Recommended Books on the Geography of Language

Carver, Craig M. 1986. American Regional Dialects: Word Geography. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. One of the best overall presentations of American English dialects from the standpoint of vocabulary.

Cassidy, Frederic C. (ed.). 1985–2002. Dictionary of American Regional English. 4 vols. Cambridge, MA.: Harvard University Press. A massive compilation of words used only regionally within the United States, with maps showing distributions.

Kurath, Hans. 1949. Word Geography of the Eastern United States. Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press. The classic study that gave rise to the geographical study of American English dialects.

Moseley, Christopher, and R. E. Asher (eds.). 1994. Atlas of the World’s Languages. London: Routledge. A wonderfully detailed color map portrait of the world’s complex linguistic mosaic; thumb through it at your library and you will come to appreciate how complicated the patterns and spatial distributions of languages remain, even in the age of globalization.

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Ostler, Nicholas. 2005. Empires of the Word: A Language History of the World. New York: Harper-Collins. This fascinating book explores the spread and evolution of languages through conquest, with many maps accompanying the text.