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Word Histories
The etymologies in standard dictionaries explain the language from which a word
was brought into English, the period at which it is first recorded in English, and the
development of modern word forms. While the
Oxford Dictionary of English
does
this, it also goes further. It explains sense development as well as morphological (or
form) development. Information is presented clearly and with a minimum of
technical terminology, and the perspective taken is that of the general user who
would like to know about word origins but who is not a philological specialist. In this
context, the history of how and why a particular meaning developed from an
apparently quite different older meaning is likely to be at least as interesting as, for
example, what the original form was in Latin or Greek.
For example, the word history for the word oaf shows how the present meaning
developed from the meaning ‘elf’, while the entry for conker shows how the word
may be related both to ‘conch’ and ‘conquer’ (explaining how the original game of
conkers was played with snail shells rather than the nut of the horse chestnut).
Additional special features of the
Oxford Dictionary of English
include ‘internal
etymologies’ and ‘folk etymologies’. Internal etymologies are given within entries to
explain the origin of particular senses, phrases, or idioms. For example, how did the
figurative use of red herring come about? Why do we call something a flash in the
pan? See the internal etymologies under red herring and flash.
The
Oxford Dictionary of English
presents the information in a straightforward,
user-friendly fashion immediately following the relevant definition.
In a similar vein, folk etymologies–those explanations which are unfounded but
nevertheless well known to many people–have traditionally simply been ignored in
dictionaries. The
Oxford Dictionary of English
gives an account of widely held but
often erroneous folk etymologies for the benefit of the general user, explaining
competing theories and assessing their relative merits where applicable. See the
folk etymologies at posh and snob.
Researching word histories is similar in some respects to archaeology: the
evidence is often partial or not there at all, and etymologists must make informed
decisions using the evidence available, however inadequate it may be. From time to
time new evidence becomes available, and the known history of a word may need
to be reconsidered. In this, the
Oxford Dictionary of English
has been able to draw
on the extensive expertise and ongoing research of the
Oxford English Dictionary
.
3. Specialist reading
A general corpus does not, by definition, contain large quantities of specialized
terminology. For this reason, a directed reading programme was set up specially
for the
Oxford Dictionary of English
, enabling additional research and collection of
citations in a number of neglected fields, for example food and cooking, health and
fitness, boats and sailing, photography, genetics, martial arts, and complementary
medicine.
4. Examples
The
Oxford Dictionary of English
contains many more examples of words in use
than any other comparable dictionary. Generally, they are there to show typical uses
of the word or sense. All examples are authentic, in that they represent actual
usage. In the past, dictionaries have used made-up examples, partly because not
enough authentic text was available and partly through an assumption that invented
examples were somehow better in that they could be tailored to the precise needs
of the dictionary entry. Such a view finds little favour today, and it is now generally
recognized that the ‘naturalness’ provided by authentic examples is of the utmost
importance in providing an accurate picture of language in use.