Hip Replacement: Lesson One

“In a soldier’s stance, I aimed my hand
at the mongrel dogs who teach . . .”
                                      — Bob Dylan, My Back Pages (1964)

English, like every other living language, constantly evolves. Every utterance holds the promise of change: a new take, a fresh twist, an old word with a new meaning, or a neatly turned phrase that nudges the language, and the people who speak it, in a new direction. This is Donald Trump in the ’80s: “You have to think anyway, so why not think big?”

New words are created all the time. The verb “mansplain,” coined less than a decade ago, describes a practice at least twice as old: when a man explains something, a new word, say, to a woman in a condescending manner. And, of course, words just disappear. I haven’t heard “tergiversation” since William Safire died. Some words are like mayflies, here and gone. A word used only once is called an “onanym,” which, appropriately, is one.

As changes accumulate, the distance between the old and new versions of the language grows and the older version gradually becomes dated, then archaic, and, eventually, incomprehensible. Read Beowulf. (Or consider that less than 60 years ago we elected a president named “Dick.”)

The sound of English changes, too. Its phonological components, such as tone, pitch, timbre, and even melody, change. If you learned American English, the North American dialect of Modern English, scores of years ago, as I did, you have heard many such changes and, while you can probably understand the current version, provided the slang isn’t too dense, you probably cannot reproduce its sound.

This, then, is a music lesson of sorts, designed to help you, my fellow older American, replicate the sounds of what we will call Post-Modern English, or PME, the successor to American English. Not the slang, mind you, but the sound of it, the music. If you are wondering why you should bother, reflect on this: you wouldn’t parade around in public wearing the same clothes that you wore as a child, would you? Of course not, because fashion changes and we should change with it, provided that we do it in an unaffected way. Choosing to update the sound of your English is as sensible as hanging up your coonskin cap. One must make an effort to ensure that one’s outfit looks snatched, after all.

The lesson includes a short passage from a radio broadcast I heard that contains many of the phonological changes that American English has undergone during the past several decades. While I managed to jot it down, I couldn’t get a copy of the audio. No matter. You can tune into any pop radio station and listen to the banter of the DJs. They are first-rate role models for Post-Modern English. (Dakota Fanning is not. I heard her interviewed on NPR, and to my ear she sounded like nothing so much as the valedictorian at a finishing school graduation, circa 1940. To be fair, NPR features many guests, and hosts, for that matter, whose mastery of PME is just totally awesome.)

Ready? There are five parts. The first reveals the essence of Post-Modern English, so that you will know how to comport yourself when speaking it. The second will help you adjust your vocal cords to the proper register. The third comprises ten exercises drawn from the transcript of that radio broadcast. The fourth alerts you to a few problems you may encounter once you have mastered PME, and suggests practical solutions. The fifth and final part will put American English where it belongs: in the rear-view mirror. Just as Professor Higgins taught Miss Eliza Doolittle to drop the cockney and pass as posh, so I will teach you to drop your stodgy American English and sound cool. By the end of this linguistic makeover you will sound like a real hep cat. (The spellchecker just underlined “hep.” Bastards.)

* * *

Part One: The Essence

As French is the language of love and German is the language of Nietzsche, Post-Modern English is the language of wimps.

(Just now, you may have jumped to the conclusion that the word “wimps” was deployed in the previous sentence as a pejorative. It was not. It was chosen because it is the word that best embodies the defining characteristics of Post-Modern English. If you’ll bear with me, I think you’ll come to agree.)

When a French woman explains a line from Also Sprach Zarathustra,she sounds as if she were flirting. When a German man puts the moves on a fräulein in a dimly lit hotel bar, he sounds as if he were explaining how to change the oil in a diesel engine. Let us stipulate that the French woman is not a flirt and the German man is not a mechanic. It doesn’t matter; their languages make them sound that way. And when a fluent speaker of Post-Modern English asks you to move your car because he’s been boxed in, he sounds like a puppy that has just peed on your white carpet. He may not be a wimp, but he sure does sounds like one. It is simply the case that each of these languages, at least when heard by Americans of a certain age, creates a vivid impression of the speaker. It is no more complicated than that. So why does the American guy sound like such a wimp?

