Nine Nasty Words by John McWhorter is "a linguist’s journey through profanity, rather than an anthropologist’s, psychologist’s, or historian’s. So many think that we are translators, or grammar scolds, or experts on how to teach kids to read, or dialect coaches. We are none of those things. Rather, we take in what looks like a mess and try to make out the sense in it." (p. 7)
McWhorter has a wicked sense of humor which I love. He's quickly becoming one of my favorite language writers, but I find it challenging to explain just how great he is! I've read quite a few articles and blog posts that he authored, but this is the first of his books I've read. One thing that I really appreciate is the incredible range of his sources, including old movies and stage plays, blues recordings, and historic documents of great diversity, as well as scholarly studies of language and its history. He fascinatingly describes how each of his chosen words became so unspeakable -- and how a few of them are now accepted, while just one of them is utterly taboo.
I especially like McWhorter's choice of three favorite sentences, which he mentions as he discusses the various profane and taboo words in the English language:
- "The funniest sentence I have ever known, by a solid but non-native-English speaker who informs us that 'Like English, Chinese is a language without gender, i.e., apart from the natural sex of the nouns such as man, woman, boy, waitress, cock, bitch, etc.'” (pp. 147-148).
- "Or a sentence I love almost as much as the one about English lacking gender except for words like waitress, cock, and bitch: A wasp just stung me on some drive-by type shit, nigga just stung me and bounced. (p. 197).
- "I may have found my third favorite English sentence... in something D. H. Lawrence grumbled in 1925 in reference to a cow: 'To me she is fractious, tiresome and a faggot.'” (pp. 214-215).
If you want more review detail, it's easy to find. But I suggest that you'd be better off reading the book rather than reviews!
This blog post © 2021 mae sander.
5 comments:
Words are fascinating to me. I generally think of the word as equal to the thing, to the action, to the description; I often forget that words are metaphors.
And words like these have powerful emotions associated with them. I'll never forget the time I sang my mom the Name Song ("Chuck, Chuck, bo-buck, banana-fanna...") just like the older girl on the bus told me to, and my mom washed out my mouth with soap...
I've read a few essays by John McWhorter, but never one of his books. I should definitely read this -- totally my cup of tea. Thanks.
When I read the post title, I immediately thought of the late, great (or grate if you are not a fan of his humor) George Carlin and the 10 words you are not allowed to say on TV. Except for a couple that I still find offensive today, the majority of those words are tame compared to what I just read. Impressive review on a difficult subject.
This is my kind of book! Thanks for the recommendation Mae.
Mae,
You certainly got me interested in this book from your review! Sounds like a book I would enjoy. thanks
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