Language City (2024) by Ross Perlin

Audiobook Review

Language City (2024)

by Ross Perlin

    I hesitate to out myself as a fan of language and languages given the lack of broad audience appeal for this sort of contact.  I'm not a die hard language guy, and I'm not a specialist in the field but I have a general interest in the study of languages that extends beyond engaging with Duolingo (Spanish, Chinese(Mandarin) and Irish).   I checked the Audiobook of Language City, written by a linguistic scholar for a general audience, after I read the New York Times review.  It wasn't a rave, but the subject matter and the idea of hearing this book, rather than reading it, made me go for it.  

   Language City is narrated by the author, a linguistic scholar with ties to... I think... Columbia University, in the field of ethno-linguistic preservation studies.   Certainly, with the exception of the recounting of certain preservation related field-trips to the foothills of the Himalayas, Language City is New York, and the idea of the book is to give a mixed view of the past and present vis a vis New York being the absolute apogee of world linguistic diversity.   Some the chapters are about hardcore linguistic preservation efforts with which the author is utterly engaged and other chapters, the chapter on Yiddish, for example, is more about the history of languages in the New York City.  

   I enjoyed Language City  as an Audiobook, because, as I suspected, Perlin himself has recordings he himself made on these different languages, and listening to the Audiobook allows the reader to hear those recordings, instead of just reading about them on the page.  Add that as an exhibit to the ongoing "Are Audiobooks actually as good as written books/do they count?" debate.