ITEM OVERVIEW
In How the Irish Invented Slang, Daniel Cassidy cuts through two hundred years worth of Anglo academic "baloney" and reveals the massive, hidden influence of the Irish language on the American language.
Irish words and phrases are scattered all across the American language, regional and class dialects, colloquialisms, slang, and specialized jargons (like gambling), in the same way that Irish-Americans have been scattered across the crossroads of North America for five hundred years. Cassidy traces the hidden history of how Ireland fashioned America, not just linguistically, but through the gambling underworld, urban street gangs, and the powerful political machines that grew out of them.
In a series of essays, including: "Decoding the Gangs of New York," "How the Irish Invented Poker and American Gambling Slang," "The Sanas (Etymology) of Jazz," "Boliver of Brooklyn," and in a first dictionary of Irish-american vernacular, Cassidy provides the hidden histories of so-called slang, and words with unknown origin—words that define the American language and culture: scam, slum, snazzy, sucker, swell, poker, daddy-o, fink, moolah, ballyhoo, and baloney, as well as the hottest word of the 20th century, jazz.
Daniel Cassidy is the founder and co-director of the Irish Studies Program at New College in San Francisco.
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