At the core of Post-Modern English are two directives that determine not just the attitude but also the moral stance that its speakers assume as they turn to face the oncoming challenges of the modern world. These two directives, sometimes called the Twin Primes, preempt both the laws enacted by governments and the commandments handed down by ancient religions. (Practically, this means that in the event of a conflict between any of those laws or commandments and either of these two directives, it is the latter that will be adhered to, not the laws of God and man, all other things being equal.) You may have heard one or both of the Twin Primes invoked when a speaker of Post-Modern English suspects a violation has occurred in the vicinity.

The First Directive is “Don’t judge.” The Second is “Don’t be a dick.”

How, you may be asking yourself, could two such sensible and straightforward prohibitions make millions of people sound wimpy? Enforced separately, they probably couldn’t, but enforced together, they lay a paradoxical trap that can make even the straightest spine go all wobbly.

Step by step, now. To judge others is considered rude in Post-Modern English, especially if the judgment is thought to be harsh. A person who judges others in this way and then communicates that judgment to those being judged is often referred to as a dick. If, for example, you saw someone who was judging others and, in a completely sincere attempt to be helpful, you said to that person, “Don’t be a dick,” you would have, in effect, not only made a judgment about that person’s behavior, but also communicated it to that person in a harsh way. By definition, then, by telling this person that he has behaved badly, you yourself would have strayed off the reservation to which PME speakers have agreed to confine themselves, and would have become the very thing that you have judged so harshly: a dick.

Now, Post-Modern English speakers are not stupid. They are aware of this trap and, not wishing to be hoist with their own petards, do what any reasonable person would do. Not only do they rarely call other people “dicks,” but they fall all over themselves to avoid any communication that can be interpreted as passing judgment on others. Simple statements about mundane matters are qualified and watered down so that the likelihood of giving offense is minimized. Explanations are inflected to sound like questions, apologies, or cries for help. Commonplace opinions are framed semi-ironically, often attached to the word “like,” so that they can be retracted at the first sign of disagreement. This feature of the language is called “ironic deniability.” It also allows one to blame irony when the real culprit is stupidity.

As a result, fluent PME speakers, when compared with speakers of earlier forms of American English, sound more uncertain, unassertive, and nonjudgmental. To put it bluntly, they sound more sheepish. Not because they are, you understand, any more than the French woman was flirtatious. It is just that the rules of the language have prodded them, bleating, into the chute that leads inescapably to the waiting tub of dip. In short, to avoid being dicks, they end up being wimps.

Wake up, old son, and smell the nitro coffee. In this brave new world, wimpiness is cool.

And that, my crusty-but-benign student, is all you need to know. You don’t need a dissertation on the cultural and historical forces that forged this pained linguistic posture; all you need is to imitate its cringe as you complete the lesson ahead and go on to achieve fluency in Post-Modern English. Here’s an aspirational commandment: “Thou shalt be cool.” You can do this. It’s goals.

Part Two: The Vocal Register

Please say, “So, that’s pretty much it, right?” in your normal 20th century voice. OK? Now say it again, but make the pitch of your voice as low as you can.

How’d it go? When you lowered the pitch, did you hear a sizzle, a popping sound, like bacon frying? No? Try again, as low as it will go. Once you’ve achieved this effect, I’ll give you the backstory.

Ready? That sizzle is the sound of liquid burbling around your slackened vocal cords. As you may have noticed, this register, often called vocal fry, has been growing in popularity during the past few decades.

In the 1987 movie Made in Heaven, Debra Winger played the archangel Emmett, God’s right-hand man, who was supposed to be a chain-smoker. As Ms. Winger was not, she had to simulate a smoker’s voice for the part, serendipitously producing a pitch-perfect proto-vocal fry. While this early mutation event does not appear to have lodged in the inheritable DNA of the language, it is fascinating in the same way that the Lost Colony of Roanoke is.

