Semantics and Pragmatics of False Friends (Routledge Studies in Linguistics) - Hardcover

'...an illuminating and fascinating book.' - Jan Harald Alnes, University of Tromso

"Chamizo-Dominguez is a multilingual author who made the most of his knowledge of several languages to write a book with such scope and insightful depth....The diversity of languages, comprehensiveness of analysis, and the author's devotion to the topic make the book an essential reference for all scholars interested in the topic of false friends." --Ahmed Seddik Al-Wahy, The Canadian Journal of Linguistics

This book approaches the topic of false friends from a theoretical perspective, arguing that false friends carry out a positive role as a cognitive device, mainly in literature and jokes, and suggesting some pragmatic strategies in order to restore the original sense of a text/utterance when a given translator (or a foreign speaker) falls victim to false friends. This theoretical account is successively verified by appealing to texts from the fields of literature, science, philosophy, journalism, and everyday speech.