Download or read book The Origins of Euphemisms and Swear Words in the English Language written by Judith Huber and published by GRIN Verlag. This book was released on 2004-05-15 with total page 17 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Seminar paper from the year 2004 in the subject English Language and Literature Studies - Linguistics, grade: 2 (B), University of Hamburg (Institute for Anglistics/ American Studies), course: Proseminar: Lexicology, language: English, abstract: Modern English is known to be a language made up of mainly two different roots: the Germanic language that was spoken by many inhabitants of the British Isles before the Norman Conquest in 1066, and the Romanic language that the Norman invaders brought with them. These two origins, however, are not distributed equally on the English vocabulary: very generally speaking, Germanic words more often denote basic concepts, while Romanic words more often denote abstract concepts. This is illustrated by the fact that the General Service List (GSL), listing the 2000 most frequent (and therefore most basic) English words, is made up by 50.98 percent of words of Germanic origin, whereas in the Computer Dictionary (CD)1, which consists of 80 096 words, only 26.28 percent of the entries have Germanic roots, but a majority of 58.52 percent have Latin or Romanic ones (Scheler 1978: 72). Therefore it seems quite obvious that swear-words in particular should, to a higher percentage, have Germanic roots, because the concepts they denote are mostly ‘basic’, the domain in which Germanic words are represented to a greater extent than Latin or Romanic words. Moreover, bearing in mind that words of Latin or Romanic origin are more likely to denote abstract concepts and that they often seem to have a certain taste of ‘culture’ and ‘good education’, one could suppose that there is a higher percentage of Latin or Romanic words among euphemisms. These considerations led to the following hypothesis:
Download or read book What the F written by Benjamin K. Bergen and published by Basic Books. This book was released on 2016-09-13 with total page 290 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It may be starred, beeped, and censored -- yet profanity is so appealing that we can't stop using it. In the funniest, clearest study to date, Benjamin Bergen explains why, and what that tells us about our language and brains. Nearly everyone swears-whether it's over a few too many drinks, in reaction to a stubbed toe, or in flagrante delicto. And yet, we sit idly by as words are banned from television and censored in books. We insist that people excise profanity from their vocabularies and we punish children for yelling the very same dirty words that we'll mutter in relief seconds after they fall asleep. Swearing, it seems, is an intimate part of us that we have decided to selectively deny. That's a damn shame. Swearing is useful. It can be funny, cathartic, or emotionally arousing. As linguist and cognitive scientist Benjamin K. Bergen shows us, it also opens a new window onto how our brains process language and why languages vary around the world and over time. In this groundbreaking yet ebullient romp through the linguistic muck, Bergen answers intriguing questions: How can patients left otherwise speechless after a stroke still shout Goddamn! when they get upset? When did a cock grow to be more than merely a rooster? Why is crap vulgar when poo is just childish? Do slurs make you treat people differently? Why is the first word that Samoan children say not mommy but eat shit? And why do we extend a middle finger to flip someone the bird? Smart as hell and funny as fuck, What the F is mandatory reading for anyone who wants to know how and why we swear.
Download or read book Why We Curse written by Timothy Jay and published by John Benjamins Publishing. This book was released on 2000 with total page 344 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Neuro-Psycho-Social Theory of Speech draws together information about cursing from different disciplines and unites them to explain and describe the psychological, neurological, cultural and linguistic factors that underlie this phenomenon.
Download or read book Euphemism Dysphemism written by Keith Allan and published by Oxford University Press, USA. This book was released on 1991 with total page 294 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Euphemism and Dysphemism In this fascinating study, Keith Allan and Kate Burrige examine the linguistic, social, and psychological aspects of this intriguing universal practice.
Download or read book Swearing in English written by Tony McEnery and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2004-06-01 with total page 378 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Do men use bad language more than women? How do social class and the use of bad language interact? Do young speakers use bad language more frequently than older speakers? Using the spoken section of the British National Corpus, Swearing in English explores questions such as these and considers at length the historical origins of modern attitudes to bad language. Drawing on a variety of methodologies including historical research and corpus linguistics, and a range of data such as corpora, dramatic texts, early modern newsbooks and television, Tony McEnery takes a socio-historical approach to discourses about bad language in English. Arguing that purity of speech and power have come to be connected via a series of moral panics about bad language, the book contends that these moral panics, over time, have generated the differences observable in bad language usage in present day English. A fascinating, comprehensive insight into an increasingly popular area, this book provides an explanation, and not simply a description, of how modern attitudes to bad language have come about.
Download or read book The Anatomy of Swearing written by Ashley Montagu and published by University of Pennsylvania Press. This book was released on 2001 with total page 388 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A pioneering work."--Steven Smith, University of Essex
Download or read book Swearing A Cross Cultural Linguistic Study written by M. Ljung and published by Springer. This book was released on 2010-11-30 with total page 203 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This study provides a definition and a typology of swearing and compares its manifestations in English and 24 other languages. In addition the study traces the history of swearing from its first known appearance in Ancient Egypt to the present day.
Download or read book Euphemania written by Ralph Keyes and published by Little, Brown Spark. This book was released on 2010-12-14 with total page 176 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How did die become kick the bucket, underwear become unmentionables, and having an affair become hiking the Appalachian trail? Originally used to avoid blasphemy, honor taboos, and make nice, euphemisms have become embedded in the fabric of our language. Euphemania traces the origins of euphemisms from a tool of the church to a form of gentility to today's instrument of commercial, political, and postmodern doublespeak. As much social commentary as a book for word lovers, Euphemania is a lively and thought-provoking look at the power of words and our power over them.
