Words from Popular Literature Not in OED

[Jonathan Lighter]

HDAS is filled to the gunwales with such terms, of a certain kind.

  JL

Wilson Gray <hwgray at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
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Sender: American Dialect Society
Poster: Wilson Gray
Subject: Re: Words from Popular Literature Not in OED
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And even though the level of usage of these terms *be* minimal, I'm
completely in agreement with you, Fred. That's why the term, "hapax
legomenon," was invented.

-Wilson

On 11/3/06, Fred Shapiro wrote:
> ---------------------- Information from the mail header -----------------------
> Sender: American Dialect Society
> Poster: Fred Shapiro
> Subject: Words from Popular Literature Not in OED
> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
> It seems to me that the OED includes many terms of highly limited
> currency, yet I see terms from important novels not being included.
>
> For example, "granfalloon" and "karass" from Vonnegut's "Cat's Cradle" are
> omitted. "Melange" from the Dune novels, which falls with the
> alphabetical range of the OED revision, is also omitted.
>
> Another word not in OED, from a comic-book provenance rather than from a
> novel, is "kryptonite." Surely this is 1000 times more frequently used
> than many of the terms in OED.
>
> Fred Shapiro
>
>
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
> Fred R. Shapiro Editor
> Associate Librarian for Collections and YALE BOOK OF QUOTATIONS
> Access and Lecturer in Legal Research Yale University Press
> Yale Law School ISBN 0300107986
> e-mail: fred.shapiro at yale.edu http://quotationdictionary.com
> --------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
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> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>


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