Word by Word: The Secret Life of Dictionaries

by Kory Stamper

Dictionaries, as Emily Brewster says, are aspirational texts, but the way we talk has always been a problem for the person aspiring to just the right social level. One must steer a steady path through a narrow strait: vulgarity, low, and classless speech on one side; prissy, overreaching affectation on the other.

Well put, again reminds me of "How You Say It"

Neat - and don't i feel like a shit for looking down at nucular?

Some folks ask why we don’t make everything simpler by using the International Phonetic Alphabet instead of whatever weird system we’re using, but the answer is in the name: “International Phonetic Alphabet.” IPA, as it’s called, isn’t accent agnostic.

interesting, did not know that

Someone doesn’t know, for instance, that we list definitions in chronological order and so is upset that the “whorehouse” sense of “stew” shows up before the “thick soup” sense does.

Bahahaha news to me but funny

We don’t just want our words to have meaning, we want them to mean something, and the difference is palpable.

ret·ro·nym \ˈre-trō-ˌnim\ n : a term consisting of a noun and a modifier which specifies the original meaning of the noun <“film camera” is a retronym> (MWC11)

Here is the one thing that our pronunciation editor wishes everyone knew: those dots in the headwords, like at “co·per·nic·i·um,” are not marking syllable breaks, as is evident by comparing the placement of the dots with the placement of the hyphens in the pronunciations. Those dots are called “end-of-line division dots,” and they exist solely to tell beleaguered proofreaders where, if they have to split a word between lines, they can drop a hyphen.

Today I learned...

“Welp,” I said, “I’ve made the big leagues. I’ve been parodied by Colbert.” —

Sure, everyone has a word (or a handful of words) that they adore because they love the sound, the feel, the silliness or silkiness of the word; I defy anyone to say the word “hootamaganzy” aloud and not immediately fall in love with it, regardless of what it means.

For sure! I've got a bunch, though coruscating comes to mind

Write-in campaigns are the inevitable product of a strong conviction that someone or something is wrong, a woefully misguided sense of grassroots justice, and unfettered Internet access.

Heh. See also xkcd, or twitter mobs generally

Jerkery, like stupidity and death, is an ontological constant in our universe.

I was invited to personally rot in hell no fewer than thirteen times. I was told to get a life, get a fucking life, to fuck off and die, and also to swallow shards of glass mixed in acid. The e-mails were, almost to the letter, uninterested in actually knowing why we entered this new subsense of “marriage.” They didn’t care about the mechanics of language change; they cared about the mechanics of culture change.

Sad but unsurprising

I call it “craft” and not “art” for connotative reasons. “Art” conjures an image of the lexicographer as medium or conduit—a live wire that merely transmits something unkenned, alien. But “craft” implies care, repetitive work, apprenticeship, and practice. It is something that is within most people’s reach, but few people devote themselves to it long enough and with enough intensity to do it well.

Nice distinction