Re: "The American People"

Thanks for the pointer to Jon Stewart, Gunnar, but in a beautifully  
ironic twist I got the error message: "Sorry, Videos are not  
currently available in your country".

Thanks for also remending me of the adjectival phrase "un-American".  
 From 1938 to 1975 you had the House Un-American Activities  
Committee, which I guess did a great job of cracking down on  
outbreaks of Morris Dancing, Mongolian throat-singing and cricket.

Conrad


On 30 May 2010, at 10:47, Gunnar Swanson wrote:

> Conrad,
>
> Jon Stewart can explain it better than I can:
> http://www.thedailyshow.com/watch/wed-may-5-2010/american-apparently
>
> The phrase is interesting rhetorically because it can be used
> grammatically in the plural (to avoid fascist overtones) while
> functionally in the singular (to imply unity.)
>
> "High vigilance" is a difficult phrase to make sense of so we don't
> want to confuse foreigners with it. As The Daily Show points out, The
> American People "get it" (and, by implication, you un-American people
> don't.)
>
> Gunnar
> ----------
> Gunnar Swanson Design Office
> 1901 East 6th Street
> Greenville NC 27858
> USA
___________________________________________________________________

Use the following address to post a message to all subscribers: 
 [email protected]

To subscribe, unsubscribe or change your options, visit:
 http://list.InformationDesign.org/mailman/listinfo/infodesign-cafe

For all Information Design matters:
 http://InformationDesign.org

Problems? Write to:
 [email protected]
___________________________________________________________________