On February 1, 1884, the very first part of what would become the most famous dictionary in history was published. It was ...

Black Americans have long contributed to the ways in which the English language is used, and now a new research project aims to compile the first Oxford Dictionary of African American English.

Just to work from "A" to "ant" took the original Oxford English Dictionary team around 10 years. They thought they'd reach "Z" in that time — but gathering definitions for hundreds of thousands of ...

Discover the story behind the critical milestone in American linguistics. Learn why a distinct dictionary was essential for ...

The great lexicographers understood that a worthy dictionary was descriptive, not prescriptive. It would simply record what we’ve already agreed upon socially You can save this article by registering ...

Getting your Trinity Audio player ready... Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, eighth grader Samara St. Louis was cramming for a spelling bee in 2012, when she stumbled upon a word that quickly became her ...

From dropped words to fake definitions, learn fun facts, hearsay, and scandal about our most useful language resource, and the words that make it up. You might be surprised to learn what the most ...

The Oxford English Dictionary added 42 new words borrowed from other languages, including gigil, a Tagalog expression for witnessing something adorable. By Gina Cherelus Need a word to emphasize that ...

What do you think he means by Zip?' 'I don't know,' said Mr. Wartle; 'let's look it up in the dictionary.' The earliest lexicographical efforts were probably made by Roman students of the Greek ...