[Ads-l] Article in The Guardian: Inside the OED: can the world=?UTF-8?Q?=E2=80=99s_?=biggest dictionary survive the internet?

[ADSGarson O'Toole]

Website: The Guardian
Title: Inside the OED: can the world’s biggest dictionary survive the internet?
Author: Andrew Dickson
Timestamp: Fri 23 Feb 2018 01.00 EST

https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/feb/23/oxford-english-dictionary-can-worlds-biggest-dictionary-survive-internet

[Begin excerpt from beginning of article]
In February 2009, a Twitter user called @popelizbet issued an
apparently historic challenge to someone called Colin: she asked if he
could “mansplain” a concept to her. History has not recorded if he
did, indeed, proceed to mansplain. But the lexicographer Bernadette
Paton, who excavated this exchange last summer, believed it was the
first time anyone had used the word in recorded form. “It’s been
deleted since, but we caught it,” Paton told me, with quiet
satisfaction.
[End excerpt]

[Begin excerpt from end of article]
A few days ago, I emailed to see if “mansplain” had finally reached
the OED. It had, but there was a snag – further research had pushed
the word back a crucial six months, from February 2009 to August 2008.
Then, no sooner had Paton’s entry gone live in January than someone
emailed to point out that even this was inaccurate: they had spotted
“mansplain” on a May 2008 blog post, just a month after the writer
Rebecca Solnit had published her influential essay Men Explain Things
to Me. The updated definition, Proffitt assured me, will be available
as soon as possible.
[End excerpt]

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