American English is changing in the twenty-first century in ways that can be challenging to master or sometimes even to understand. I will discuss gender-neutral pronouns, the euphemism treadmill and its requirement that we regularly rename topics of urgent discussion, and new categories of profanity. In all of these cases, we must revise our sense of how labels correspond to concepts in ways that can be wrenching but ultimately represent the ideological and moral progress of our society. This event is co-sponsored by The English Department. [Please note: The final date of this lecture is TBA. Please check our website for an update as we get closer to the event.]