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Alumnus

Alumnus

An alumnus (masculine) or alumna (feminine) is a former student of a college, university, or school. Informal equivalents are alum and alumn (with a silent "n"). The term is often mistakenly thought of as synonymous with "graduate." Alumni/ae reunions are popular events at many institutions. They are usually organized by alumni associations and are often social occasions for fundraising. In Latin, alumnus is the masculine singular form and alumna the feminine singular form. (The words are derived from the Latin verb alere, "to nourish," and literally mean "nourished one" or "nursling.") Although these terms are recommended by leading English-language dictionaries, their use can be limited because they are gender-specific. The Latin plural is alumni for men and mixed groups and alumnae for women. The gender-neutral English term alum/alumn, created by clipping the ending from alumnus, is also used, along with its plural alums/alumns. Recently, the definition of "alum" has expanded to include people who have "matriculated at" or exited from any kind of organization or process. As such, one can potentially be a "corporate alum" of XYZ Company, or an alum of a military branch, non-profit organization, or training process. Educational institutions tend to follow Latin usage: alumnus for males, alumna for females, and alumni for mixed groups. All-women colleges use alumna and alumnae. Some institutions, such as Texas A&M University, do not refer to their graduates as "alumni" or even "graduates," choosing to use the term former students. In the United Kingdom, the phrases old boy and old girl are traditionally used for former school pupils, and old member for former university students. The term old student can nowadays refer to the graduates of either schools or universities.

Colleges and universities

A -- B -- C -- D -- E -- F -- G -- H -- I -- J -- K -- L -- M -- N -- O -- P -- Q -- R -- S -- T -- U -- V -- W -- X -- Y -- Z ---- The alphabetical listing is based on Christina DeMello's pages at http://www.mit.edu:8001/people/cdemello/univ.html.

Reunion

Reunion has multiple meanings:
- Réunion is an overseas department and region of France, located in the Indian Ocean east of Madagascar.
- Reunion is the name of a pop music group best known for their 1974 hit song "Life Is A Rock (But The Radio Rolled Me)", a rapid-fire musical recitation of nearly 100 artists, songs, industry names, and trends in pop music up to that date.
- Reunion a 2005 television series on FOX starring Matthew St. Patrick and Sean Faris.
- Re-union is the name of a Dutch duo who performed at the Eurovision Song Contest 2004.
- Reunion is the name of a genealogy application for the Apple Macintosh.
- Reunion is the name of a live album released by metal group Black Sabbath in 1997.
- Reunion is the name of a play by David Mamet.
- A reunion is the coming together of people who had been separated, but kept bonds or ties with each other: such as family reunions and class reunions

