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Talk Is Cheap: Sarcasm, Alienation, and the Evolution of Language
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Talk Is Cheap: Sarcasm, Alienation, and the Evolution of Language Paperback - 1998

by John Haiman

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From the publisher

Putting aside questions of truth and falsehood, the old "talk is cheap" maxim carries as much weight as ever. Indeed, perhaps more. For one need not be an expert in irony or sarcasm to realize that people don't necessarily mean what they say. Phrases such as "Yeah, right" and "I couldn't care less" are so much a part of the way we speak--and the way we live--that we are more likely to notice when they are absent (for example, Forrest Gump). From our everyday dialogues and conversations ("Thanks a lot!") to the screenplays of our popular films (Pulp Fiction and Fargo), what is said is frequently very different from what is meant.

Talk is Cheap begins with this telling observation and proceeds to argue that such "unplain speaking" is fundamentally embedded in the way we now talk. Author John Haiman traces this sea-change in our use of language to the emergence of a postmodern "divided self" who is hyper-conscious that what he or she is saying has been said before; "cheap talk" thus allows us to distance ourselves from a social role with which we are uncomfortable. Haiman goes on to examine the full range of these pervasive distancing mechanisms, from clichs and quotation marks to camp and parody. Also, and importantly, this text highlights several new ways in which the English language is evolving (and has evolved) in response to our postmodern world view. In other words, this study shows us how what we are saying is gradually separating itself from how we say it.

As provocative as it is timely, the book will be fascinating reading for students of linguistics, literature, communication, anthropology, philosophy, and popular culture.

Details

  • Title Talk Is Cheap: Sarcasm, Alienation, and the Evolution of Language
  • Author John Haiman
  • Binding Paperback
  • Pages 232
  • Volumes 1
  • Language ENG
  • Publisher Oxford University Press, Cary, North Carolina, U.S.A.
  • Publication date 1998-03-26
  • ISBN 9780195115253 / 0195115252
  • Weight 0.8 lbs (0.36 kg)
  • Dimensions 9.16 x 6.09 x 0.73 in (23.27 x 15.47 x 1.85 cm)
  • Reading level 1370
  • Category Language Arts / Linguistics / Literacy
  • Library of Congress subjects Language and languages - Philosophy, Semantics
  • Library of Congress Catalogue Number 9600040140
  • Dewey Decimal Code 401

About the author


John Haiman is a Professor of Linguistics at Macalester College in St. Paul, Minnesota. He has written several books about language, including The Rhaeto-Romance Languages (co-author, 1992) and Natural Syntax (1985).
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