Watching TV with a Linguist
In Watching TV with a Linguist, Fägersten challenges the conventional view of television as lowbrow entertainment devoid of intellectual activity. Rather, she champions the use of fictional television to learn about linguistics and at the same time promotes enriched television viewing experiences by explaining the role of language in creating humor, conveying drama, and developing identifiable characters. The essays gathered in this volume explore specific areas of linguistics, providing a comprehensive yet accessible introduction to the study of language. Through programs such as Seinfeld, The Simpsons, Sherlock, and The Wire, contributors deftly illustrate key linguistic concepts and terminology using snippets of familiar dialogue and examples of subtle narration. In addition, contributors aim to raise linguistic awareness among readers by identifying linguistics in action, encouraging readers to recognize additional examples of concepts on their own. To this end, each chapter provides suggestions for viewing other television series or specific episodes, where further examples of the linguistic concepts in focus can be found. Invaluable as a resource in linguistics and communication courses, Watching TV with a Linguist is the first book to use the familiar and compelling medium of television to engage students with the science of language.
1123773295
Watching TV with a Linguist
In Watching TV with a Linguist, Fägersten challenges the conventional view of television as lowbrow entertainment devoid of intellectual activity. Rather, she champions the use of fictional television to learn about linguistics and at the same time promotes enriched television viewing experiences by explaining the role of language in creating humor, conveying drama, and developing identifiable characters. The essays gathered in this volume explore specific areas of linguistics, providing a comprehensive yet accessible introduction to the study of language. Through programs such as Seinfeld, The Simpsons, Sherlock, and The Wire, contributors deftly illustrate key linguistic concepts and terminology using snippets of familiar dialogue and examples of subtle narration. In addition, contributors aim to raise linguistic awareness among readers by identifying linguistics in action, encouraging readers to recognize additional examples of concepts on their own. To this end, each chapter provides suggestions for viewing other television series or specific episodes, where further examples of the linguistic concepts in focus can be found. Invaluable as a resource in linguistics and communication courses, Watching TV with a Linguist is the first book to use the familiar and compelling medium of television to engage students with the science of language.
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Overview

In Watching TV with a Linguist, Fägersten challenges the conventional view of television as lowbrow entertainment devoid of intellectual activity. Rather, she champions the use of fictional television to learn about linguistics and at the same time promotes enriched television viewing experiences by explaining the role of language in creating humor, conveying drama, and developing identifiable characters. The essays gathered in this volume explore specific areas of linguistics, providing a comprehensive yet accessible introduction to the study of language. Through programs such as Seinfeld, The Simpsons, Sherlock, and The Wire, contributors deftly illustrate key linguistic concepts and terminology using snippets of familiar dialogue and examples of subtle narration. In addition, contributors aim to raise linguistic awareness among readers by identifying linguistics in action, encouraging readers to recognize additional examples of concepts on their own. To this end, each chapter provides suggestions for viewing other television series or specific episodes, where further examples of the linguistic concepts in focus can be found. Invaluable as a resource in linguistics and communication courses, Watching TV with a Linguist is the first book to use the familiar and compelling medium of television to engage students with the science of language.

Product Details

ISBN-13: 9780815653950
Publisher: Syracuse University Press
Publication date: 09/09/2016
Series: Television and Popular Culture
Sold by: Barnes & Noble
Format: eBook
File size: 3 MB

About the Author

Kristy Beers Fägersten is associate professor of English linguistics at Södertörn University in Sweden. She is the author of Who’s Swearing Now? The Social Aspects of Conversational Swearing.

Table of Contents

List of Illustrations Acknowledgments Abbreviations Introduction: The Linguist's View of Television Kristy Beers Fägersten 1. Watching the Detective: Sherlock and Spoken Television Discourse Kay Richardson 2. Dealers and Discourse: Sociolinguistic Variation in The Wire Joe Trotta 3. "Back in St. Olaf . . ." Regional Variation in The Golden Girls Jean Ann 4. SaMANtha: Language and Gender in Sex and the City Kristy Beers Fägersten and Hanna Sveen 5. The Pragmatics Explication: Making Sense of Nerds in The Big Bang Theory Matthias Eitelmann and Ulrike Stange 6. Cunning Linguistics: The Semantics of Word Play in South Park Michael Percillier 7. Word Formation in HIMYM Jessie Sams 8. What's the Deal with Morphemes? Doing Morphology with Seinfeld Kristy Beers Fägersten 9. Channel Surfing: Tuning into the Sounds of English Kristy Beers Fägersten 10. Syntax in Seattle Gülsat Aygen 11. I'm Learneding! First Language Acquisition in The Simpsons Kristy Beers Fägersten 12. Lost and Language Found Kristy Beers Fägersten and Ilaria Fiorentini 13. The One Based on 738,032 Words: Language Use in the Friends-corpus Paulo Quaglio Appendix A: WMatrix Grammatical Tags Appendix B: WMatrix Semantic Tags Glossary Contributors Index

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Provides a comprehensive introduction to linguistics

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