Fundraising

:This page is an encyclopedia article on fundraising; for fundraising on Wikipedia, see [http://wikimediafoundation.org/fundraising our fundraising page], or read about [http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/What_we_use_the_money_for how we use the money]. Fundraising is the process of soliciting and gathering money by requesting donations from individuals, businesses, charitable foundations, or governmental agencies. Although fundraising typically refers to efforts to gather funds for not-for-profit organizations, it is sometimes used to refer to the identification and solicitation of investors or other sources of capital for for-profit enterprises. Fundraising is the primary way that non-profit organizations obtain the money for their operations. These operations can involve a very broad array of concerns such as religious or philanthropic groups such as research organizations, public broadcasters, and political campaigns. When special events are arranged to raise funds, they are often known as fund drives, pledge drives, or, sometimes when television is involved, telethons. Many non-profit organizations take advantage of the services of professional fundraisers. These may be paid for their services either through fees unrelated to the amounts of money to be raised, or by retaining a percentage of raised funds. The latter approach is expressly forbidden under the Code of Ethics of the Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP), the profession's primary international support and regulatory body. Many non-profit organizations nonetheless engage fundraisers who are paid a percentage of the funds they raise. In the United States, this ratio of funds retained to funds passed on to the non-profit is subject to reporting to a number of state's Attorneys General. This ratio is highly variable and subject to change over time and place, and it is a point of contention between a segment the general public and the non-profit organizations. Some examples of charitable organizations include student scholarship merit awards for athletic or academic achievement, humanitarian concerns, disaster relief, human rights, research, and other social issues. Equally important are fundraising efforts by virtually every recognized religious group throughout the world. These efforts are organized on a local, national, and global level. Sometimes, such funds will go exclusively toward assisting the basic needs of others, while money may at other times be used only for evangelism. Usually, religious organizations mix the two, which can sometimes cause tension. Fundraising also plays a major role in political campaigns which, despite numerous campaign finance reform laws, continues to be a highly controversial topic in American politics. Political action committees (PACs) are the best-known organizations that back candidates and political parties, though others such as 527 groups also have an impact. While public broadcasters are completely government-funded in much of the world, there are many countries where some funds must come from donations from the public. Pledge drives commonly occur about three times each year, usually lasting one to two weeks each time. Viewership and listenership often declines significantly during funding periods, so special programming may be aired in order to keep regular viewers and listeners interested. (Commercial television interestingly has a similar situation to this, known as sweeps). Fundraising organizations in the United States are often established for charitable purposes and are given a specific designation by the Internal Revenue Service, noted as 501(c)(3), as a charitable nonprofit organization. These fundraising organizations must outline a mission statement, which states its main purpose and objectives and its overall policies. A major organizations will list the programs in which it is involved, the kind of funding it receives, and how it allocates its expenses. In addition these organizations are rated annually for both efficiency and compliance by the American Institute of Philanthropy and other watchdog groups. Many non-profit organizations receive some annual funding from a financial endowment, which is a large sum of money that is usually invested to generate a sizable amount of interest each year. Endowments are generally created when a sizable gift is received from an individual or family, often as directed in a will upon the death of a family member. Corporate entities also may also contribute to endowments, which are often handled by charitable organizations known as foundations. While fundraising often involves the donation of money as an out-right gift, money may also be generated by selling a product of some kind, also known as product fundraising or in-kind gifts. Girl Scouts are well-known for selling cookies in order to generate funds. It is also common to see on-line impulse sales links to be accompanied by statements that a proportion of proceeds will be directed to a particular charitable foundation.

Some prominent charitable fundraising events

- Band Aid (1984), Live Aid (1985) and Sport Aid (1986), for famine relief in Ethiopia
- the annual Terry Fox Run, in honour of Terry Fox, for cancer research in Canada
- Red Nose Day in the United Kingdom

External links

- [http://www.afpnet.org/ Association of Fundraising Professionals]
- [http://nonprofit.about.com/od/fundraising/ Fundraising Articles and Resources at About.com]
- [http://www.fundraisingplans.com/ Fund Raising Plans for schools and youth groups]
- [http://www.charitywatch.org/ American Institute of Philanthropy]
- [http://www.bbb.com/ Better Business Bureau]
- [http://www.charitynavigator.com/ Charity Navigator]
- [http://www.fia.org.au Fundraising Institute - Australia] FIA) is the professional association for individuals responsible for fundraising and developing philanthropic support for a wide variety of Not for Profit, charitable organisations, throughout Australia.
- [http://www.cfnet.org/ Discussion forum and mailing list, primarily university]
- [http://www.afrds.org/ Association of Fund-Raising Distributors & Suppliers] - a not-for-profit trade association with information on raising funds through product sales.

Notes and References

# For example, # This is an example and not an advertisement. See the fine print at the bottom of this website, which states "The Foundation for American Veterans and The Lance Armstrong Foundation will receive 25% of all profits from the sale of their items." Category:Economics Category:Philanthropy

English language

English is a West Germanic language that is spoken in the United Kingdom, United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Ireland, South Africa, and many other countries. English is now the third-most spoken native language worldwide (after Chinese and Hindi), with some 380 million speakers. It has lingua franca status in many parts of the world, due to the military, economic, scientific, political and cultural influence of the British Empire in the 18th and 19th centuries and that of the United States from the 20th century to the present. Through the global influence of native English speakers in cinema, airlines, broadcasting, science, and the Internet in recent decades, English is now the most widely learned second language in the world. Many students worldwide are required to learn some English, and a working knowledge of English is required in many fields and occupations.

