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Amglish, in Like, Ten Easy Lessons: A Celebration of the New World Lingo
One of the world's leading linguists recently wrote: "We may be seeing the birth of a new language as yet without a name." He was referencing the new informal mixture of English and other languages being freely formed around the world, with little effortto conform to prescribed rules of grammar, syntax, or spelling. Amglish in, Like, Ten Easy Lessons: A Celebration of the New World Lingo, by Arthur Rowse with illustrations by John Doherty, offers both a name for this new language and an enjoyableguide on how one can learn to use the language through ten easy "lessons." The authors describe how Amglish, or American English influenced by online grammar and syntax, has begun to dominate our global language. Featuring an ironic manual on how to usethis developing language, Amglish is a light and highly entertaining addition to the recent literature on grammar and punctuation. Illustrated with original drawings throughout, the book shows readers how to improve their Amglish and have fun doingso.
236 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2011
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January 4, 2012
"S I Hayakawa said: Slang is the poetry of everyday life." (50)
THIS BOOK totally caught my eye whilst browsing through NG a couple of months ago. Seriously. It was, like, written for ME to READ. Essentially, Amglish, is the head on collision of American slang (like.oh.my.god.) and Proper English. Uh hello?! Have you not heard me talk.
Okay, so you probably haven't and will just have to trust me on this. I might be the antithesis of Proper English teacher. I've been known to walk into my classroom and great the students with: what up my peeps. (They both laugh with me AND at me - *headshake* 7th graders). Also, if I have a side thought, I segue into it with a "BTW" in mini lectures.
Sure, sure, I know PROPER English. And I absolutely teach PROPER English. But I love language. I love how fluid language is. I love how words are only as powerful as we allow them to be. I love that POWER.
This book was a fantastic read. Rowse shares moments in educational history that sorta allowed for Amglish to grow. Like, when NCTE said hey let the kids write however they want to write; it's a form of expression. what they're saying is much more important than how they say it. Didja know that? I sure didn't. ["In 1974 that students have the right to speak and write virtually any way they want - whether in Spanglish, Ebonics, Valspeak, or Geekish - and teachers should respect that. (40)]
And how THEN there was this big COVER UP because guess what? When you allow students to write however they feel and turn it in as substance without knowing the basic rules that they're breaking it's impossible to get them to differentiate between proper and improper. ["the steady relaxation of formal language standards may have had an effect over the years on test results from the College Board's annual Scholastic Aptitude Test for verbal skills. But the Board has done its best to cover up the actual scores." (44) and "But the scores actually went down. The 2010 score does not show what happened in 1994, when the total had plummeted from 478 in 1963 to 419. At that point, the Board figured out how to make things look better. It added 80 points to the scores. It explained that the test needed to be 'recentered' to reflect a study indicating that the decline was largely due to an influx of poor blacks and Hispancis during those years." (45)]
But there's much more than that debate. Let's talk about dirty words. "Even the f-word, which used to be the best attention getter, seems to be fading. To describe a sunset with it, for example, is apparently no longer considered hilarious. And when Vice President Dick Cheney publicly told Senator Patrick Leahey of Vermont to "go f yourself", hardly anybody was surprised or shocked. (70)"
And you know, it's pretty true. Think about what's on the tele during prime time! Man, I know foul language doesn't offend me at all but the times are a'changin. There's no way some of these things would have been heard in 80's while I was growing up. Even the daytime game shows are risque. Have you seen Family Feud lately? Every episode I've seen on break made mention of sexytimes.
STILL there's more to this book than the above discussions. Let's talk about America(tm)...more specifically the English language and how we've taken over the world. And I'm only half playing here. There's a large portion devoted to what does the mixture of our language and other country's language look like. This was so much fun. For example: "Koreans also like to shorten long words in ways that even Americans themselves might envy. For example, an office-hotel complex boils down to officetel, a word processor becomes wo-pro, and a digital camera becomes di-ca. Koreans are especially clever at fabricating words with English letters such as skinship, which means physical contact between two or more people that is not necessarily sexual" (195)
Hmmmm....what else? The debate about Huck Finn? Yeah, that's mentioned: "but the comedy central's Stephen Colbert supported the idea of whitwashing American history and suggested that the job had only begun. "It's great to have the n-word out of Huckleberry Finn. Now get to work on the Moby D-word." (79)\
Finally, my last bit of coolness: "Whitman's love of slang led to a pioneering magazine article entitled 'Slang in America'" (77)
I cannot stress how brain fodder this book offered. I wished I was in college and this was a book used in a class. So many great discussions to be had.
