Introduction to Nigerian English
Nigeria, a country in West Africa, is the most populous Black country in the world, with an estimated population of nearly 220 million people. A former British colony until 1960,…
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Release notes: East African English
Recent OED updates have included a significant number of new entries from South Africa and Nigeria. In this quarterly update, the OED continues to broaden its coverage of words from…
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From Pythagoreans to soysages: words relating to vegetarianism and veganism in the Historical Thesaurus of the OED
As we were updating the entries soy and soya this quarter, we took the opportunity to review our coverage of words for vegetarian and vegan foods and diets in the…
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Release notes: IGN-
A verdict of ignoramus The word ignoramus is today most familiar to us as a way to describe a stupid or ignorant person; however, the word has its origins in…
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Stress busting and smoking hot: the OED June 2022 update
The latest update to the OED includes over 700 new entries and senses. These range alphabetically from the East African ahoi (a person or body of people given the right…
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Press Release: Announcing the launch of a research project to create the Oxford Dictionary of African American English
A cornerstone of new research into African American language, history, and culture Editor-in-Chief: Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. June 2022, Oxford/New York – Oxford Languages, a division of Oxford University…
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OED100: Expanding the Historical Thesaurus of the OED
The Historical Thesaurus of the OED (HTOED) is a semantic network of OED senses arranged by concept or meaning. It allows users to explore the different ways that meanings have…
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OED 100: World English programme
One of the main goals in the lead up to the centenary of OED’s first edition in 2028 is widening the geographical coverage of the dictionary. This is in recognition…
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Oxford Languages Summer Placement
Each year Oxford Languages offers summer placement positions, for two candidates to work on various lexical projects within the department. Our interns from 2021 reflect on their experiences: What made…
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OED100: Revising Function Words in the OED
Function words are the words that enable language to operate, rather like the gears in a machine. Typically they don’t have a referential meaning of their own but connect together…
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