Vocal fry’s current run on the linguistic hit parade is more likely to have begun when Britney Spears croaked “Baby One More Time” in 1998, although it is occasionally said that the real patient zero was someone named Kardashian. Whatever.

Women tend to use vocal fry more than men. A wag on TV once said that women are trying to usurp the authority of the patriarchy by imitating the vocal register of the male. This would be in stark contrast to the southern belle or transvestite, both of whom artificially raise the pitch of their voices, sometimes into falsetto, to enhance the appearance of femininity.

Another theory holds that the phenomenon is simply the result of too much booze and marijuana. For this “Animal House Hypothesis” to be taken seriously, however, it must account for the fact that vocal fry did not present in the ’60s (except briefly in Clarence “Frogman” Henry’s 1956 recording of “Ain’t Got No Home”). Considering that the sound more nearly resembles an audition for the next installment of the Exorcist franchise, isn’t the theory that these bubbling vocal cords were repeatedly sautéed and baked less likely than the much simpler explanation of demonic possession? The smoker’s rasp sounds much drier, anyway.

There has been an effort to dismiss the bubbling as a mere affectation. But ask yourself: what are the odds that a vocalization nearly indistinguishable from Mongolian throat singing will be adopted by millions of young people, simply to strike a pose? I’m just not buying it. The simplest explanation may be best: it was an innocently adopted, thoroughly harmless preteen fad that unexpectedly took root in adolescence and grew into a well-established, widespread adult habit, like picking one’s nose.

We may not know where it came from, and we may not know why it came, but we do know that vocal fry, while not quite the sine qua non of Post-Modern English, sends the loud and clear message, to anyone who happens to be within earshot, that standing here is a proud master of the 21st-century version of American English, gargling spit while speaking. (I seem to recall once seeing something similar being done by a ventriloquist.)

Learn the sounds in the lesson below; sing them with the sizzle above, while acting like a sick toy poodle at the vet’s, and your quest will be over. The Holy Grail of this Elders’ Crusade will be yours: PME fluency. (Oh, and remember: don’t sizzle when you uptalk. You’ll frighten the children.)

Part Three: The Exercises

So, in the 2016 election, Clinton was really sure she would sort of capture the states in the rust belt, but she didn’t. I mean, the turnout there was pretty much deplorable, right?

1. Discourse markers, sometimes called fillers, such as those used above (so, really, sort of, I mean, pretty much, and right), while not integral to either the meaning or the music of Post-Modern English, enhance its aesthetics, signal that the speaker is part of the linguistic in-crowd, and help the speaker sound as if his grip on what he’s saying is less than firm. It gives him wiggle room and makes him seem all squirmy: the Daily Double. Placing fillers in a phrase to best effect calls for a keen ear, rigorous practice, and a constant monitoring of how it is being done by the cool kids.

Beginning immediately, insert at least one filler into each sentence you speak. Yes, it requires self-discipline, but don’t worry; in time, it will become habitual and you will be able to dispense with self-discipline entirely.

There are fillers galore. To gain perspective, note that like, actually, and dude, while still heard, have grown slightly stale.

About ten years ago, like was like ubiquitous. Like it was in like every sentence like three or four times. I mean, it had like metastasized. Then, over the next few years, its rate of use fell by 73%, as though it had gone into remission. Often, when a word or fad becomes a pandemic, it burns itself out. There was a sign on a Mississippi country store: “Live Bait – Nitecrawlers – Cappuccino.” It could be that the overuse of like was deemed uncool by some shadowy teen language tribunal and labeled a bad habit, like smoking tobacco. But as with that addiction, many found it impossible to go cold turkey. You’ve probably heard of Nicorette,a gum used by smokers trying to ease withdrawal. Well, the discourse markers sort of, kind of, you know, I mean, and pretty much have been the linguistic Nicorette to millions of like addicts trying to kick the habit. Some former addicts have resorted to saying kinda-sorta. They are sincere in their belief that this constitutes an evolutionary step forward.

