Language

Linguist Geoff Nunberg talks about the computer language of the nineties, and looks at how new "information age" words sound remarkably like George Orwell's Newspeak.

Speech Therapist Sam Chwat. Chwat's New York Speech Improvement Services attracts 200 to 250 clients a week. He taught Robert DeNiro how to gain an Appalachian accent for his role in "Cape Fear." Julia Roberts sought him out to relearn her southern drawl for "Steel Magnolias." He helped another southerner, Andie McDowell, after her lines for "Greystoke: The Legend of Tarzan" were dubbed by Glenn Close.

Linguist Geoff Nunberg talks about how the French are trying to keep their language pure.

Rock critic Ed Ward on the troubles of shopping in Berlin.

Steven Pinker, a psycholinguist at MIT and director of its Center for Cognitive Neuroscience, has a new book on how language works: "The Language Instinct: How the Mind Creates Language" (Morrow). He argues that language is not simply a cultural invention taught by parents and schools, but a biological system, --an instinct-- partly learned, and partly innate. To Pinker, a three year old toddler is a "grammatical genius", capable of obeying adult rites of language, similar to web-spinning in spiders or sonar in bats.

Rock Critic Ed Ward on encountering the hip new language in Berlin: English.

Linguist Geoffrey Nunberg talks about the bicentennial of the French Revolution.

Linguist Geoffrey Nunberg on the oral culture of Somalia.

Linguist Geoffrey Nunberg defends the use of "you know."

The tenth edition of "Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary," is out. Terry talks about pronunciation with one of the book's associate editors, Brian Sietsema -- and examines how recent Fresh Air guests say particular words.