History

English is a West Germanic language that originated from the Old Saxon language brought to Britain by Germanic settlers from various parts of northwest Germany. The original Old English language was subsequently influenced by two successive waves of invasion. The first was by speakers of languages in the Scandinavian branch of the Germanic family, who colonised parts of Britain in the 8th and 9th centuries. The second wave was of the Normans in the 11th century, who spoke a variety of French. These two invasions caused English to become "creolised" to some degree (though it was never a full creole in the linguistic sense of the word); creolisation arises from the cohabitation of speakers of different languages, who develop a hybrid tongue for basic communication. Cohabitation with the Scandinavians resulted in a significant grammatical simplification and lexical enrichment of the Anglo-Friesian core of English; the later Norman occupation led to the grafting onto that Germanic core a more elaborate layer of words from the Romance branch of European languages; this new layer entered English through use in the courts and government. Thus, English developed into a "borrowing" language of considerable suppleness and huge vocabulary. According to the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, around the year 449, Vortigern, King of the British Isles, invited the "Angle kin" (Angles led by Hengest and Horsa) to help him against the Picts. In return, the Angles were granted lands in the south-east. Further aid was sought, and in response "came men of Ald Seaxum of Anglum of Iotum" (Saxons, Angles, and Jutes). The Chronicle talks of a subsequent influx of settlers who eventually established seven kingdoms, known as the heptarchy. Modern scholarship considers most of this story to be legendary and politically motivated. These Germanic invaders dominated the original Celtic-speaking inhabitants, whose languages survived largely in Scotland, Wales, Cornwall, and Ireland. The dialects spoken by the invaders formed what would be called Old English, which resembled some coastal dialects in what are now the Netherlands and north-west Germany. Later, it was strongly influenced by the North Germanic language Norse, spoken by the Vikings who settled mainly in the north-east (see Jorvik). The new and the earlier settlers spoke languages from different branches of the Germanic family; many of their lexical roots were the same or similar, although their grammars were more distant, including the prefixes, suffixes and inflections of many of their words. The Germanic language of these Old English inhabitants of Britain would be partly creolised by the contact with Norse invaders. This resulted in a stripping away of much of the grammar of Old English, including gender and case, with the notable exception of the pronouns; thus, the language became simpler and plainer. The most famous work from the Old English period is the epic poem "Beowulf", by an unknown poet. For the 300 years following the Norman Conquest in 1066, the Norman kings and the high nobility spoke only a variety of French. A large number of Norman words were assimilated into Old English, with some words doubling for Old English words (for instance, ox/beef, sheep/mutton). The Norman influence reinforced the continual evolution of the language over the following centuries, resulting in what is now referred to as Middle English. Among the changes was a broadening in the use of a unique aspect of English grammar, the "continuous" tenses, with the suffix "-ing". During the 15th century, Middle English was transformed by the Great Vowel Shift, the spread of a standardised London-based dialect in government and administration, and the standardising effect of printing. Modern English can be traced back to around the time of William Shakespeare. The most well-known work from the Middle English period is Geoffrey Chaucer's The Canterbury Tales.

Classification and related languages

The English language belongs to the western subbranch of the Germanic branch of the Indo-European family of languages. The closest living relative of English is Scots (Lallans), a West Germanic language spoken mostly in Scotland and parts of Northern Ireland. Like English, Scots is a direct descendant of Old English, also known as Anglo-Saxon. After Scots, the next closest relative is Frisian—spoken in the Netherlands and Germany. Other less closely related living languages include Dutch, Afrikaans, German, Plattdüütsch and the Scandinavian languages. Many French words are also intelligible to an English speaker (pronunciations are not always identical, of course), because English absorbed a tremendous amount of vocabulary from French, via the Norman language after the Norman conquest and directly from French in further centuries; as a result, a substantial share of English vocabulary is quite close to the French, with some minor spelling differences (word endings, use of old French spellings, etc.), as well as occasional differences in meaning.

