OED first uses

[Fred Shapiro]

On Thu, 4 Dec 2003 RonButters at AOL.COM wrote:

> Well, "demolish" strikes me as rather too strong a word. S seems to suggest
> that the OED was primarily conceived of as a dictionary of first uses.
>
> In fact, though interesting and occasionally even useful, "first uses"
> is a relatively trivial aspect of lexicography, aqnd marginal predatings
> by only a few years is even moreso. The OED clearly meant to suggest
> only that "these are the first uses that we've come up with so far," not
> "these are the first uses that anyone will ever find."

You are right that first uses are just one aspect of the OED, which also
is intended to provide authoritative information on etymology,
significations, illustration of usage over time, pronunciation, etc.  It
is easy on this listserv to forget that the OED is not all, or even
primarily, about first uses.

However, first uses are a significant component of what people look to the
OED for, and the OED devotes a tremendous amount of effort to researching
and verifying first uses.  The current electronic revolution in
historical-lexicographical research, spearheaded by me and Barry and the
OED itself, is demolishing the first uses in the original OED and bringing
more attention to first uses in general than was ever the case before.
First uses now are arguably becoming a different kind of animal than they
were before, approaching more closely the elusive true origins of words.
(This is true even for slang vocabulary.)  I think if you asked John
Simpson or Jesse Sheidlower whether the word "demolish" was appropriate,
they might agree that it is not too strong a word.

Fred Shapiro


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Fred R. Shapiro                             Editor
Associate Librarian for Collections and     YALE DICTIONARY OF QUOTATIONS
  Access and Lecturer in Legal Research     Yale University Press,
Yale Law School                             forthcoming
e-mail: fred.shapiro at yale.edu               http://quotationdictionary.com
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