Reinventing English: The Troubled Future of Reading, Writing, and Thinking

The English language is changing at a faster rate than almost ever before. Not only are new words and new expressions entering popular expression, but the language is becoming more evocative and idiomatic. Digital technologies have changed the way we write and read. Global media has helped make English into a world language — but a world language with many different social, regional, and cultural variations.

Should English be an official language; what standards do we use in public discourse; what happens when cultures come together and introduce new words; what role does technology have in language change? These are all questions that, in one form or another, have been asked for a thousand years — ever since the Anglo-Saxons first committed “English” into writing and created poetry and prose of power and imagination. English has always been reinvented by everyone who speaks and writes it. In this course, led by literature professor and award-winning writer Seth Lerer, we will search for ways of anticipating future changes to the language and prepare for a world in which English will be reinvented before our eyes and ears.