The Talk of the Party: Political Labels, Symbolic Capital, and American Life. By Sharon E. Jarvis. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield, 2005. 304p. $80.00 cloth, $27.95 paper.

How did the term “liberal” become a dirty word in American politics? Why are Democrats “accused” of being liberal as a campaign tactic? These types of questions motivate Sharon Jarvis's book. The language of politics, especially partisan politics, is a topic visited by political scientists and other social scientists with modest frequency, but Jarvis offers a different, and fresh, perspective that bridges public opinion approaches with rhetorical analysis. This method should prove appealing to a variety of social scientists and students and illuminate new ways of studying political language.