Going Nucular: Language, Politics and Culture in Confrontational Times

by Geoffrey Nunberg

Overview

Nunberg (linguistics, Stanford U.) does not spend much time on the romance of words or decrying the state of the language, but more often takes language as a jumping off point to see what words can reveal about other things, among them culture, war, politics, symbols, media, business, and technology. Many of the 65 essays began life as articles or radio commentaries. Annotation ©2004 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781586482343
Publisher:	PublicAffairs
Publication date:	05/10/2004
Pages:	320
Product dimensions:	5.70(w) x 8.56(h) x 1.24(d)

About the Author

Geoffrey Nunberg is a senior researcher at the Center for the Study of Language and Information at Stanford University and a Consulting Full Professor of Linguistics at Stanford University. He is chair of the Usage Panel of the American Heritage Dictionary. Since 1989, he has done a regular language feature on NPR's "Fresh Air," and more recently he has been doing regular features about language and topical issues for the Sunday New York Times "Week in Review."

Table of Contents

	Introduction	XI
	Culture at Large
	Plastics!	3
	Keeping Ahead of the Joneses	8
	Caucasian Talk Circles	12
	Near Myths	17
	Lamenting Some Enforced Chastity	21
	Stolen Words	25
	Beating Their Brows	29
	Prurient Interests	33
	War Drums
	When Words Fail	39
	A Name Too Far	42
	Beleaguered Infidel	47
	It All Started with Robespierre	51
	It May Be Banal but It's Bad News	55
	Going Nucular	59
	Appease Porridge Hot	63
	The Second Casualty	67
	Naming of Foreign Parts	72
	The Syntax of Resistance	75
	A Couple of Words for Nothing Left to Lose	79
	The Gallic Subject	84
	Begin the Regime	88
	We'll Always Have Kirkuk	92
	Politics as Usual
	So Sorry	99
	Some of My Best Friends	103
	Interested Parties	107
	Me, Too, Too	112
	Slippery Slopes	117
	If It's Orwellian, It's Probably Not	121
	Meetings of the Minds	126
	Lattes, Limousines, and Libs	131
	Where the Left Commences	135
	A Fascist in Every Garage	139
	Class Dismissed	144
	Special Effects	148
	Symbols
	A Date to Remember	155
	Our Nation's Favorite Song	159
	The Last Refuge of Scoundrels and Other People	163
	Pledge Break	168
	Media Words
	Rush Limbaugh's Plurals	175
	The Politics of Polysyndeton	179
	The Speech That Turns Mere Presidents Into Talk Show Hosts	184
	I Seeing the News Today, Oh Boy	188
	Roil Pain	192
	Business Cycles
	For Love or Money	199
	The Triumph of Capitalism	202
	A Good Old-Gentlemanly Vice	206
	The Vision Thing	210
	Initiating Mission-Critical Jargon Reduction	214
	Farewell to the Alero	218
	100 Percent Solutions	222
	Tech Talk
	As Google Goes, So Goes the Nation	227
	I Have Seen the Future, and It Blogs	231
	Prefixed Out	235
	The Icebox Goeth	238
	Watching Our Language
	Deceptively Yours	243
	The Bloody Crossroads of Grammar and Politics	246
	Letter Perfect	251
	A Thousand Pictures	255
	All That You Can Bee	260
	Like, Wow!	264
	Lucubratin' Rhythm	268
	Ain't Misbehavin'	271
	There Are No Postmodernists in a Foxhole	275
	Adverbially Yours	279
	Word Index	283
	Subject Index	289

What People are Saying About This

San Francisco Chronicle

What [Nunberg] hopes to remind us is that in language lies clues to understanding the most divisive issues of the day.
—July 8, 2004

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Clearly, Nunberg knows about etymology and usage and a good deal more witty, entertaining, informative and unfailingly fascinating.
—June 30, 2004

Editorial Reviews

Although Nunberg ranges over many kinds of words, including shrewd meditations on the teenager's "like" and the growing vogue of "Caucasian" instead of "white" -- his observations on political speech are especially valuable in revealing how words inform our understanding of issues.
— The Washington Post

David Greenberg