Geographic distribution

Norman conquest English is the second or third most widely spoken language in the world today; a total of 600–700 million people use English regularly. About 377 million people use English as their mother tongue, and an equal number of people use it as their second or foreign language. It is used widely in either the public or private sphere in more than 100 countries all over the world. In addition, the language has occupied a primary place in international academic and business communities. The current status of the English language compares with that of Latin in the past. English is the primary language in Antigua and Barbuda, Australia (Australian English), the Bahamas, Barbados (Caribbean English), Bermuda, Belize, Canada (Canadian English), the Cayman Islands, Dominica, the Falkland Islands, Gibraltar, Grenada, Guernsey, Guyana, Ireland (Irish English), Isle of Man, Jamaica (Jamaican English), Jersey, Montserrat, New Zealand (New Zealand English), Saint Helena, Saint Lucia, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Trinidad and Tobago, the Turks and Caicos Islands, the United Kingdom (various forms of British English), the U.S. Virgin Islands, and the United States. English is also an important minority language of South Africa (South African English), and in several other former colonies and current dependent territories of the United Kingdom and the United States, for example Guam and Mauritius. In Hong Kong, English is an official language and is widely used in business activities. It is taught from kindergarten, and is the medium of instruction for a few primary schools, many secondary schools and all universities. Substantial numbers of students acquire native-speaker level. It is so widely used and spoken that it is inadequate to say it is merely a second or foreign language, though there are still many people in Hong Kong with poor or no command of English. The majority of English native speakers (67 to 70 per cent) live in the United States. Although the U.S. federal government has no official languages, it has been given official status by 27 of the 50 state governments, most of which have declared English their sole official language. Hawaii, Louisiana, and New Mexico have also designated Hawaiian, French, and Spanish, respectively, as official languages in conjunction with English. In many other countries where English is not a major first language, it is an official language; these countries include Cameroon, Fiji, the Federated States of Micronesia, Ghana, Gambia, India, Kiribati, Lesotho, Liberia, Kenya, Namibia, Nigeria, Malta, the Marshall Islands, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, Rwanda, the Solomon Islands, Samoa, Sierra Leone, Swaziland, Tanzania, Zambia and Zimbabwe. English is the most widely learned and used foreign language in the world, and as such, many linguists believe it is no longer the exclusive cultural emblem of "native English speakers", but rather a language that is absorbing aspects of cultures worldwide as it grows in use. Others believe that there are limits to how far English can go in suiting everyone for communication purposes. It is the language most often studied as a foreign language in Europe (32.6 per cent), followed by French, German, and Spanish. It is also the most studied in Japan, South Korea and in the Republic of China (Taiwan), where it is compulsory for most high school students. See English as an additional language.

English as a global language

See also: English on the Internet Because English is so widely spoken, it has been referred to as a "global language". While English is not the official language in many countries, it is the language most often taught as a second language around the world. It is also, by international treaty, the official language for aircraft/airport communication. Its widespread acceptance as a first or second language is the main indication of its global status. There are numerous arguments for and against English as a global language. On one hand, having a global language aids in communication and in pooling information (for example, in the scientific community). On the other hand, it excludes those who, for one reason or another, are not fluent. It can also marginalise populations whose first language is not the global language, and lead to a cultural hegemony of the populations speaking the global language as a first language. Most of these arguments hold for any candidate for a global language, though the last two counter-arguments do not hold for languages not belonging to any ethnic group (like Esperanto). A secondary concern with respect to the spread of global languages (English, Spanish, etc.) is the resulting disappearance of minority languages, often along with the cultures and religions that are primarily transmitted in those languages. English has been implicated in a number of historical and ongoing so-called "language deaths" and "linguicides" around the world, many of which have also led to the loss of cultural heritage. In the Americas, Native American nations have been most strongly affected by this phenomenon.

Dialects and regional variants

The expansiveness of the British and the Americans has spread English throughout the globe. Because of its global spread, it has bred a variety of English dialects and English-based creoles and pidgins. The major varieties of English in most cases contain several subvarieties, such as Cockney within British English, Newfoundland English within Canadian English, and African American Vernacular English ("Ebonics") within American English. English is considered a pluricentric language, with no variety being clearly considered the only standard. Some consider Scots as an English dialect. Pronunciation, grammar and lexis differ, sometimes substantially. The Scottish dialect retains many German aspects including guttural pronunciations. Because of English's wide use as a second language, English speakers can have many different accents, which may identify the speaker's native dialect or language. For more distinctive characteristics of regional accents, see Regional accents of English speakers. For more distinctive characteristics of regional dialects, see List of dialects of the English language. Many countries around the world have blended English words and phrases into their everyday speech and refer to the result by a colloquial name that implies its bilingual origins, which parallels the English language's own addiction to loan words and borrowings. Named examples of these ad-hoc constructions, distinct from pidgin and creole languages, include Engrish, Wasei-eigo, Franglais and Spanglish. (See List of dialects of the English language for a complete list.) Europanto combines many languages but has an English core.