Actually, which often sounds a trifle pompous, has largely been replaced by so in the initial position and right in the final position, as demonstrated in the lesson. It can still be used, but sparingly. Once per minute ought to do it, actually; twice, at most.

In place of dude, try bro, or brah, or bruh, or perhaps you could consider using nothing at all.

In summary, “Actually, I like know what I’m talking about, dude,” compares unfavorably to, “So, that’s pretty much, you know, how it sort of is, brah — I mean, right?” While both sets of words still appear in the lexicon of New English, the latter reflects the more gracile stage of linguistic evolution that has been achieved, and is, therefore, preferred. It sounds more woke, too, doesn’t it, or is that just me?

2. The first two syllables in the word “election” should be mid-range in pitch, and clearly and crisply enunciated, while the final syllable should be lower pitched and slightly drawn out: “shuuun.” (In other applications, the terminal syllable must be uptalked. This will be covered in Lesson Two.) The increase in duration for the final “shun” is mandatory for all words ending in “-tion.” God knows why. But try it again, with a little sizzle: “elek- shuuun.” Nice.

3. “Clinton” should be pronounced “Cli/en” with a glottal stop entirely replacing the medial “nt” consonant blend. Glottal stops are a thing right now. “Mountain” is “mow/en,” and “important” is “impor/ent,” not to be confused with the mid-Atlantic pronunciation “impordent.” (Note that in the go-to example for glottal stops in American English, “mitten” becoming “mi/en,” it is only the “t” sound that is replaced, as it is in “impor/ent.” Replacing the “nt” seems to be the more recent, bolder approach, and is thus more worthy of imitation.) Practice these glottal stops in front of a mirror. To avoid embarrassment, it’s better to practice when you’re alone than to try them out in public before they’ve been thoroughly polished.

4. The word “sure” should not be pronounced like “shirt” without the “t” but rather as “shore,” rhyming with “snore,” with the long “o” and a strongly vocalized “r.” This pronunciation probably hails from Brooklyn, where it had been successfully detained for decades. Similarly, don’t say “toorist,” say, “toarist.” (By George, you’ve got it.) Again, practice. This is hot stuff. Cutting edge. Hundo P.

5. In the word “capture,” the first syllable, “cap,” should be mid-range in pitch and clipped at the end, with a fraction of a second pause before dropping down to the second syllable, “chur,” which must be at a low pitch and slightly drawn out, so that it sounds like the endearing growl of a small dog.

This rule, first promulgated by anonymous Valley Girls back in the eighties, applies to all multi-syllabic words that end in “-ture” and most words of more than one syllable that end in “r.” The amount of fry used in this application has varied over time, and the appropriate level has been the subject of a lively but inconclusive debate. I take the view that it is a matter of personal taste. Experiment with the sizzle; go ahead. Practice with this list: rapture, juncture, fracture, puncture, rupture. Remember: Start high, go low, go long. Grrrr.

6. In “the rust belt,” “the” should be at mid-register pitch, while both “rust” and “belt” should be about five full notes higher. Yes, this is the famous sound of uptalk. The higher pitch of “rust” and “belt” suggests that a question is being asked. The goal is to create the impression that you are checking to see if the listener knows, as you are pretending to know, exactly what the rust belt is. What is desired is the illusion of a simultaneous, unspoken, empathetic interaction of mutual insecurity, something like, “Are you still with me? Am I doing OK?”, evoking at most an instant, tiny nod from the listener and a silent “Yes, I’m still with you, and you’re doing just fine, I think.” Try not to sound too needy. Aim for a subtle patina of clingy insecurity. It’s more credible. No need to ham it up.

Again, it is the legendary Valley Girls who are credited with this classic innovation. Australia recently filed a suit with the International Court of Justice disputing this claim. As if!

Uptalk, like vocal fry, is used by women more than men, and is frowned upon by some, especially when it is “overused” and “exaggerated.” What crap. When it’s used once or twice per sentence, and the high-pitched words don’t pierce the falsetto barrier too often, uptalk reliably contributes to an authentic-sounding PME fluency. While I’ll grant that it may be something of an acquired taste, with practice and patience you’ll come to find its chirping high notes as precious as I do. Uptalk is cool and is likely to remain so. (I suspect that some men avoid uptalk because it makes their mansplaining hilarious.)

