The 100 Words That Make the English

by TonyThorne (Author)

• New

  Paperback
  2011

  $22.58

  Englishness is an ancient and powerful concept, but no one seems sure exactly what it means in the twenty-first century. In exploring our national identity, Tony Thorne has compiled a fascinating compendium of the hundred words and phrases that have become the cornerstones of modern English, and have been used - sometimes deliberately, but often inadvertently - to stake out our common ground, to define what makes us essentially English, and thus different from those beastly foreigners who lurk just off our shores.

• Used

  Hardcover
  2009

  $4.24

  JOLLY WICKED ACTUALLY is a wonderfully entertaining compendium of the hundred words and phrases that have over the last century become the cornerstones of modern spoken English, and have been used - sometimes deliberately, but often inadvertently - to stake out the common identity that unites the English, to define what makes us who we are, and thus different from those beastly foreigners who lurk just off our shores. Despite attempts by politicians and writers, despite lessons in citizenship enshrined in the national curriculum, we have famously never been able to define for posterity precisely what Englishness is. JOLLY WICKED ACTUALLY takes certain well-loved and crucial expressions such as sorry, nice, common, posh, cuppa, and chippy, explores their strange and wonderful origins, and demonstrates with wit and charm how they are emblems of an era or an attitude, of a heritage and of the traits and quirks essential to all our notions of Englishness.