Research idea - dictionaries

[Ben Zimmer]

Jack Lynch's _The Lexicographer's Dilemma_ (2009) is quite good.

--bgz


On Wed, Aug 1, 2012 at 10:46 AM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:
>
> Sidney Landau's _Dictionaries_ (2001) is a good place to start.
>
> The Dictionary Society of North America publishes a journal also called
> _Dictionaries_.
>
> James Sledd edited _Dictionaries and That Dictionary_ (1962),  all about
> the Merriam-Webster moral panic.
>
> JL
>
> On Wed, Aug 1, 2012 at 10:29 AM, Garson O'Toole
> <adsgarsonotoole at gmail.com>wrote:
>
> >
> > Some of Samuel Johnson's definitions in "A Dictionary of the English
> > Language" (1755) humorously illustrate the tension between describing
> > and prescribing. The definition of patron is fun.
> >
> > Patron: One who countenances, supports or protects. Commonly a wretch
> > who supports with insolence, and is paid with flattery.
> >
> > Oats: A grain, which in England is generally given to horses, but in
> > Scotland appears to support the people.
> >
> > Distiller: One who makes and sells pernicious and inflammatory spirits.
> >
> > Lexicographer: A writer of dictionaries; a harmless drudge that busies
> > himself in tracing the original, and detailing the signification of
> > words.
> >
> > Politician: 1. One versed in the arts of government; one skilled in
> > politicks. 2. A man of artifice; one of deep contrivance.
> >
> > These items are abbreviated and taken from a secondary source (on the
> > web).
> >
> > http://www.samueljohnson.com/definitions.html
> >
> > Perhaps one could search GB and JSTOR for pieces of these definitions.
> > Matches might reveal critical essays on the topic of
> > prescribing/describing.
> >
> > Garson
> >
> > On Wed, Aug 1, 2012 at 9:45 AM, W Brewer <brewerwa at gmail.com> wrote:
> > >
> > > Arnold Zwicky wrote/requoted: <<<Do you know of any good critical
> > > studies
> > > of dictionaries? Dictionaries as prescribing/ascribing vs.
> > > describing?>>>
> > > WB: Understandably vague. Somewhere I have stuff on the Webster's
> > > Third
> > > controversy, when descriptivism hit a brick wall in 1961. So much for
> > > the
> > > Grande Vulgarisation of linguistic science. (Wikipedia s.v. Webster's
> > > Dictionary looks like a good survey.)

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