Four-letter words, expletives, obscenities, insults, curses and cusses—there are almost as many euphemisms for offensive language as there are swearwords. But why? How has bad language retained its emotional valence in an increasingly liberal and secular society? Why do people still cringe when someone drops an f-bomb in front of a grandmother, or, worse, a toddler? These questions form the basis for Melissa Mohr’s new book, Holy Shit: A Brief History of Swearing. Mohr traces the history of English swearing back to its Latinate roots, through the Middle Ages, Reformation and Victorian era in order to explain its modern-day instantiations.
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