Phonetics of English and Dutch is aimed at Dutch-speaking students, from both the Netherlands and Belgium, taking phonetics as part of courses in English at university and teacher-training institutes. In addition, it is hoped that the book will prove useful to English speakers who wish to gain an insight into the present-day pronunciation of Dutch. The course provides a complete introduction to the phonetics of English and Dutch based on an essentially practical approach to the subject. No previous knowledge of phonetics is assumed of the reader, and all technical terms are explained in straightforward language as they are introduced. There is an emphasis throughout on the application of phonetics in second language acquisition; students are shown how a knowledge of phonetics can help them improve their own pronunciation and how this know-how can be passed on to pupils. Theoretical and practical aspects of the subject are clarified for the reader by means of numerous self-study exercises in articulation and transcription.

This is the first theoretically informed study of the relationship between an academic discipline and what the Nazis termed their Weltanschauung. The first study of Sinnbildforschung, German ideograph or swastika studies, though more broadly it tells the tale of the development of German antiquarian studies (ancient Germanic history, archeology, anthropology, folklore, historical linguistics and philology) under the influence of radical-rightwing politics, and the contemporary construction of 'Germanicness' and its role in Nazi thought. The swastika and similar symbols were employed by the ancestors of the modern-day Germans. As these had also become emblematic symbols of the forces of German reaction, Sinnbildforschung became intrinsically connected with the National Socialist regime after 1933 and disappeared along with the Third Reich in 1945.With the Nazi seizure of power, ideographic studies became directly supported by the state. In 1935, an organization was founded within the SS to further its study, the SS-Ahnenerbe. Most infamous as the organ through which medical experiments were arranged to be performed on the inmates of concentration camps, the Ahnenerbe was founded as a historical research institution before it expanded its horizons to the physical sciences.