Summary: In this program, Robert MacNeil heads to California to take part in meaningful dialogues on Spanglish, Chicano, Ebonics, and "Surfer Dude" before going to Seattle to consider the implications of voice-activation technology. Linguist Carmen Fought, Stanford University's Cliff Nass, screenwriters Amy Heckerling and Winnie Holtzman, and others speak their minds about Spanish in America, why teens...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
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Summary: In this program, Robert MacNeil canvasses the North to learn firsthand about linguistic dialect zones, the tension between prescriptivism and descriptivism, the impact of dialect on grapholect, the northern cities vowel shift, the roots of African-American English, minority dialects and linguistic profiling, biases against nonstandard speech, and the general perception of the U.S. Midland...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program follows Robert MacNeil down the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers to Appalachia, Louisiana Cajun country, and the Tex-Mex border to examine Southern dialects and accents and the influences of French and Spanish on American English. Linguist Walt Wolfram, columnist Molly Ivins, pop country singer Cody James, and others talk about regional differences in vernacular, the steady displacement...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2005
View online at AVOD
Mercieca, Jennifer R.
Summary: "Political communication expert Jennifer Mercieca shows how the Trump campaign expertly used the common rhetorical techniques of a demagogue, a word with two contradictory definitions--"a leader who makes use of popular prejudices and false claims and promises in order to gain power" or "a leader championing the cause of the common people in ancient times" (Merriam-Webster, 2019). These...
Format: text
Publisher / Publication Date: Texas A&M University Press 2020
Copies Available at Woodmere
1 available in Adult Non-fiction, Call number: 973.933 MERSummary: When Massasoit hailed the Plymouth settlers in their own language, they might have taken it for a sign that English would dominate the New World. Packed with surprising etymologies and intriguing stories, this program traces the dynamic relationship between English and America, exploring the linguistic influence of westward expansion, cowboy culture, slave culture, and encounters with the...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Has any single person shaped English more than William Shakespeare? This program uses unparalleled access to some of the greatest English texts, including the first English dictionary and a rare first folio of Shakespeare's plays, to illustrate the great Bard's influence. John Barton, honorary associate director of the Royal Shakespeare Company, discusses the sound and accessibility of...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program follows English through the 18th and 19th centuries, from attempts at reforming and standardizing the tongue in the Age of Reason to the soaring verse of Romanticism and the verbal prudishness of the Victorian era. Linguistic milestones are highlighted by original editions of critical texts, including Newton's Opticks, Samuel Johnson's Dictionary of the English Language, Thomas...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: In late-medieval England, English quietly ousted French in law and government- but the move to make it God's language meant bloodshed. This program looks at the battle for a Bible in English, a struggle with huge impact on the language itself. Dramatic readings from successive English Bibles show the language's evolution. Location footage and original manuscripts illustrate key figures and...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: This program explores how America's rise as an economic power made it the driving force behind the spread of English in the 20th century. A world tour illustrates how English has mixed with other languages-from "Franglais" in France to "Singlish" in Singapore-and how the dollar's power, coupled with the lure of consumerism, has made English the international trade language. Bringing it full...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: With the Norman invasion, English became a third language in its own country, behind French and Latin. In this program, Melvyn Bragg examines the impact of Old French on the development of English. Manuscripts, tapestries, and dozens of curious etymologies help illustrate a tremendous influx of vocabulary pertaining to romance, chivalry, and, of course, food. The influence of Eleanor of...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Amok, "boomerang," "bungalow," "bangle," "dumdum," "plonk," "assassin"-these are some of the many words that have entered English by way of colonial expansion. This program explores how the British Empire in its heyday exported its language around the globe and how different forms of speech and vocabulary, as well as different attitudes to English, developed out of that colonial expansion. Rich...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: English is a language spoken by two billion people, perhaps even more. This classic PBS program examines the prevalence of English in the world today and presents a historical overview of its rise. Focusing on the expansion of the British Empire and the emergence of English-language mass media, the program explains how widespread English usage survived Britain's post-WWII decolonization,...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
View online at AVOD
Summary: The Irish experience reflects two language traditions, English and Gaelic. This classic PBS program shows how English was first established in Ireland in the 17th century and how, in cases of violent cultural conflict, language can function as a weapon. Exploring the west of Ireland today, the program identifies traces of Irish Celtic culture, despite the historical decline of the Gaelic...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
View online at AVOD
Summary: As the landscape of the New World awakened England's imagination, so did a new landscape of words-in the English of William Shakespeare and the King James Bible. This classic PBS program describes the spread of English to North America and explains how Shakespeare's prodigious vocabulary filled the language with startling new words, phrases, and constructions. Recording strong echoes of...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
View online at AVOD
Summary: In the 19th century, English spread throughout the British Empire-but which English? This classic PBS program traces the roots of white Commonwealth English to Cockney, the language of London's working class. Explaining the influence of Cockney on modern, standardized speech, the program shows how, in fact, the accents of BBC English are gradually becoming modified by Cockney speech...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
View online at AVOD
Summary: Will standard English, as it was known in the 20th century, disappear? Will English continue as the global tongue, or will its numerous varieties become, as offshoots of Latin did, a host of mutually unintelligible languages? This classic PBS program features new varieties of English that have transcended British and American influence. The program focuses on some of the most successful...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
View online at AVOD
Summary: The Scottish tongue is one of the oldest in Britain, a Northern variety of English that, but for the accidents of history, might have become a separate language. This classic PBS program deals with the influence of the Scots in spreading the language of their historic enemies-the Sassenachs of the South-around the world. The program begins in the 15th century, the golden age of the Scottish...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
View online at AVOD
Summary: The making of English is the story of three great invasions and a cultural revolution. This classic PBS program shows how an early form of English was carried to Britain by invading Anglo-Saxons, how that language was all but obliterated by waves of Viking settlers, and how it was reshaped by the French-speaking Normans. The fact that English survived on the lips of people who left no written...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
View online at AVOD
Summary: Melvyn Bragg begins the story of English in Holland, finding ancestral echoes in the Frisian dialect. What follows is a chapter on survival as the English language weathers Viking and Norman invasions, vying with and eventually absorbing rival tongues. Lively settings such as village pubs and markets bring home the lasting influence of Anglo-Saxon, Old Norse, and Old French. The connection...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2006
View online at AVOD
Summary: Both westward expansion and 19th-century immigration affected the development of a uniquely American English. This classic PBS program tells the story of that burgeoning dialect, from the Revolutionary War to the 1920s. Beginning with the Declaration of Independence, the program depicts the determination of American radicals-dictionary author Noah Webster among them-to achieve linguistic as...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007
View online at AVOD
Summary: Gullah-the African-influenced dialect of Georgia's Sea Islands-has undergone few changes since the first slave ships landed 300 years ago, and provides a clear window into the shaping of African-American English. This classic PBS program traces that story from the west coast of Africa through the American South, then to large northern cities in the 1920s. Studying the origins of West African...
Format: software, multimedia
Publisher / Publication Date: Films Media Group 2007