Math for English Majors - Outside of a Dog

English language

Published 2024 by Running Press.

ISBN:: 978-0-7624-9981-6

In this trailblazing work from the internet’s most empathetic math teacher, Ben Orlin unravels the secrets behind the world’s most confounding language.

Math, it is said, is the "universal language.” But if a language brings people together, why does math make so many of us feel so alone? In Math for English Majors, bestselling author Ben Orlin (Math with Bad Drawings) offers fresh insights for the mathematically perplexed and mathematical masters alike.

As Orlin reveals, the “universal language” is precisely that: a language. It has nouns (numbers), verbs (calculations), and grammar (algebra). It has funny idioms (“exponential”), quirky etymologies (“squaring”), and peculiar ambiguities (“PEMDAS”). It even has its own form of literature, with equations ranging from the simple wisdom of A2 + B2 = C2 to the startling profundity of eπi + 1 = 0.

Along the way, he shares relatable stories of his own mathematical misunderstandings …

In this trailblazing work from the internet’s most empathetic math teacher, Ben Orlin unravels the secrets behind the world’s most confounding language.

Math, it is said, is the "universal language.” But if a language brings people together, why does math make so many of us feel so alone? In Math for English Majors, bestselling author Ben Orlin (Math with Bad Drawings) offers fresh insights for the mathematically perplexed and mathematical masters alike.

As Orlin reveals, the “universal language” is precisely that: a language. It has nouns (numbers), verbs (calculations), and grammar (algebra). It has funny idioms (“exponential”), quirky etymologies (“squaring”), and peculiar ambiguities (“PEMDAS”). It even has its own form of literature, with equations ranging from the simple wisdom of A2 + B2 = C2 to the startling profundity of eπi + 1 = 0.

Along the way, he shares relatable stories of his own mathematical misunderstandings and epiphanies, as well as the trials and triumphs of his students. And, as always, he sheds further light and levity on the subject with his inept—yet strangely effective—drawings.

2 editions

Soh Kam Yung reviewed Math for English Majors by Ben Orlin

A book that looks at maths like a language.

3 stars

An interesting book that demystifies mathematics by looking at it as a language: it has nouns, verbs and a grammar. By looking at maths from this angle, the author hopes to guide the reader to look past the numerous symbols that make up mathematics, and to think of it as a language for describing aspects of mathematics. The book is livened by the authors numerous (trademark) bad drawings and personal recollections of teaching and talking about maths.

The first part of the book looks at numbers and arithmetics, which the author considers as nouns. This is usually the first encounter people have with maths. He looks at different ways to count and measure numbers, negative numbers and ways to express large numbers. He then moves on to verbs, which are the actions that can be done on numbers like addition, multiplication and other more advanced forms like square roots …

An interesting book that demystifies mathematics by looking at it as a language: it has nouns, verbs and a grammar. By looking at maths from this angle, the author hopes to guide the reader to look past the numerous symbols that make up mathematics, and to think of it as a language for describing aspects of mathematics. The book is livened by the authors numerous (trademark) bad drawings and personal recollections of teaching and talking about maths.

The first part of the book looks at numbers and arithmetics, which the author considers as nouns. This is usually the first encounter people have with maths. He looks at different ways to count and measure numbers, negative numbers and ways to express large numbers. He then moves on to verbs, which are the actions that can be done on numbers like addition, multiplication and other more advanced forms like square roots and logarithms. Finally, he shows that the symbols, variables, expressions and equations make up a grammar, making use of the numbers (nouns) and actions (verbs) to make up a mathematical sentence. He then ends with a brief 'phrase book' on the vocabulary of the various aspects of mathematics from geometry, statistics, proofs and so on.

By the end, the author hopes to show that mathematics resembles a language that is used to express an idea or to make a statement, rather than just a jumble of symbols to be manipulated in obscure manners.

Subjects

Mathematics