Webinars and events

Information about any upcoming events and webinars will be posted on this page. Recordings from past events are also published here.

We are always looking for new ideas and potential speakers for future webinars, so please share your thoughts with us.

You can explore more ways to use the OED through our teaching resources page.

Upcoming webinars

There are no upcoming events for the moment.

Our most recent events

The Oxford Dictionary of African American English: First 100 words

The Oxford Dictionary of African American English (ODAAE), a joint project of Oxford Languages (Oxford University Press) and Harvard University’s Hutchins Center for African & African American Research, is now well underway, and the first 100 entries have recently been completed. The project is spearheaded by Prof Henry Louis Gates, Jr., Editor-in-Chief, Director of the Center, and Alphonse Fletcher University Professor at Harvard.

Watch a presentation of the project’s progress, followed by a Q&A session.

Agenda:

• Where we are one year into the project
• How did we get here? The roles people played in uncovering and recording words
• Some examples of the entries already finished
• Q&A

This project is funded in part by grants from the Mellon (https://mellon.org/) and Wagner Foundations (www.wfound.org). Read more about it here.

Bermudian English in the Oxford English Dictionary

In this talk, the panellists commented on the uniqueness of Bermudian English, and the fact that many word evidence sources are found in dialect parody. They also explained how academic research can be used to inform OED updates, using this as an example.

The talk covered:

• The Bermudian English variety and its description (watch from 00:00 – 12:48)
• Using academic research in OED updates (watch from 12:48 – 24:43)
• The Bermudian English pronunciation model (watch from 24:43 – 38:44)
• Dialect parody – why it happens, and the caveats of using it as lexicographic evidence (watch from 38:44 until the end)

The questions that were submitted during the event were addressed by the presenters and can be accessed here: Q&A: Bermudian English in the Oxford English Dictionary

Read more about Bermudian English in the OED here.

The Oxford Dictionary of African American English in the making: panel discussion

Oxford Languages and the Harvard University’s Hutchins Center for African & African American Research have partnered for a three-year research project, whose aim is to compile the Oxford Dictionary of African American English (ODAAE).

The panel discussion covered:

• Project overview and aims
• Where we are now
• Why we are compiling ODAAE
• The socio-linguistic importance of African American English
• Q&A

Watch the recording:

Semantic transfer and the OED: investigating metonymization

Lauren Simon, holder of an MSt in Linguistics, Philology, and Phonetics, describes the methodology and labelling process used in her investigation of semantic change through metonymization, and discusses some of her findings.

Who is this for?

What did this session cover?

Oxford World English Symposium 2022

The sessions from the Oxford World English Symposium 2022 are now available for viewing:

Language prejudice and the documentation of minoritized varieties of English

Many still consider some varieties of English to be inferior to others. Such language prejudice has a clear social and economic impact on certain language communities, whose members are frequently marginalized because of their accents or their choice of words.

Many still consider some varieties of English to be inferior to others. Such language prejudice has a clear social and economic impact on certain language communities, whose members are frequently marginalized because of their accents or their choice of words.

To mark the launch of the OED’s Varieties of English page, Dr Danica Salazar, World English Editor, and Dr Catherine Sangster, OED Executive Editor, were joined by a panel of guest speakers to discuss:

Our guest panel was composed by:

The questions which could not be addressed during the webinar session were addressed by the panelists and their answers are available to view here.

OED resources to support teaching and academic research in Hong Kong, Macao, and Taiwan

The OED is a powerful online linguistic resource, providing features, tools, and language data which are essential for academic research and teaching. However, the extent of the OED capabilities is not always explored to its full potential.

The Oxford University Press team – Dr Danica Salazar, World English Editor, and Ms Chen Zhou, Regional Customer Trainer, presented a session where they provided an overview of all the OED can offer.

Guest speaker Dr Lisa Lim, Associate Professor at Curtin University and ‘Language Matters’ columnist for the South China Morning Post, presented her perspective of how the OED can be used in academic and other professional research, within the realms of language contact and evolution within multicultural environments.

Watch the recording of this presentation here:

The Oxford English Dictionary for Chinese users: resources to support teaching and academic research

The OED is a powerful online linguistic resource, providing features, tools, and language data which are essential for academic research and teaching. However, the extent of the OED capabilities is not always explored to its full potential.

The Oxford University Press team – Dr Danica Salazar, World English Editor, and Ms Chen Zhou, Regional Customer Trainer, presented a session where they provided an overview of all the OED can offer.

Guest speaker Dr Zhong Ai, Lecturer in English at Shanghai Maritime University, presented her perspectives of how the OED can be used in academic research, with a particular focus on the language contact between English and Chinese, and Chinese loanwords in English.

Watch the recording of this presentation here:

The questions that we were not able to address during the live presentation were passed on to the panellists and their answers, as well as the presentation slides are available to view here.

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Language updates

Word of the Year and other words of interest

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