7. Then, after “rust belt,” comes a pause, as though the speaker were waiting for some confirmation of comprehension. This is a faux pause. The pause should not be so long that it gives the listener sufficient time to formulate and initiate an inquiry — in this instance, into the actual membership roster of states or cities in the rust belt. The duration of the pause will vary according to the speaker’s assessment of the listener’s level of expertise. Here, the assessment would involve the fields of (a) voter behavior in 2016 and (b) the deindustrialization of the non-Canadian area around the Great Lakes during the past half-century. To use the faux pause correctly, then, refer to this rule of thumb: Low expertise? Short pause. High expertise? Shorter pause. As always, the primary concern should be style, not substance.

8. The words “but she” should be two full steps lower than “belt” (from the fifth to the third), but “didn’t” should be right back at the same pitch as “belt.” That’s right, another dose of uptalk.

To master the technique, the novice should start by uptalking at least 50 times a day. When I was starting out, I kept a pencil stub and a little note pad in my shirt pocket to tally up my uses of uptalk during the course of the day with neatly crosshatched bundles of five. You might want to give it a try, as it keeps your shoulder to the wheel. I am proud to say that I uptalk effortlessly all the time now, and the surprise and sheer delight on the faces of young people when they hear an older gentleman “talking up” makes all the hours of practice worthwhile. I feel like I’m really making a difference.

A word of caution. When uptalk is employed at a very high frequency, volume, and pitch, and the whole sampler of fillers is tossed in, a critical mass can be achieved that has been known to set off a chain reaction. First your dog, then the neighbors’, then their neighbors’ — before you know it, the whole neighborhood is filled with the sound of a howling canine chorus. Once, when I overdid it, the damned coyotes even joined in. So mix fillers into your uptalk carefully. I’m just saying.

9. The word “didn’t” should be pronounced as a crisp, two-syllable “dident.” The short “e” sound should be clearly heard as in “Polident.” (Think “prissy.”) This same rule applies to “doesn’t,” which becomes “duhzent,” emphasis again on the short “e.” While “couldn’t” and “shouldn’t” also sometimes become “couldent” and “shouldent,” as one might expect, just as frequently they come out as, “coont” and “shoont,” utilizing the short “oo” of “schnook.” (Thinking back, the guys I heard using this pronunciation may have been lit.) Either of these modern variants is acceptable, but eschew the fuddy-duddy standard pronunciations of the original contractions, “could/nt” and “should/nt,” which, oddly, feature glottal stops. (Yesterday, I heard “coo/ent.” Very chill.) Oh, and don’t say “did/nt.” (With all due respect, you’d sound like a cave man.)

10. The final word, “right,” should be pronounced in a way that places it at an equal distance from (a) assuring the listener that what you just said was not only correct, but cool, and (b) seeking assurance from the listener that what you just said was not only correct, but cool. In order to achieve this effect, the coloration of “right” must be subtly blended so as to become a creature of the twilight world between the declarative and the interrogative: not falling, not rising, not whining, and never, ever abrupt. With the proper inflection, “right” will hit this sweet spot, where the listener will wonder, “Wait. What? Is he asking me or telling me?”

Practice these ten exercises. Practice hard, then get out there and commence pussyfooting.

Part Four: Problems and Solutions

As you gain fluency in Post-Modern English, what you seem to lose in self-confidence, you will more than make up for with an increased capacity to appear empathetic. Your use of PME will lower the walls and build new bridges between you and the people around you. Your sacrifice of the ability to assert your will and pass judgment on others will help create a more open, tolerant, and nonjudgmental human community. You will contribute to a world in which nobody will feel the need to say “Don’t judge me,” or “Don’t be a dick,” because there will be no one judging them and no one will be acting like a dick. That’s right: no more judges and no more dicks. It will be a world of greater respect, warmth, and, yes, love.

