San Antonio College Library

This book looks at how English words have been recorded, ordered, dissected, and displayed in dictionaries in Great Britain and the USA from the seventeenth century to the present. In the process it offers a complete introduction to how dictionaries are made. It considers the aims of their authors, the methods of their compilation, and the concepts and beliefs that lie behind them. Henri Bǰoint compares the descriptive approach of English lexicography...

"A compelling history of the national conflicts that resulted from efforts to produce the first definitive American dictionary of English. ... [English professor] Peter Martin recounts the patriotic fervor in the early American republic to produce a definitive national dictionary that would rival Samuel Johnson's 1755 Dictionary of the English Language. But what began as a cultural war of independence from Britain devolved into a battle among lexicographers,...

"Brimming with intelligence and personality, a vastly entertaining account of how dictionaries are made - a must read for word mavens. Have you ever tried to define the word "is?" Do you have strong feelings about the word (and, yes, it is a word) "irregardless?" Did you know that OMG was first used in 1917, in a letter to Winston Churchill? These are the questions that keep lexicographers up at night. While most of us might take dictionaries for...

"Although Samuel Johnson is recognized as the central English literary figure of the second half of the 18th century, and the period is often referred to as "The Age of Johnson," no consequential edition of his works has appeared since 1825, and no edition at any time has exercised the care in presenting the complete and accurate text of his works that modern readers require. Now, Yale University is sponsoring a new edition of the works of Samuel...