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 . '/' . substr('9781560256649',-6,3) . '/' . '9781560256649' . '.jpg'; ?>)
By Marc Cooper
By Andy Borowitz
$9.95
$35
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Fanboy30 (CC BY-NC-SA 2.0)
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By Rebecca Solnit, TomDispatch —
We often speak as though the source of so many of our problems is complex and even mysterious. I’m not sure it is. You can blame it all on greed: the refusal to do anything about climate change, the attempts by the .01% to destroy our democracy, the constant robbing of the poor, the resultant starving children, the war against most of what is beautiful on this Earth.
Posted on Oct 30, 2012
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Photo illustration from an image by Colin Grey (CC-BY)
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In this edition of Truthdig Radio in association with KPFK: Ms. magazine Executive Editor Kathy Spillar on Todd Akin and friends; Pussy Riot; keeping native languages alive; and the enduring impact of war on women.
Posted on Aug 27, 2012
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In this edition of Truthdig Radio in association with KPFK: Ms. magazine Executive Editor Kathy Spillar on Todd Akin and friends; Pussy Riot; Syria; keeping native languages alive; and the enduring impact of war on women.
Posted on Aug 27, 2012
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Schröder+Schömbs (CC-BY-ND)
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According to journalism prof Ted Gup, the prevalence of the word “like” in youth-speak is evidence that teachers have “condemned children to a common cluster of mediocrity.” But as linguist Geoffrey Nunberg pointed out a decade ago, “like” isn’t a tic or filler, it’s “a word with a point of view.” (more)
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AP
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By Chris Hedges — The corporate state does not have a Politburo or raving dictator, but it shares one aspect with despotic regimes and the collapsed empires that have plagued human history.
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AP / Manu Fernandez
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With the world economy still wallowing in crisis and social services being cut across poor and rich nations alike, it’s not surprising that the winner of Merriam-Webster’s annual “Top Ten Words of the Year” for 2010 is … austerity.
Posted on Dec 26, 2010
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On today’s list: Speaking more than one language can delay Alzheimer’s, literary tattoos, why they hate us (hint: it’s not our freedom), and Barbie goes geek.
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Today on the list: Afghanistan on life support, obsessing over punctuation, and how the Supreme Court (kind of) legalized bribery.
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It’s not entirely clear what, besides a love of linguistics and an apparently compelling documentary, spurred young Guillaume Leduey to launch a one-man campaign to resuscitate an Alaskan language, Eyak ... (continued)
Posted on Aug 9, 2010
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Fake News by Andy Borowitz —
Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin defended her use of the word refudiate, telling her critics, “Look it up in the fictionary.” While claiming that refudiate is a real word, she reserved her right to make up new words in the future.
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Move over, George W. Bush, there’s a new language butcher and she’s on a tear. Sarah Palin loved her made-up word refudiate so much she used it twice—first in an interview and again on Twitter. Realizing she blew it, Palin corrected the word to refute but then used it incorrectly. Eventually, she compared herself to William Shakespeare and called it a day.
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Why do Americans refuse to believe crime has been going down for a decade? Why are so many of them foot fetishists? And was Rene “I think, therefore I am” Descartes really murdered with a poisoned communion wafer? Answers to these questions and more on today’s list.
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Is it time to remodel Stonehenge? Is M. Night Shyamalan’s latest movie a whitewash? Will the U.S. and China ever go to war? Answers to these questions and more on today’s list.
Posted on Feb 11, 2010
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Look out for those TSA body scanners and cell phones, take a minute to ponder the oddest book titles of the year (including “Bacon: A Love Story”) and read all about the political collapse of the left, right here on today’s list.
Posted on Feb 8, 2010
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By Fred Branfman — Should progressives hold themselves to a higher standard than the name-calling and intellectual violence that conservative bloggers routinely engage in? Much could rest on the answer to this question.
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colbertnation.com
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Can you tell your metaphors from your synecdoches? These terms may trigger bad freshman English flashbacks, but at least when it comes to metaphors, they’re more important than you might think; in fact, they might just be intrinsic to how you think.
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AP / Mohammed Ballas
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By Chris Hedges — Those who seek to dominate our behavior first seek to dominate our speech. They seek to obscure meaning. The English- and Arabic-speaking worlds are each beset with a similar assault on language.
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White House / Shealah Craighead
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The conservative New York Times columnist, Nixon speechwriter and college dropout lost a battle with pancreatic cancer Sunday. In his final opinion column for The Times, Safire wrote about mortality and his intention to reinvent himself at 75.
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news.bbc.co.uk
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In a continuation of the decades-long struggle between the Spanish government and those calling for independence of the Basque territories, a car bomb went off near a Bilbao television station Wednesday. No one was injured in the blast, which authorities believe was set off by the ETA, a militant Basque independence group.
Posted on Dec 31, 2008
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AP photo / Tina Fineberg
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By Chris Hedges — The change from a print-based to an image-based society has transformed our nation. All the traditional tools of democracies, including dispassionate scientific and historical truth, facts, news and rational debate, are useless instruments in a world that lacks the capacity to use them.
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Flickr / Photo Mojo
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Speaking over the phone to Philadelphia’s WHYY, Bill Clinton defended his controversial comments following the South Carolina primary, saying the Obama campaign had played the race card against him. After the interview, apparently neglecting to hang up, the former president could be heard using language not normally aired on public radio: “I don’t think I should take any s—- from anybody on that, do you?” Update: Denial.
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German Chancellor Angela Merkel is scheduled to speak before the Israeli Knesset to underscore her country’s strong ties with Israel, but at least one aspect of her visit is already causing controversy. Merkel will address the Israeli parliament in German.
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By Marie Cocco — The English language won’t be done in by the influx of Latin Americans. To see the fallacy of this warning, just take a little look at American history.
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By Eugene Robinson — One need only listen to the president’s definition of success in Iraq to appreciate the value of a full and immediate withdrawal.
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Lake Superior State University has recommended the banishment of 16 words and phrases from the English language, including “Brangelina” and “ask your doctor.” The annual list targets expressions that are irritating, overused or generally ill-applied.
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By Jabari Asim — Va. Sen. George Allen, who has a history of racist behavior, incomprehensibly wants us to believe that his opponent is no better—because he has written novels whose characters use racist language.
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Illustration: Karen Spector
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By Sam Harris — The bestselling secularist author of “The End of Faith” delivers a scathing review of “The Language of God,” a new book by Human Genome Project head Francis Collins that attempts to demonstrate a harmony between science and evangelical Christianity.
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Attorney General Alberto Gonzales claims that Bush has never supported making English the national language, but White House Press Secretary Tony Snow just said the opposite. (And the Senate just voted to make it so.)
Posted on May 19, 2006
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House Republican leaders have stripped a pending bill of language that would require lobbyists to disclose their fundraising activities and contacts with lawmakers.
Posted on Apr 24, 2006
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Now that 48,000 boxes of Arabic-language Iraqi documents captured in Iraq have hit the web, armchair analysts have their work cut out for them.
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China wants to raise the number of foreigners studying Mandarin to 100 million by 2010. | story
So-called Confucius Institutes are popping up all over the world to teach the language. | story
Posted on Jan 11, 2006
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Kindergartners to learn Arabic, Farsi, Chinese. | more
Posted on Jan 5, 2006
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Too Soon to Tell: The Case for Hope, Continued
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