THIS BOOK totally caught my eye whilst browsing through NG a couple of months ago. Seriously. It was, like, written for ME to READ. Essentially, Amglish, is the head on collision of American slang (like.oh.my.god.) and Proper English. Uh hello?! Have you not heard me talk.
Okay, so you probably haven't and will just have to trust me on this. I might be the antithesis of Proper English teacher. I've been known to walk into my classroom and great the students with: what up my peeps. (They both laugh with me AND at me - *headshake* 7th graders). Also, if I have a side thought, I segue into it with a "BTW" in mini lectures.
Sure, sure, I know PROPER English. And I absolutely teach PROPER English. But I love language. I love how fluid language is. I love how words are only as powerful as we allow them to be. I love that POWER.
This book was a fantastic read. Rowse shares moments in educational history that sorta allowed for Amglish to grow. Like, when NCTE said hey let the kids write however they want to write; it's a form of expression. what they're saying is much more important than how they say it. Didja know that? I sure didn't. ["In 1974 that students have the right to speak and write virtually any way they want - whether in Spanglish, Ebonics, Valspeak, or Geekish - and teachers should respect that. (40)]
And how THEN there was this big COVER UP because guess what? When you allow students to write however they feel and turn it in as substance without knowing the basic rules that they're breaking it's impossible to get them to differentiate between proper and improper. ["the steady relaxation of formal language standards may have had an effect over the years on test results from the College Board's annual Scholastic Aptitude Test for verbal skills. But the Board has done its best to cover up the actual scores." (44) and "But the scores actually went down. The 2010 score does not show what happened in 1994, when the total had plummeted from 478 in 1963 to 419. At that point, the Board figured out how to make things look better. It added 80 points to the scores. It explained that the test needed to be 'recentered' to reflect a study indicating that the decline was largely due to an influx of poor blacks and Hispancis during those years." (45)]
But there's much more than that debate. Let's talk about dirty words. "Even the f-word, which used to be the best attention getter, seems to be fading. To describe a sunset with it, for example, is apparently no longer considered hilarious. And when Vice President Dick Cheney publicly told Senator Patrick Leahey of Vermont to "go f yourself", hardly anybody was surprised or shocked. (70)"
And you know, it's pretty true. Think about what's on the tele during prime time! Man, I know foul language doesn't offend me at all but the times are a'changin. There's no way some of these things would have been heard in 80's while I was growing up. Even the daytime game shows are risque. Have you seen Family Feud lately? Every episode I've seen on break made mention of sexytimes.
STILL there's more to this book than the above discussions. Let's talk about America(tm)...more specifically the English language and how we've taken over the world. And I'm only half playing here. There's a large portion devoted to what does the mixture of our language and other country's language look like. This was so much fun. For example: "Koreans also like to shorten long words in ways that even Americans themselves might envy. For example, an office-hotel complex boils down to officetel, a word processor becomes wo-pro, and a digital camera becomes di-ca. Koreans are especially clever at fabricating words with English letters such as skinship, which means physical contact between two or more people that is not necessarily sexual" (195)
Hmmmm....what else? The debate about Huck Finn? Yeah, that's mentioned: "but the comedy central's Stephen Colbert supported the idea of whitwashing American history and suggested that the job had only begun. "It's great to have the n-word out of Huckleberry Finn. Now get to work on the Moby D-word." (79)\
Finally, my last bit of coolness: "Whitman's love of slang led to a pioneering magazine article entitled 'Slang in America'" (77)
I cannot stress how brain fodder this book offered. I wished I was in college and this was a book used in a class. So many great discussions to be had.
August 25, 2019
I literally speed read this. I just didn't get the sense of humor or what the author was talking about half the time.
October 10, 2011
Amglish is, like, English in blue jeans, you know. And in best Amglish tradition Arthur Rowe presents his book Amglish In, Like, Ten Easy Lessons in a way that will make friends of correct orthography cringe more than just once.
While you could get the idea that this book is basically a how-to guide to improve your informal American English skills it is actually much more than that. Introducing the reader to the history of informal language, the author focuses on American English and its impact not only on the more obvious entertainment industry, but also on the media, politics (George W. Bush, anyone?), and teaching, but even more so, the global influence it has on other languages too (just think about what the Germans call Denglish or the Mexican-Americans Spanglish).
A smart and absorbing read, that certainly didn't lack on the amusement-scale, it was interesting to learn how informal language, with all its misspellings and abbreviations, has become an integral part of our everyday communication. Last but not least Rowe stresses the importance of being proficient in your native language and knowing how and when to switch from formal language to a more casual dialogue.
To improve the later just turn to the ten easy lessons in the last chapter. And don't you worry - the rules are flexible and may be broken if the need arises!
