Includes notes on sources, select bibliography, index

Introduction. The mayflower and before. Becoming Americans. A ´democratical phrenzy´: America in the age of revolution. Making a nation. By the dawn´s early light: forging a national identity. We´re in the money:The age of invention. Names. ´Manifest destiny´: Taming the west. The melting pot: immigration in America. When the going was good: Travel in America. What´s cooking?: Eating in America. Democratizing luxuri; Shopping in America. Manners and other matters. The hard sell: Advertising in America. The movies. The pursuit of pleasure: sport and play. Of bombs and bunkum: Politics and war. Sex and other distractions. From kitty hawk to the jumbo jet. Welcome to the space age: The 1950s and beyond. America english today.

“A literate exploration of why we use—or mangle—our native tongue.”—USA TodayBill Bryson celebrates America’s magnificent offspring in the book that reveals once and for all how a dusty western hamlet with neither woods nor holly came to be known as Hollywood…and exactly why Mr. Yankee Doodle call his befeathered cap “Macaroni.”