1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910790093803321

Autore

Halliday Fred

Titolo

Shocked and awed : how the war on terror and Jihad have changed the English language / / by Fred Halliday

Pubbl/distr/stampa

London ; ; New York : , : I.B. Tauris, , 2010

ISBN

0-7556-1439-9

0-7556-1059-8

1-283-04827-2

9786613048271

0-85771-875-4

Edizione

[First edition.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (354 p.)

Disciplina

303.6250321

Soggetti

English language

English language - New words

Jihad

Language and international relations

Linguistic change

War on Terrorism, 2001-2009 - Language

Language: history & general works

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Description based upon print version of record.

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Contents; Publisher's Note; Introduction; Chapter 1. 9/11, US Intelligence and Counterterrorism; Chapter 2. Motifs of Jihad: Terrorist Group, Armed Actions and the Imagery of Osama bib Laden; Chapter 3. Extraordinary Renditions: Abduction, Abuse and Torture; Chapter 4. The Wars in Afghanistan and Iraq; Chapter 5. Some Islamic and Middle Eastern Vocabulary; Chapter 6. Images of Muslims: Stereotypes, Insults, Self-Perceptions; Chapter 7. Palestine and Israel: 'Holy Land' and Other Inventions; Chapter 8. From 'Collateral Damage' to 'Mowing the Lawn': The Euphemisms of War

Chapter 9. 'Bad Guys', 'Circular Firing Squad', 'Slum Dunk': The Vitality of US ColloquialChapter 10. Spaces, Real and Imagined; Chapter 11. Obscuring Responsability: Euphemisms, Circumlocutions and Vagaries



of 'Exculpatory Passive'; Chapter 12. Some Other Distortions: History, Politics and International Relations; Acknowledgements; Note on Transliteration, Standardisation and Abbreviation; Works Consulted; Index

Sommario/riassunto

"Far more than just a military conflict, the 'War on Terror' has been a struggle over values and meanings, a desperate contest for hearts and minds in which language has become its battlefield. In this highly original book, Fred Halliday takes us on a tour of this new war-zone, its artillery and trenches, minefields and booby-traps. Drawing on years of painstaking collation, Halliday shows how the 'War on Terror' has brought us not just new words and acronyms, such as 'Gitmo' and 'IED', and new imports, such as 'jihad' and 'Salafi', but also new - and distinctly sinister - ways of using existing language, such as 'extraordinary rendition' and 'enhanced interrogation techniques'. Halliday chronicles the use and development of all the neologisms produced by the 'War on Terror', and examines the underlying dynamics driving them. He argues that the increased use of everyday words from Arabic, for example, reflects not only increased interest in the Arab world but also hostility to it, a sense that its reference points are 'untranslatable' in our own culture. Scanning the pock-marked semantic landscape of the post 9/11 world, he uncovers hidden twists of phrasing and word associations which in themselves tell a story about the violent clash of ideologies that has marked the opening of the 21st century. Part indispensable reference, part polemic, part entertaining snapshot of our times, Shocked and Awed is a bristling arsenal of the 21st century's most potent weapons: Words."--Bloomsbury Publishing.