
Nine Nasty Words
English in the Gutter: Then, Now, and Forever
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Narrated by:
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John McWhorter
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By:
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John McWhorter
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.
©2020 John McWhorter (P)2020 Penguin AudioListeners also enjoyed...




















Critic reviews
"Rollicking, salty, learned, and intensely informative, John McWhorter's Nine Nasty Words is a grand tour through the history of the profanities we (sometimes) abhor and (sometimes) revel in (and sometimes both), peppered with cameos by everyone from Geoffrey Chaucer and Cole Porter to Tallulah Bankhead and the too-little-known singer-songwriter Lucille Bogan, still making people blush 70-odd years after her death, God bless her. I laughed frequently and learned plenty." (Benjamin Dreyer, New York Times best-selling author of Dreyer's English)
"Nine Nasty Words is a deeply intelligent celebration of language that teaches us how to see English in high definition and love it as it really is, right now and in its myriad incarnations to come." (The New York Times)
"Shakespeare’s Caliban spoke for the human race when he said 'You taught me language, and my profit on’t is, I know how to curse.' Taboo language combines our touchiest social emotions with the poetic and metaphorical powers of language, and no one can explain these more clearly and compellingly than John McWhorter." (Steven Pinker, Johnstone Professor of Psychology, Harvard University; author of The Stuff of Thought: Language as a Window Into Human Nature)
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4 Stars
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Entertaining and Educational
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"all bad b....... go to heaven"
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great
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Those who know me well know that I am in love with language. I am the one who sat down and read a grammar book during high holiday services one year, only to receive puzzled looks at my apparent enjoyment and love of the activity. Coming from that vein, I also truly enjoyed this book. Of course, I'm also the one whose family spent one evening dinner (a long, long time ago) looking up swear words in the dictionary, so it isn't surprising that I really enjoyed _Nine Nasty Words_?
The book itself: it went over WHY nasty words are called "swearwords", and it went over some of what WAS and what IS CURRENTLY considered taboo, along with some of the history and a bit about language in general. It did not cover the current (in my mind stupid) religious implications, other than to say that a lot of the hype is self-contradictory…
The book is definitely a good addition to understanding the use of various unsavory language and what parts of speech we use it to enhance and how we actually use said words.
Even the cuss words are constantly changing
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Scholarly & Hilarious
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by Melissa Mohr
but John's performance as a narrator was absolutely delightful. As an African American, John was also able to dive into racially charged words that Mohr was only able to skirt around.
John McWhorter is so charming
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learn and laugh
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John Mcwhorter is great, his performance adds to h
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