Download or read book An Encyclopedia of Swearing written by Geoffrey Hughes and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2015-03-26 with total page 600 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This is the only encyclopedia and social history of swearing and foul language in the English-speaking world. It covers the various social dynamics that generate swearing, foul language, and insults in the entire range of the English language. While the emphasis is on American and British English, the different major global varieties, such as Australian, Canadian, South African, and Caribbean English are also covered. A-Z entries cover the full range of swearing and foul language in English, including fascinating details on the history and origins of each term and the social context in which it found expression. Categories include blasphemy, obscenity, profanity, the categorization of women and races, and modal varieties, such as the ritual insults of Renaissance "flyting" and modern "sounding" or "playing the dozens." Entries cover the historical dimension of the language, from Anglo-Saxon heroic oaths and the surprising power of medieval profanity, to the strict censorship of the Renaissance and the vibrant, modern language of the streets. Social factors, such as stereotyping, xenophobia, and the dynamics of ethnic slurs, as well as age and gender differences in swearing are also addressed, along with the major taboo words and the complex and changing nature of religious, sexual, and racial taboos.
Download or read book Holy Sh t written by Melissa Mohr and published by Oxford University Press. This book was released on 2013-05-30 with total page 327 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A humorous, trenchant and fascinating examination of how Western culture's taboo words have evolved over the millennia
Download or read book Hidden Agendas written by John Pilger and published by Random House. This book was released on 2010-09-02 with total page 713 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In this powerful book, journalist and film maker John Pilger strips away the layers of deception, dissembling language and omission that prevent us from understanding how the world really works. From the invisible corners of Tony Blair's Britain to Burma, Vietnam, Australia, South Africa and the illusions of the 'media age', power, he argues, has its own agenda. Unchallenged, it operates to protect its interests with a cynical disregard for people - shaping, and often devastating, millions of lives. By unravelling the hidden histories of contemporary events, Pilger allows us to read between the lines. He also celebrates the eloquent defiance and courage of those who resist oppression and give us hope for the future. Tenaciously researched and written with passion and wit, Hidden Agendas will change the way you see the world.
Download or read book The Soldiers Press written by G. Seal and published by Springer. This book was released on 2016-04-30 with total page 267 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Through the first comprehensive investigation and analysis of the English language trench periodicals of the First World War, The Soldiers' Press presents a cultural interpretation of the means and methods through which consent was negotiated between the trenches and the home front.
Download or read book Politics and the English Language written by George Orwell and published by Renard Press Ltd. This book was released on 2021-01-01 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: George Orwell set out ‘to make political writing into an art’, and to a wide extent this aim shaped the future of English literature – his descriptions of authoritarian regimes helped to form a new vocabulary that is fundamental to understanding totalitarianism. While 1984 and Animal Farm are amongst the most popular classic novels in the English language, this new series of Orwell’s essays seeks to bring a wider selection of his writing on politics and literature to a new readership. In Politics and the English Language, the second in the Orwell’s Essays series, Orwell takes aim at the language used in politics, which, he says, ‘is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind’. In an age where the language used in politics is constantly under the microscope, Orwell’s Politics and the English Language is just as relevant today, and gives the reader a vital understanding of the tactics at play. 'A writer who can – and must – be rediscovered with every age.' — Irish Times
Download or read book A Worlde of Wordes written by John Florio and published by Georg Olms Publishers. This book was released on 1972 with total page 490 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Pejorative Suffixes and Combining Forms in English written by José A. Sánchez Fajardo and published by John Benjamins Publishing Company. This book was released on 2022-02-15 with total page 247 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The book is a research monograph that reviews and revises the concept of linguistic pejoration, and explores the role of 15 suffixes and combining forms, such as -ie, -o, -ard, -holic, -rrhea, -itis, -porn, -ish, in the formation of English pejoratives. The examination of the inner structure of the resulting derivatives is based on an innovative methodology that encompasses the theories and approaches of Construction Morphology, Componential Analysis, and Morphopragmatics. Following the principles of this methodology, pejorative words collected from dictionaries and corpora (a total of approximately 950 words) are abstracted into generalizations (or constructional schemas) where structural and functional similarities are used to cognitively trace the ways in which negative (or derisive) meaning is connected with a specific form. Through this multifaceted methodology, my analysis showcases the fact that the universal properties of ‘diminution’, ‘excess’, ‘resemblance’, and ‘metonymization’ are what underlie the making of pejorative meaning. These generalizations, along with the schematic representations of formatives, can help linguists, or linguistics enthusiasts in general, to understand the conventions and intricacy of lexical pejoration.
Download or read book Bad Language written by Lars-Gunnar Andersson and published by Penguin (Non-Classics). This book was released on 1992 with total page 202 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Discusses attitudes toward the English language and the slang, swearing, grammar, and differences in pronunciation that have changed the language
Download or read book Nine Nasty Words written by John McWhorter and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2023-10-10 with total page 289 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The New York Times bestseller now in paperback. One of the preeminent linguists of our time examines the realms of language that are considered shocking and taboo in order to understand what imbues curse words with such power--and why we love them so much. Profanity has always been a deliciously vibrant part of our lexicon, an integral part of being human. In fact, our ability to curse comes from a different part of the brain than other parts of speech--the urgency with which we say "f&*k!" is instead related to the instinct that tells us to flee from danger. Language evolves with time, and so does what we consider profane or unspeakable. Nine Nasty Words is a rollicking examination of profanity, explored from every angle: historical, sociological, political, linguistic. In a particularly coarse moment, when the public discourse is shaped in part by once-shocking words, nothing could be timelier.
