[A Banquet Of Books For The Holiday]

December, 2007

Daniel CassidyHow could Irish Americans, for all their sod-carrying numbers, leave such a small trace on our language? Cassidy says they haven't and proceeds to find Gaelic rootsfor much of American slang. Etymologists may not agree that jerk comes from deirceach (pronounced jer-kah, Gaelic for "bum"), but this is still an intriguing read. ¥¥¥'/?—Leopold Froehlich