The bad news is that you’ll have to keep an eye out for three problems that may rear their ugly little heads.

First, there is backsliding. Although you now sound hip, as you approach your dotage you may find among your life’s baggage a few truths that you feel should be self-evident to everyone. You may even feel a need to share these truths with the people who, sad to say, have not had the pleasure of reading the self-published revisions to your personal Boy Scout Handbook. (You may also feel a constant pain in your lower back. These symptoms often occur together.) Pretending to be wimpy may have grown so taxing that, as therapy, you decide to briefly drop the Post-Modern English charade and revert to your former pre-PME self. But how do you safely remount your high horse?

To avoid unjust accusations of hypocrisy, it is best to choose the venue and target of these code-switching episodes carefully. I’ve heard that a marvelous place to engage in them is on urban motorways. I am told that it is easy to find drivers who are unaware of your exhaustive personal list of driving dos and don’ts. What next?

You may find yourself behind the wheel of a large automobile. Some knucklehead in a little Kia cuts in front of you without even signaling, missing you by mere yards. Gunning it, you pull up next to him. You lower your window. He lowers his. Then you let him have it with both barrels — figuratively, of course. You tell him, in stark Anglo-Saxon terms, in as loud and clear a voice as you can muster, the obscene fate that awaits him and his mother before their imminent and humiliating deaths. After that, spleen thoroughly vented, you brake and swerve onto the exit ramp, switch back to PME,and reassume your Oprah-like pose of nonjudgmental equanimity.

Here are a few tips. Before you switch codes, make absolutely sure that the knucklehead in your crosshairs doesn’t know who you are. Anonymity is crucial. And avoid the rush hour, when traffic sometimes grinds to a halt. Offended knuckleheads have been known to leap from their cars, screaming obscenities and brandishing revolvers. They are, after all, knuckleheads. (Good thing it’s illegal to use a wireless telephone while driving. No one will be able to post your outburst on the internet.)

The best way to keep from backsliding is, obviously, to get a grip on yourself.

Second, should you choose to “just say no” to the temptation to backslide, beware of unsuccessful repression. If, in order to achieve PME fluency, you have to repress the wish to lord it up over everybody, and the repression fails to keep that wish contained, you may catch it sneaking out of that darkened back room of your consciousness, where you’ve been keeping it out of public view, and exposing itself in what is popularly known as a “Freudian slip.”

Attending a lovely garden party, you might intend to say, “Oh, You’re so kind. Thank you so much,” only to find yourself saying, “Why don’t you just go fuck yourself.” Remember, you could have said this to the knucklehead who cut you off, but you didn’t want to be seen as a hypocrite.

What then? The best way to avoid Freudian slips is to keep a civil tongue in your head. If you think that you might need professional help to accomplish this, weekly sessions with a competent therapist for a year or two should do the trick. And don't be put off if the hourly fee is hundreds of dollars. Medicare covers it.

Third, and finally: As bad as that slip would be, there is the possibility of something even more embarrassing. Freud himself believed that a sufficiently strong unfulfilled wish, if locked away in some dark dungeon of the subconscious, could create intolerable internal feelings that were then projected onto an external object in the form of a paranoid delusion of the kind that motivates such modern political extremists as white supremacists and their mirror-twins, the antifas. You may find yourself on the campus of a large university, waiving simplistic placards, shouting incoherent platitudes, and trading ineffectual blows with someone very much like yourself, a person who speaks Post-Modern English fluently but finds it difficult to express his opinions nonviolently. Why, he may even lack the most basic linguistic tools that are needed to engage in civil discourse.

The solution? Just pull yourself together, man. Snap out of it, for the love of God.

Given your age, maturity, and ability in archaic English, spotting these pitfalls early on and avoiding them should not be difficult. If, however, you find that you’re experiencing uncontrollable urges to play the pontiff, convert the heathen, or some such, and you feel the need for relief, there is a category of medications called anti-androgens that lower the testosterone levels often associated with judgmentalism. Most of the side effects are limited to the secondary sexual characteristics and are not life threatening. If this sounds right for you, you should consult your health care provider.

