{"product_id":"trading-tongues-jonathan-hsy-9780814212295","title":"Trading Tongues: Merchants, Multilingualism, and Medieval Literature","description":"\u003ci\u003eTrading Tongues \u003c\/i\u003eoffers fresh approaches to the multilingualism of major early English authors like Geoffrey Chaucer, John Gower, Margery Kempe, and William Caxton, and lesser-known figures like French lyricist Charles d'Orl饌ns. Juxtaposing literary works with contemporaneous Latin and French civic records, mixed-language merchant miscellanies, and bilingual phrasebooks, Jonathan Hsy illustrates how languages commingled in late medieval and early modern cities. Chaucer, a customs official for the Port of London, infused English poetry with French and Latin merchant jargon, and London merchants incorporated Latin and vernacular verse forms into trilingual account books. Hsy examines how writers working in English, Latin, and French (and combinations thereof) theorized the rich contours of polyglot identity. In a range of genres--from multilingual lyrics, poems about urban life, and autobiographical narratives--writers found venues to consider their own linguistic capacities and to develop new modes of conceiving language contact and exchange. Interweaving close readings of medieval texts with insights from sociolinguistics and postcolonial theory, \u003ci\u003eTrading Tongues \u003c\/i\u003enot only illuminates how multilingual identities were expressed in the past; it generates new ways of thinking about cultural contact and language crossings in our own time.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eAuthor:\u003c\/b\u003e Jonathan Hsy\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-10:\u003c\/b\u003e 0814212298\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eISBN-13:\u003c\/b\u003e 9780814212295\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublisher:\u003c\/b\u003e Ohio State University Press\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eLanguage:\u003c\/b\u003e English\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePublished:\u003c\/b\u003e 07\/30\/2013\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003ePages:\u003c\/b\u003e 264\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eFormat:\u003c\/b\u003e Hardcover\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eWeight:\u003c\/b\u003e 1.20lbs\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eSize:\u003c\/b\u003e 9.10h x 6.00w x 0.90d\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cb\u003eReview Citation(s): \u003c\/b\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003ci\u003eChoice\u003c\/i\u003e 03\/01\/2014","brand":"Jonathan Hsy","offers":[{"title":"Hardcover","offer_id":44149201174783,"sku":"9780814212295","price":75.95,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0662\/2982\/9887\/files\/img_f40f836e-8d7b-428a-9fc3-71fc06cb4a6b.jpg?v=1688455385","url":"https:\/\/www.whiterainbookhouse.com\/products\/trading-tongues-jonathan-hsy-9780814212295","provider":"WR Book House","version":"1.0","type":"link"}