TV is dinning a new language into the U.S. ear. It is something like English, but it has a grammar, vocabulary and pronunciation of its own. It grows out of a rich compost of dialects heard at Lindy's and the Stork Club, in the hominy-grits-and-corn-pone belt and around Hollywood and Vine. It is calculatedly lowbrow: and out of the mouths of M.C.s, comedians, interviewers, children's hosts, singers and announcers, it has become a powerful influence on American speech. Critic Clifton Fadiman calls it Televenglish.
In a primer on the new tongue in the current Holiday, Fadiman classifies the M.C.s of the top...
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