciplinary approaches to inscribed material.

9781789257892

Paperback

232 Pages

Oxbow Books

Literary Prizes and Cultural Transfer

Petra Broomans, Mathijs Sanders, Jeanette den Toonder, Elise Bijl

This book addresses the multilevel nature of literary and translation prizes, with the aim of expanding our knowledge about them as an international and transnational phenomenon. The contributions to this book analyse the social, institutional, and ideological functions of such prizes

9789493194380

Paperback

275 Pages

Barkhuis

Rise Up

Nauja Lynge

This novel exposes a captivating narrative about identity, social heritage, and personal development, and about stereotypes, prejudice, and discrimination.

9781736690215

Paperback

256 Pages

International Polar Institute

Early Greek Alphabetic Writing

A Linguistic Approach

Natalia Elvira Astoreca

This latest volume in the Contexts of and Relations Between Early Writing Systems series explores ancient Greek scripts and their development and evolution as a variety of scripts that usually fall under the umbrella of 'the Greek alphabet'.

9781789257434

Hardcover

160 Pages

Oxbow Books

Memes, Communities and Continuous Change

Chinese Internet Vernacular Explained

Nie Hua

A pioneering digital ethnography of the complex and dynamic language varieties and practices on Chinese internet as a holistic sociolinguistic phenomenon.

9781626430181

Paperback

230 Pages

Bridge 21 Publications

Our Stories Etched in Ivory

Qulip'yugut Iksiaqtuumaruat Tuugaami

Amy Phillips-Chan

This book describes the world’s largest collection of pictorially-engraved 19th century ivory drill bows and how they document Inuit heritage as illuminated by stories ‘read’ from the artifacts by modern Inuit descendants.

9780578906799

Paperback

192 Pages

International Polar Institute

Messages of the Masters / Messaggi dai Maestri

The Secret Language of an Italian Brotherhood in Renaissance Art / Il linguaggio segreto di fratellanza e solidarietà nell’arte rinascimentale

Renée Mulcahy

An age-old secret visual language of the great Italian Renaissance Masters including Michelangelo, Leonardo, and Raphael is revealed through details hidden in plain sight.

9788859621508

Paperback

160 Pages

Edizioni Polistampa

The Social and Cultural Contexts of Historic Writing Practices

Philip J. Boyes, Philippa M. Steele, Natalia Elvira Astoreca

This book offers new ways of approaching the study of writing and integrating it into wider debates and discussions about culture, history and archaeology.

9781789254785

Hardcover

384 Pages

Oxbow Books

Script and Society

The Social Context of Writing Practices in Late Bronze Age Ugarit

Philip J. Boyes

Proposes a methodology for analysing the social context of writing systems, using the Syrian city of Ugarit c. 1450-1180 BC as a case study.

9781789255836

Hardcover

320 Pages

Oxbow Books

The Correspondence of Thomas Stephens

Revolutionising Welsh Scholarship in the Mid-Nineteenth Century through Knowledge Exchange

Adam Coward

Authoritative annotated collection of the international correspondence of the influential 19th-century Welsh polymath Thomas Stephens.

9781891271304

Paperback

272 Pages

Celtic Studies Publications

Prophets, Viziers and Philosophers

Wisdom and Authority in Early Arabic Literature

Emily J. Cottrell

The collection of essays assembled in this volume addresses the models of divine and practical wisdom in some of the earlier Arabic prose texts passed down to us. All essays were initially presented and discussed at an international conference held at the Freie Universität Berlin in October 2014.

9789493194199

Hardcover

421 Pages

Barkhuis

Actualities

Transparent, to the Stone

Leonard Schwartz

Transparent, to the stone follows the movement of water through the multiple forms, narratives, and lives it makes possible, either overwhelming them or linking them together in the process.

9780996193894

Paperback

International Polar Institute

Tracing the Indo-Europeans

New evidence from archaeology and historical linguistics

Birgit Anette Olsen, Thomas Olander, Kristian Kristiansen

Inter-disciplinary study combining archaeological evidence for cultural development with DNA studies and historical linguistics to examine the origins, chronology and spread of Indo-European cultures

9781789252705

Paperback

192 Pages

Oxbow Books

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