There are some who consider language a scientific subject. Certainly it can be very technical. You might enjoy "The Cambridge Encylopedia of Language." I believe you can get a pdf download for your E reader. Tenses: Some languages (Latin, German, ...) use changes to the endings of nouns to indicate different purposes. English does not do this very much. Most languages (German, French, Latin, Russian .. ) offer a much smaller set of changes to verbs than does English.