Amanda Montell | |
---|---|
![]() Montell at her home in Los Angeles. | |
Born | Baltimore, Maryland, U.S. | February 16, 1992
Alma mater | New York University |
Genre | Feminist, Nonfiction, Linguistics, Social Science |
Notable works | Wordslut: A Feminist Guide to Taking Back the English Language (2019) Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism (2021) The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality (2024) |
Website | |
Amanda Montell |
Amanda Montell (born February 16, 1992) is an American author, linguist, and writer.
Montell was born and raised in Baltimore, Maryland to a Jewish family; she attended Hebrew school as a child. [1] [2] Her debut book, Wordslut: A Feminist Guide to Taking Back the English Language, was released in 2019 and received positive reviews from critics. [3] [4] [5] [6] It was named one of the best books of May 2019 by Popsugar, [7] Marie Claire , [8] and Cosmopolitan. [9]
Her second book, Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism , was published in 2021 and also received positive reviews from critics. [10] [11] [12] The book was partially inspired by Montell's father, who spent his teen years in the cult Synanon. [13] Montell is also a cohost of the weekly podcast Sounds Like a Cult with documentarian Isabela Medina-Maté, where they examine groups from across the cultural zeitgeist. [14]
Her third book, The Age of Magical Overthinking: Notes on Modern Irrationality, was published in April 2024. [15] [16] The book purports to explain how cognitive biases warp our actions.
Montell studied linguistics at New York University [17] and her writing has appeared in Time, [18] Nylon , Cosmopolitan, [19] Glamour , Domino , [20] and Marie Claire . She previously worked as a beauty and features editor at Byrdie and Who What Wear. She also created a web series, The Dirty Word, [21] for Joey Soloway's now defunct platform, Wifey. [22] [23]
Carolyn Heilbrun was an American academic at Columbia University, the first woman to receive tenure in the English department, and a prolific feminist author of academic studies. In addition, beginning in the 1960s, she published numerous popular mystery novels with a woman protagonist, under the pen name of Amanda Cross. These have been translated into numerous languages and in total sold nearly one million copies worldwide.
Pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis is a 45-letter word coined in 1935 by the then-president of the National Puzzlers' League, Everett M. Smith. It has sometimes been used as a synonym for the occupational disease known as silicosis, but it should not be as most silicosis is not related to mining of volcanic dusts. It is the longest word in the English language published in a popular dictionary, Oxford Dictionaries, which defines it as "an artificial long word said to mean a lung disease caused by inhaling very fine ash and sand dust".
Synanon, originally known as Tender Loving Care, was a new religious movement founded in 1958 by Charles E. "Chuck" Dederich Sr. in Santa Monica, California, United States. Originally established as a drug rehabilitation program, Synanon developed into an alternative community centered on group truth-telling sessions that came to be known as the "Synanon Game", a form of attack therapy.
Hey Monie! is an American animated sitcom produced by Soup2Nuts. It features heavily improvised dialogue by the Second City cast, similarly to Soup2Nuts animated sitcom Home Movies.
Amanda Marie Marcotte is an American blogger and journalist who writes on feminism and politics from a liberal perspective. Marcotte has written for several online publications, including Slate, The Guardian, and Salon, where she is currently senior politics writer.
Kory Stamper is a lexicographer and former associate editor for the Merriam-Webster family of dictionaries. She is the author of Word by Word: The Secret Life of Dictionaries.
Lane Moore is an American stand-up comedian, actor, author, musician, writer, and director, living in New York, New York.
Relationship anarchy is the application of anarchist principles to intimate relationships. Its values include autonomy, anti-hierarchical practices, anti-normativity, and community interdependence. RA is explicitly anti-amatonormative and anti-mononormative and is commonly, but not always, non-monogamous. This is distinct from polyamory, solo poly, swinging, and other forms of “dating”, which may include structures such as amatonormativity, hierarchy of intimate relationships, and autonomy-limiting rules. It has also been interpreted as a new paradigm in which closeness and autonomy are no longer considered to create dilemmas within a relationship.
Amirah Kassem is an American-born baker, author, designer and media personality. She is best known as the owner and founder of FLOUR SHOP and a judge on the Disney+ food-art series Foodtastic. Her kitchen, table, home and clothing products are sold worldwide.
Marie Kondo, also known as Konmari (こんまり), is a Japanese organizing consultant, author, and TV presenter.
Nadia Lee Cohen is a British artist, photographer, filmmaker, and model. She works inside popular culture, citing inspiration from cinema, commercials, and consumerism, which then re-enters the mass media in the form of magazine covers, music videos and Instagram posts.
Amanda Lovelace is an American poet who rose to fame through her poetry posted to Tumblr and Instagram. Her works have feminist themes, often focusing on modern interpretations of traditional tales. She is the author of the women are some kind of magic series, including the Goodreads Choice Award-winning the princess saves herself in this one and women are some kind of magic.
Overthinking with Kat & June is an American comedy series, created by Mackenzie Yeager, that premiered on December 19, 2018, on YouTube Premium. The series stars an ensemble cast featuring Alexia Dox, Tenea Intriago, Sasheer Zamata, Blake Lee, Elizabeth Hinkler, Emily Hinkler, Burl Moseley, Madeleine Byrne, Montana Roesch, Justin Kirk, Kelli Goss, Jessika Van, Aaron Takahashi, Kevin Bigley, Nick Fink, Stephen Ellis, Constance Marie, David L. King, and Amanda Foreman.
Claire Saffitz is an American food writer, chef, and YouTube personality. Until mid-2020, she was a contributing editor at Bon Appétit magazine and starred in several series on the Bon Appétit YouTube channel, including Gourmet Makes, in which she created gourmet versions of popular snack foods by reverse engineering them. Since leaving the company, she has published two cookbooks, Dessert Person and What's for Dessert, which both became New York Times Best Sellers. She has continued work as a video host on her own YouTube channel and as a freelance recipe developer, including for New York Times Cooking.
Kelsey Weier is an American TV host and beauty pageant titleholder. She received national recognition after appearing as a contestant on season 24 of The Bachelor. She was eliminated during week 8 by Peter Weber. She appeared on season 7 of Bachelor in Paradise. She was eliminated week 1. Prior to her television career, Weier had been crowned Miss Iowa USA in 2017.
Dolls of Our Lives is a podcast hosted by Allison Horrocks and Mary Mahoney in which the hosts revisit the American Girl book series they loved as children.
Tiffany Reisz is an American author. She is best known for the Original Sinners series of erotica and she has won the RITA Award and a Lambda Literary Award.
Lucy Foley is a British author of contemporary, historical fiction and mystery novels. Her novels The Paris Apartment and The Guest List are New York Times best sellers.
Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism is a 2021 nonfiction book by linguist Amanda Montell about the use of language in cults. It was published on June 15, 2021 by Harper Wave.
Light academia is an internet aesthetic and subculture, that emphasizes visually light aesthetics and positive themes, including optimism, joy, and friendship. Accordingly, light academia is often considered to be the visually and emotionally lighter counterpart to dark academia. The term light academia was coined on Tumblr in 2019 and gained popularity during the early 2020s.