In short: Entertaining all the way through, the book had me ROFL more than once. Highly recommendable!
While you could get the idea that this book is basically a how-to guide to improve your informal American English skills it is actually much more than that. Introducing the reader to the history of informal language, the author focuses on American English and its impact not only on the more obvious entertainment industry, but also on the media, politics (George W. Bush, anyone?), and teaching, but even more so, the global influence it has on other languages too (just think about what the Germans call Denglish or the Mexican-Americans Spanglish).
A smart and absorbing read, that certainly didn't lack on the amusement-scale, it was interesting to learn how informal language, with all its misspellings and abbreviations, has become an integral part of our everyday communication. Last but not least Rowe stresses the importance of being proficient in your native language and knowing how and when to switch from formal language to a more casual dialogue.
To improve the later just turn to the ten easy lessons in the last chapter. And don't you worry - the rules are flexible and may be broken if the need arises!
In short: Entertaining all the way through, the book had me ROFL more than once. Highly recommendable!
November 7, 2014
I was irritated by a lot of aspects of this book. The author's frequent changes in tone and content make it unclear whether he really does think that Amglish (informal American English) is interesting, or whether he is promoting it facetiously. There was some interesting information about the way English has spread around the world, but there was far more to gripe about, especially the uncited, incorrect assertion that computers have reduced traffic in libraries! All along, I was thinking about what the author wasn't addressing, such as the differences between spoken and written language, and the ability to code-switch, or modify your usage according to the situation. I almost lost it when he finally made that point on the last two pages of the book, in a mostly tongue-in-cheek section that gave the ten easy lessons advertised in the title. Had those points been addressed earlier and throughout the text, it would have been a much more sophisticated discussion of the topic.
June 6, 2012
Amglish is, like, funny yet insightful. Arthur Rowse has used humor quite well to get his points across, but this is also a very serious look at how we Americans use language in everyday life. While I try to use good American grammar when writing, I will usually opt for vernacular when speaking just like most Americans. And I absolutely agree with Mr. Rowse on the importance of Lesson Ten, whether applying for a job, talking to a judge, or explaining things to children. This is a book I would recommend to every teacher of English. Also, John Doherty's caricatures are spot on.
June 18, 2012
Short and entertaining, but there were a few historical errors. Janet Jackson's wardrobe malfunction was in 2004, not 2001. George H. W. Bush's "line in the sand" comment on Kuwait was in August of 1990, not November of 1991. I also disagree that the movie Clueless invented the word "whatever".
I literally LOL'd when it referred to Bill Clinton as a cunning linguist when he questioned the meaning of the word "is," though. So extra points for that.
I literally LOL'd when it referred to Bill Clinton as a cunning linguist when he questioned the meaning of the word "is," though. So extra points for that.
October 7, 2012
If this is the first time you have ever encountered the notion that English is all over the world and is changing as a result (and that some folks don't really like this), then you might find this book much more interesting than I did. The book is fine, but no real new information here, at least not for me. Also, there a few factual errors, but they don't really invalidate the overall thrust of the book.
September 22, 2012
The first 100 pages attracted me very much with the author's witty comments and interesting anecdotes from daily life; the last 100 pages were very dry, boring and factual, which I skipped a dozen pages to avoid the monotony and boredness. In general, it is interesting to those who love language but boring and dull for those who aren't so into language. It did not take me a long time to finish, but I don't want to read it again.
July 30, 2012
The descriptions of different "lishes" at the end of the book--Konglish, Spanglish, Franglais, and many others--were what drew me to buy this book. It's also a pretty awesome, accessible guide to the concept of language change.
May 29, 2012
I appreciated the author's passion for his subject. I'm a big fan of the fun to be had with the mother tongue myself. But Mr. Rowse seems to be about as tone-deaf on the topic as my own last sentence!
February 20, 2012
This totally LOL look at how we speak was, like, GR8! Some1 must've spent lots of time observating slang speach patterns from, like, all over--and not just in this country. Check it out.
May 28, 2013
this just didn't capture my attention for very long. I'm declaring it finished, but if someday I find my electronic copy and have nothing better to read I may return to it.
August 9, 2012
An interesting idea and the writing itself is often clever. But I found all the tiny snippets somewhat distracting.
July 1, 2014
It is a very interesting book. It sheds new light on the fast changing world of the English language, American English.
never-finished
May 30, 2015Interesting topic, but the book itself seemed repetitive and unorganized.
Want to read
January 20, 2012Downloaded from NetGalley, courtesy of Rowman & Littlefield Publishers Inc.
Did not finish
February 22, 2017The subject is interesting...the book, not so much. DNF@25%
Displaying 1 - 17 of 17 reviews