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Dent's Modern Tribes

On sale

20th October 2016

Price: £19.99

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Selected: Audiobook Downloadable / ISBN-13: 9781473631427

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Did you know that . . . a soldier’s biggest social blunder is called jack brew – making yourself a cuppa without making one for anyone else? That twitchers have an expression for a bird that can’t be identified – LBJ (the letters stand for Little Brown Job)? Or that builders call plastering the ceiling doing Lionel Richie’s dancefloor? Susie Dent does.

Ever wondered why football managers all speak the same way, what a cabbie calls the Houses of Parliament, or how ticket inspectors discreetly request back-up? We are surrounded by hundreds of tribes, each speaking their own distinct slanguage of colourful words, jokes and phrases, honed through years of conversations on the battlefield, in A&E, backstage, or at ten-thousand feet in the air.

Susie Dent has spent years interviewing hundreds of professionals, hobbyists and enthusiasts, and the result is an idiosyncratic phrasebook like no other. From the Freemason’s handshake to the publican’s banter, Dent’s Modern Tribes takes us on a whirlwind tour of Britain, decoding its secret languages and, in the process, finds out what really makes us all tick.

(P)2016 John Murray Press

Reviews

Jonathan Ross
A fabulous read for anyone who loves words, and wants to learn some more. Funny, fact-filled and delightful
Richard Osman
Wonderfully clever and funny . . . a national treasury from a national treasure
Matt Haig
A fascinating, joyful look at the tribes all around us, from twitchers to taxi-drivers. A must
Lynne Truss
I thought only criminals had their own words for everything. Dent's Modern Tribes shows me quite how wrong I was
David Crystal
Sparkles with gentle wit, fascinating illustration, and linguistic insight
Richard Madeley
A brilliant, funny, wise, and illuminating canter through the languages of modern tribes
Pam Ayres
Susie Dent is a one-off. She breathes life and fun into words
Adam Buxton
The keys to the mysterious Kingdom of Jargon
The Sun
This phrasebook is like no other and will help anyone talk the talk - whatever that might be
Independent
Thoroughly entertaining and illuminating
The Lady
Fascinating study of expressions . . . Dent is something of a modern-day Professor Henry Higgins
Sentence First blog
A work of considerable interest and charm, dishing up verbal pleasures and surprises on virtually every page