Constructed variants of English

- Basic English is simplified for easy international use. It is used by some aircraft manufacturers and other international businesses to write manuals and communicate. Some English schools in the Far East teach it as an initial practical subset of English.
- Special English is a simplified version of English used by the Voice of America. It uses a vocabulary of 1500 words.
- English reform is an attempt to improve collectively upon the English language.
- Seaspeak and the related Airspeak and Policespeak, all based on restricted vocabularies, were designed by Edward Johnson in the 1980s to aid international co-operation and communication in specific areas.
- European English is a new variant of the English language created to become the common language in Europe.

Sounds

Vowels

Notes: It is the vowels that differ most from region to region. Where symbols appear in pairs, the first corresponds to the sounds used in North American English, the second corresponds to English spoken elsewhere. #North American English lacks this sound; words with this sound are pronounced with or . According to The Canadian Oxford Dictionary (1998), this sound is present in Standard Canadian English. #Many dialects of North American English do not have this vowel. See cot-caught merger. #The North American variation of this sound is a rhotic vowel. #Many speakers of North American English do not distinguish between these two unstressed vowels. For them, roses and Rosa's are pronounced the same, and the symbol usually used is schwa . #This sound is often transcribed with or with . #The letter U can represent either /u/ or the iotated vowel /ju/.

Consonants

This is the English Consonantal System using symbols from the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA). #The velar nasal is a non-phonemic allophone of /n/ in some northerly British accents, appearing only before /g/. In all other dialects it is a separate phoneme, although it only occurs in syllable codas. #The alveolar flap is an allophone of /t/ and /d/ in unstressed syllables in North American English and increasingly in Australian English. This is the sound of "tt" or "dd" in the words latter and ladder, which are homophones in North American English. This is the same sound represented by single "r" in some varieties of Spanish. #In some dialects, such as Cockney, the interdentals /θ/ and /ð/ are usually merged with /f/ and /v/, and in others, like African American Vernacular English, /ð/ is merged with /d/. In some Irish varieties, /θ/ and /ð/ become the corresponding dental plosives, which then contrast with the usual alveolar plosives. #The sounds are labialised in some dialects. Labialisation is never contrastive in initial position and therefore is sometimes not transcribed. #The voiceless velar fricative /x/ is used only by Scottish or Welsh speakers of English for Scots/Gaelic words such as loch or by some speakers for loanwords from German and Hebrew like Bach or Chanukah /xanuka/, or in some dialects such as Scouse (Liverpool) where the affricate [kx] is used instead of /k/ in words such as docker . Most native speakers have a great deal of trouble pronouncing it correctly when learning a foreign language. Most speakers use the sounds [k] and [h] instead. #Voiceless w is found in Scottish, Irish, some upper-class British, some eastern United States, and New Zealand accents. In all other dialects it is merged with /w/.

Voicing and Aspiration

Voicing and aspiration of stop consonants in English depend on dialect and context, but a few general rules can be given:
- Voiceless plosives and affricates (//, //, //, and //) are aspirated when they are word-initial or begin a stressed syllable and are not part of a consonant cluster—compare pin [] and spin [].
- In some dialects, aspiration extends to unstressed syllables as well.
- In other dialects, such as Indian English, most or all voiceless stops may remain unaspirated.
- Word-initial voiced plosives may be devoiced in some dialects.
- Word-terminal voiceless plosives may be unreleased or accompanied by a glottal stop in some dialects (e.g. many varieties of American English)—examples: tap [], sack [].
- Word-terminal voiced plosives may be devoiced in some dialects (e.g. some varieties of American English)—examples: sad [], bag []. In other dialects they are fully voiced in final position, but only partially voiced in initial position.

Intonation

Tone groups

English is an Intonation language. This means that the pitch of the voice is used syntactically, for example, to convey surprise and irony, or to change a statement into a question. In English, intonation patterns are on groups of words, which are called tone groups, tone units, intonation groups or sense groups. Tone groups are said on a single breath and, as a consequence, are of limited length, more often being on average five words long or lasting roughly two seconds. The structure of tone groups can have a crucial impact on the meaning of what is said. For example: :- :- :-

