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In this ingenious, lyrical exploration, Julie Sedivy draws on years of experience in the lab and a lifetime of linguistic love to bring the discoveries of linguistics home, to the place language itself lives: within the yearnings of the human heart and amid the complex social bonds that it makes possible. Linguaphile: A Life of Language Love follows the path that language takes through a human life—from an infant’s first attempts at sense-making to the vulnerabilities and losses that accompany aging. As Sedivy shows, however, language and life are inextricable, and here she offers them together: a childish misunderstanding of her mother’s meaning reveals the difficulty of relating to other minds; frustration with “professional” communication styles exposes the labyrinth of standards that define success; the first signs of hearing loss lead to a meditation on society’s discomfort with physical and mental limitations. Part memoir, part scientific exploration, and part cultural commentary, this book epitomizes the thrills of a life steeped in the aesthetic delights of language and the joys of its scientific scrutiny.","forthcoming":false,"isbn13":"9781250397553","publication_date":"20251014","publisher":"Picador","slug":"linguaphile","subtitle":"A Life of Language Love","title":"Linguaphile"},"discovery":{"categories":{"all":[{"bisac_code":"LAN009050","confidence_band":"medium","label":"Sociolinguistics","score":0.8156,"source":"bisac_hint_model"},{"bisac_code":"LAN009040","confidence_band":"medium","label":"Psycholinguistics","score":0.8036,"source":"bisac_hint_model"},{"bisac_code":"LAN009010","confidence_band":"high","label":"Historical Linguistics","score":0.7941,"source":"bisac_hint_model"}],"hint":[{"bisac_code":"LAN009050","confidence_band":"medium","label":"Sociolinguistics","score":0.8156,"source":"bisac_hint_model"},{"bisac_code":"LAN009040","confidence_band":"medium","label":"Psycholinguistics","score":0.8036,"source":"bisac_hint_model"},{"bisac_code":"LAN009010","confidence_band":"high","label":"Historical Linguistics","score":0.7941,"source":"bisac_hint_model"}],"publisher":[{"bisac_code":"BIO026000","confidence_band":"high","label":"Personal Memoirs","score":1,"source":"onix_publisher_code"},{"bisac_code":"LAN004000","confidence_band":"high","label":"Communication Studies","score":1,"source":"onix_publisher_code"},{"bisac_code":"LAN009040","confidence_band":"high","label":"Psycholinguistics","score":1,"source":"onix_publisher_code"}]},"genres":[{"label":"Sociolinguistics","score":0.8156,"slug":"sociolinguistics"},{"label":"Psycholinguistics","score":0.8036,"slug":"psycholinguistics"},{"label":"Historical Linguistics","score":0.7941,"slug":"historical-linguistics"}],"reader_fit":["For readers curious about linguistics and how language shapes human lives","For readers interested in memoir blended with science and cultural commentary"],"related_lists":[],"series":null,"similar_books":[{"authors":["Etienne Gilson"],"book_id":"9780268160531","cover_image_url":"https://img.bookfrontier.com/9780268160531.jpg?v=67d481a7405f8394","score":0.7346,"title":"Linguistics and Philosophy","url":"https://bookfrontier.com/books/9780268160531"},{"authors":["J. 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