Should the medication prove ineffective and your symptoms persist, there is a growing body of evidence indicating that immediate and lasting relief can be achieved through gender reassignment surgery, provided that you are a male. While this has become a relatively safe and routine procedure, boasting a single-digit mortality rate, a small percentage of otherwise qualified candidates hesitate to “go under the knife.” But if you count yourself among these reluctant few, take heart. There is one more glimmer of hope: the experimental treatment protocol called “strategic relocation.” While there is insufficient data to conclusively prove the treatment’s therapeutic efficacy, the available anecdotal evidence suggests that, at the very least, more research is warranted.

Ferris T. Pranz, a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Applied Metaphysics of Eastern Montana State University at Purdie, has been observing a band of people living with judgmentalism. These people were individually tagged and released over the past decade by the Montana Department of Behavior Management (MDBM) outside Fertin, a farming town near Lake Gombay, just south of the Missouri River. In his unpublished 2017 field notebook, Pranz records his painstaking efforts to gain the trust of this strategically relocated band at their watering hole, a smoke-filled bar called “Grumpy’s.”

Pranz’s observations have raised some eyebrows in the judgmentalism community in Montana. Despite the Fertin band’s characteristically opinionated and aggressive communicational style and constant abuse of both alcohol and tobacco, they seem to share a gruff good humor while playing at pool, darts, and cards. Interestingly, they often refer to themselves as “blowhards,” apparently without shame or irony, and then laugh loudly. When Pranz would ask the group to explain the laughter, they would invariably laugh again, more loudly. Pranz has recommended that further research be conducted to discern the motives behind this laughter, possibly utilizing a double-blind design.

More broadly, Pranz and his colleagues at EMSUP have proposed a major longtitudinal study to explore the incongruity of the seemingly upbeat ambience in “Grumpy’s” by designing instruments to quantify (1) the specific characteristics of these Fertin people and the effect that such characteristics may have on their communicational dynamics; (2) the effects of the complete absence of treatment by means of any of the experimentally proven therapies for people living with late-stage degenerative judgmentalism. These effects can then be compared with therapeutic outcomes in matched groups receiving such treatments. Pranz has also recommended that the proposed longtitudinal study be completed prior to authorization of an expanded “strategic relocation” program to include areas beyond Fertin. In October of 2017, the Board of Directors of the Friends of Judgmentalism in Bozeman passed a resolution in support of Pranz’s proposal. Pranz plans to apply for a grant through the MDBM in June of 2018.

Part Five: Looking Backward

American English is the language of our past, already dated and quickly becoming archaic. As will be shown, the impression that it makes when spoken is not good. More importantly, it conveys an aggressive smugness that is out of step with today’s world. Even the founding documents of the United States, written in American English, sound absolutist, judgmental, and harsh.

By now, you must have asked yourself: “If French is the language of love, and German is the language of Nietzsche, and Post-Modern English is the language of wimps, then what the heck is American English?” Well?

As a native speaker of American English, I am not qualified to answer. To find a place to sit somewhere outside of one’s own language and culture, and then to sit there and listen to one’s language being spoken in order to gather an impression of the speaker, using only the sound of the language, not its meaning, is like trying to street-park a Class A RV on the Upper East Side: while it may be possible, I’ve never seen it done. No, this question should be answered by people who don’t speak the language.

American English began in 1607, when the first British colonist stepped on the shore of the James River. How do you suppose American English sounds to British ears today? I’m told there are three main impressions. First, it is spoken more slowly than British English, giving the impression that the speaker is also a little slow. Second, it is spoken more loudly than British English, and with more emotion. As both of these characteristics are associated with children, the impression is that the speaker is somewhat immature. Third, American English is rhotic, meaning that “r” is pronounced both at the end of a word and before another consonant. As this pronunciation is normally associated with Scotland, Ireland, and remote rural areas, the impression is that the speaker is a bit rustic.

