Dictionary Society of North America

Speaking American

The Visual Thesaurus has published an enthusiastic reflection on the late Richard Bailey's book Speaking American. Richard Bailey was a fellow of the Dictionary Society and a former editor of the society's journal Dictionaries. Language columnist Mark Peters writes that Speaking American is "one of those books I wish I could make every prescriptivist grouch in the world read." He also praises "the inspiring scope" of Bailey's project, and "the power of his prose." Speaking American was published by Oxford UP in December 2011.

Lexicophilia

The 31 January New York Times reviews a new translation of the Kama Sutra; one piece of indispensible erotic advice will be old news to readers of this blog:

Among the “64 arts” a woman should master are "improvisation of poetry; knowledge of dictionaries; knowledge of prosody" and "reciting difficult verses."

News from AFRILEX

The Board of AFRILEX (i.e. the African Association for Lexicography) has decided to turn Lexikos into an open-access journal. Starting with Volume 21 (2011), Lexikos is now freely available to all online readers. Back issues are being added as they are digitized and indexed. The journal is online here.

Also, the 17th International AFRILEX conference has released its Call for Papers.  The conference will be held 3-5 July 2012 in Pretoria, South Africa. Abstracts for papers on any aspect of lexicography or terminology are invited.

Writing and Literacy in Early China

DSNA member and lexicographer of Chinese David Prager Branner is co-editor (with Li Feng) of a new collection from University of Washington Press, entitled Writing and Literacy in Early China. The long-term continuity and stability of the Chinese written language allows for detailed study of the role literacy played in early civilization. The eleven contributors to this volume inquire into modes of manuscript production, the purposes for which manuscripts were produced, and the ways in which they were actually used. For more information, visit the press's website.

"Occupy" gets ADS nod as 2011 Word of the Year

For the full details, including juicy items like "most outrageous" and "most creative" words, and a photo featuring the backs of a lot of linguist heads, visit the American Dialect Society website. 

A troop of baboons

The fact-checking organization Politifact Rhode Island has determined that an aggregate of baboons is not called a "congress," as claimed in a chain e-mail. After consulting dictionary.com, Merriam Webster, and Oxford, which shed no light, and Urban Dictionary, which was apparently updated using the chain e-mail as a source, the reporter sensibly sought the advice of both primate specialists and lexicographers, consulting DSNA President Orin Hargraves. According to the article, the proper term is "troop."  Using the word "congress" casts unfair aspersions on baboons.

Is there a collective noun for dictionary-makers? I propose "a fascicle of lexicographers." The term is both apropos and sufficiently obscure to send folks to their dictionaries.

Pity the harmless drudge

Reblogging is brisk with a New Year's Eve New York Times story about online dictionaries that "leave out the middleman"--"middleman" now being a synonym for "harmless drudge." Ann Eisenberg's story profiles Wordnik, the project of DSNA member Erin McKean, and the Corpus of Contemporary American English, compiled by Mark Davies, a professor at Brigham Young University. The pros and cons of lexicographer-free lexicography are thrashed out among experts including DSNA's William Kretsczhmar, along with Mark Liberman and Geoffrey Nunberg.   

DSNA winter break hours

The DSNA office will close 24 December - 15 January. During our break we occasionally check email and pick up snail mail, because we can't help ourselves.  After all, we want to hear the American Dialect Society's final word on the word of the year.

CFP: Conference on Language, Literature and Linguistics

The Annual International Conference on Language, Literature and Linguistics (L3 2012) has announced a Call for Papers for its next meeting, to be held 9-10 July in Singapore. For more information, visit the conference website.

More on invented languages

Also published this month: A Dictionary of Made-Up Languages: From Adûnaic to Elvish, Zaum to Klingon, the Anwa (Real) Origins of Invented Lexicons, by Stephen D. Rogers (Adams Media Corporation). The Chicago Tribune published an amusing feature on the book which you can read here; I was particularly pleased to learn about "Molvanian. Created by three guys who wrote a faux travel guide, 'Molvania: A Land Untouched by Modern Dentistry,' it uses four genders: male, female, neutral and the collective noun for cheeses."