Insufficiencies of Language

Why is it that we talk so much? Why can't weinfluence the way we speak and why do we useswearwords even when we don't want to? These andother questions are the starting point of this book.So called bad language is dealt with, as ispoliteness, and possible reasons for our use ofcertain types of language like medical or legaljargon are investigated. From a biological point ofview these phenomena seem to be rather harmful to thespeaker sometimes, but once we adopt a memetic pointof view they seem to make perfect sense. So after abrief introduction into both evolutionary biology andmemetics, Edith Simmel explores certain peculiaritiesof language and discusses possible explanations forour speaking behaviours.