Characteristics of intonation

Each tone group can be subdivided into syllables, which can either be stressed (strong) or unstressed (weak). There is always a strong syllable, which is stressed more than the others. This is called the nuclear syllable. For example: :That | was | the | best | thing | you | could | have | done! Here, all syllables are unstressed, except the syllables/words "best" and "done", which are stressed. "Best" is stressed harder and, therefore, is the nuclear syllable. The nuclear syllable carries the main point the speaker wishes to make. For example: :John had stolen that money. (... not I) :John had stolen that money. (... you said he hadn't) :John had stolen that money. (... he wasn't given it) :John had stolen that money. (... not this money) :John had stolen that money. (... not something else) The nuclear syllable is spoken louder than all the others and has a characteristic change of pitch. The changes of pitch most commonly encountered in English are the rising pitch and the falling pitch, although the fall-rising pitch and/or the rise-falling pitch are sometimes used. For example: :When do you want to be paid? :Nów? (rising pitch. In this case, it denotes a question: can I be paid now?) :Nòw (falling pitch. In this case, it denotes a statement: I choose to be paid now)

Grammar

English grammar is based on its Germanic roots, though some scholars during the 1700s and 1800s attempted to impose Latin grammar upon it, with little success. English is just slightly inflected, much less so than most Indo-European languages. It compensates for this by placing more grammatical information in auxiliary words and word order. Unlike most other Indo-European languages, modern nominal groups (nouns) in English do not carry gender, although an archaic form of gender is technically assigned as either masculine, feminine, neuter or common. Engendered nouns are only apparent in special cases, such as "I loved that ship as if she were my own", where the noun "ship" is referred to by its feminine pronoun.

Vocabulary

Almost without exception, Germanic words (which include all the basics such as pronouns and conjunctions) are shorter and more informal. Latinate words are often regarded as more elegant or educated. However, the excessive use of Latinate words is often mistaken for either pretentiousness (as in the stereotypical policeman's talk of "apprehending the suspect") or obfuscation (as in a military document which says "neutralise" when it means "kill"). George Orwell's essay Politics and the English Language gives a thorough treatment of this feature of English. An English speaker is often able to choose between Germanic and Latinate synonyms: "come" or "arrive"; "sight" or "vision"; "freedom" or "liberty"—and sometimes also between a word inherited through French and a borrowing direct from Latin of the same root word: "oversee", "survey" or "supervise". The richness of the language is that such synonyms have slightly different meanings, enabling the language to be used in a very flexible way to express fine variations or shades of thought. List of Germanic and Latinate equivalents In everyday speech the majority of words will normally be Germanic. If a speaker wishes to make a forceful point in an argument in a very blunt way, Germanic words will usually be chosen. A majority of Latinate words (or at least a majority of content words) will normally be used in more formal speech and writing, such as a courtroom or an encyclopedia article. English is noted for the vast size of its active vocabulary and its fluidity. English easily accepts technical terms into common usage and imports new words which often come into common usage. In addition, slang provides new meanings for old words. In fact this fluidity is so pronounced that a distinction often needs to be made between formal forms of English and contemporary usage. See also sociolinguistics.

Number of words in English

As the General Explanations at the beginning of the Oxford English Dictionary state: :The Vocabulary of a widely diffused and highly cultivated living language is not a fixed quantity circumscribed by definite limits.... there is absolutely no defining line in any direction: the circle of the English language has a well-defined centre but no discernible circumference. The vocabulary of English is undoubtedly vast, but assigning a specific number to its size is more a matter of definition than of calculation. Unlike other languages, there is no Academy to define officially accepted words. Neologisms are coined regularly in medicine, science and technology—some enter wide usage; others remain restricted to small circles. Foreign words used in immigrant communities often make their way into wider English usage. Archaic, dialectal, and regional words might be considered "English" or not. The Oxford English Dictionary (2nd edition) includes over 500,000 headwords, following a rather inclusive policy: :It embraces not only the standard language of literature and conversation, whether current at the moment, or obsolete, or archaic, but also the main technical vocabulary, and a large measure of dialectal usage and slang (Supplement to the OED, 1933). The difficulty of defining the number of words is compounded by the emergence of new versions of English, such as Asian English.