Taken together, then, to British ears American English is the language of dim-witted, childish yokels. One might call it the language of knuckleheads. That is not to say that Americans are knuckleheads. It simply means that our language makes us seem that way.

Post-Modern English, while less given to the glacial John Wayne drawl or the grating Jerry Lewis bray of American English, retains the rhotic accent, even doubling down on it with the vocal fry. Still, in two of the three categories, it constitutes an evolutionary step beyond its parent language. Even British children have begun to pick up Post-Modern English from Netflix, much to the delight and amusement of their parents.

I was once told by a friend who spoke only the Arabic of the Nejd that French sounded like someone saying, “Loo, loo, loo, loo, loo,” and English sounded like someone saying, “Raw, raw, raw, raw, raw.” That was just one Bedouin’s opinion, of course. It seemed funnier in Arabic, somehow. “Loo, loo, loo.” We had a good laugh.

In 1776, less than 200 years after that first colonist was beached, Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence. What a marvelous symbolic moment in the evolution of English! He had to write it in American English, of course, because the Post-Modern branch wouldn’t emerge for two centuries. While this does not excuse him, it reduces his level of culpability. Listen:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.

Can you hear his certainty? Why, the phrase simply drips with self-confidence. To assert that a truth is self-evident is an act of rhetorical bravado that positively swaggers. (“Because I said so.”) Note the absence of fillers to dull the sharp edges. He seems to have missed the lesson that explains how “you have your truths and I have mine.” He seems to be saying that “all truths are not created equal,” pardon my French. And what is this nonsense about “men”?

So Jefferson was sure of himself, and assertive. But was he judgmental? Ask yourself: What is this Declaration of Independence, at its core? Is it a celebratory birth announcement, like a Hallmark card? (“Please welcome…”)

Far from it. This is Thomas Jefferson leveling a public and harsh judgment against one King George III. It spells out George’s crimes, like a rap sheet or an indictment. It is clear: Tom is judging George. Tommy is calling Georgie a dick. Listen:

A prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

This white, male, rich, privileged, powerful, slaveholding “founder” of America is writing in the scathingly self-righteous tones of archaic American English. The sound of Jefferson’s voice is clear. He is cocksure and in-your-face. He is your judge, jury, and executioner. The music of his American English is a march being played by a big brass band oompahing down Main Street on the Fourth of July, snare drums rattling like assault rifles. Courage is needed to follow the facts, no matter where they lead. It pains me to have to say it, but Thomas Jefferson was a dick.

Your final assignment is to translate the first of the two fragments above (the one with the “self-evident truths”) from American English into Post-Modern English. You have five minutes. Begin.

OK, time’s up. Answers will vary, of course, but it might be useful to compare your translation with the following:

So, some of us were sorta thinking? that a coupla of these like, ideas? or whatever? we had were, oh, I don’t know, kind of, you know, well, not so bad? I guess, right? And, uh, oh yeah, that all men, I mean, like women, too, kind of like, everybody? I mean, are pretty much, I’m gonna say, created? you know, like, equal? right. or whatever, so…”

It sounds vaguely Canadian, eh?

Yes, it is time to put American English out to pasture. Post-Modern English is not just cooler; it is more in keeping with the zeitgeist. It is the language best suited to the more equitable, inclusive, and nonjudgmental world that we are building together.

It is time to hang up that coonskin cap.

* * *

All living languages are continuously evolving — as are we, the species that speaks those languages. Do these two forms of evolution influence each other? Of course they do. Through millennia, the evolutionary pas de deux of our species on this earth has been and continues to be shaped by, and to shape, the words and music of our languages. To the extent that there is intent in this choreography, it is ours. We are making ourselves. The changes we make to our languages have consequences beyond the merely aesthetic. They affect the choices we make that determine our destiny. We should, therefore, make changes to our languages with the same caution we exercise in rearranging the molecules of our genome. Are we good?

“. . . Fearing not that I’d become my enemy
in the instant that I preach.”
                          — Bob Dylan, My Back Pages (1964)