"A wide-ranging account of American English, Speaking American investigates the history and continuing evolution of our language from the sixteenth century to the present. The book is organized in half-century segments around influential centers: Chesapeake Bay (1600-1650), Boston (1650-1700), Charleston (1700-1750), Philadelphia (1750-1800), New Orleans (1800-1850), New York (1850-1900), Chicago (1900-1950), Los Angeles (1950-2000), and Cyberspace (2000-present). Each of these places has added new words, new inflections, new ways of speaking to the elusive, boisterous, ever-changing linguistic experiment that is American English. Freed from British constraints of unity and propriety, swept up in rapid social change, restless movement, and a thirst for innovation, Americans have always been eager to invent new words, from earthy frontier expressions like 'catawampously' (vigorously) and 'bung-nipper' (pickpocket), to West African words introduced by slaves such as 'goober' (peanut) and 'gumbo' (okra), to urban slang such as 'tagging' (spraying graffiti) and 'crew' (gang). Throughout, Bailey focuses on how people speak and how speakers change the language." -- From the Publisher.