Word origins

One of the consequences of the French influence is that the vocabulary of English is, to a certain extent, divided between those words which are Germanic (mostly Old English) and those which are "Latinate" (Latin-derived, mostly from Norman French but some borrowed directly from Latin). A computerised survey of about 80,000 words in the old Shorter Oxford Dictionary (3rd ed.) was published in Ordered Profusion by Thomas Finkenstaedt and Dieter Wolff (1973) which estimated the origin of English words as follows:
- French, including Old French and early Anglo-French: 28.3%
- Latin, including modern scientific and technical Latin: 28.24%
- Old and Middle English, Old Norse, and Dutch: 25%
- Greek: 5.32%
- No etymology given: 4.03%
- Derived from proper names: 3.28%
- All other languages contributed less than 1% James D. Nicoll made the oft-quoted observation: "The problem with defending the purity of the English language is that English is about as pure as a cribhouse whore. We don't just borrow words; on occasion, English has pursued other languages down alleyways to beat them unconscious and riffle their pockets for new vocabulary." [http://groups.google.com/groups?selm=1990May15.155309.8892%40watdragon.waterloo.edu&oe=UTF-8&output=gplain]

Writing system

English is written using the Latin alphabet. The spelling system or orthography of English is historical, not phonological. The spelling of words often diverges considerably from how they are spoken, and English spelling is often considered to be one of the most difficult to learn of any language that uses an alphabet. See English orthography.

Basic sound-letter correspondence

Written accents

English includes some words which can be written with accent marks. These words have mostly been imported from other languages, usually French. But it is increasingly rare for writers of English to actually use the accent marks for common words, even in very formal writing, to the point where actually writing the accent may be interpreted as a sign of pretension—though this view is counterbalanced by the view that fine typography should preserve accents, especially where it makes a distinction in pronunciation (compare façade vs. facade which would rhyme with cascade). The strongest tendency to retain the accent is in words that are atypical of English morphology and therefore still perceived as slightly foreign. For example, café has a pronounced final e, which would be silent by the normal English pronunciation rules. Some examples: ångström, appliqué, attaché, blasé, bric-à-brac, café, cliché, crème, crêpe, façade, fiancé(e), flambé, naïve, né(e), papier-mâché, passé, piñata, protégé, raison d'être, résumé, risqué, über-, vis-à-vis, voilà. For a more complete list, see List of English words with diacritics. Some words such as rôle and hôtel were first seen with accents when they were borrowed into English, but now the accent is almost never used. The words were considered very French borrowings when first used in English, even accused by some of being foreign phrases used where English alternatives would suffice, but today their French origin is largely forgotten. The accent on "élite" has disappeared from most publications today, but Time magazine still uses it. For some words such as "soupçon" however, the only spelling found in English dictionaries (the OED and others) uses the diacritic. Italics, with appropriate accents, are generally applied to foreign terms that are uncommonly used in or have not been assimilated into English: for example, adiós, coup d'état, crème brûlée, pièce de résistance, raison d'être, über (übermensch), vis-à-vis. It is also possible to use a diaeresis to indicate a syllable break, but again this is often left out or a hyphen used instead. Examples: coöperate (or co-operate), daïs, naïve, noël, reëlect (or re-elect). One publication that still uses a diaeresis to indicate a syllable break is the New Yorker magazine. Written accents are also used occasionally in poetry and scripts for dramatic performances to indicate that a certain normally unstressed syllable in a word should be stressed for dramatic effect, or to keep with the meter of the poetry. This use is frequently seen in archaic and pseudoarchaic writings with the "-ed" suffix, to indicate that the "e" should be fully pronounced, as with cursèd. In certain older texts (typically in Commonwealth English), the use of ligatures is common in words such as archæology, œsophagus, and encyclopædia. Such words have Latin or Greek origin. Nowadays, the ligatures have been generally replaced in Commonwealth English by the separated letters "ae" and "oe" ("archaeology", "oesophagus") and in American English by "e" ("archeology", "esophagus"). However, the spellings "oeconomy" and "oecology" are now generally replaced by "economy" and "ecology" in Commonwealth English, making these spellings the same as in American English.
See also

- English literature
- Formal written English - regional differences
- List of languages
- Common phrases in various languages
Dialects

- American and British English differences
- English speaking Europe
- General American
- List of dialects of the English language
Pronunciation

- General American
- International Phonetic Alphabet for English
- List of words of disputed pronunciation
- Non-native pronunciations of English
- Phonemic differentiation in English
- Received Pronunciation
- Regional accents of English speakers
- Rhotic and non-rhotic accents
Social, cultural or political

- English as a lingua franca for Europe
- English as an additional language
- English on the Internet
- Foreign language influences in English
- Languages in the United States
- Lists of English words of international origin
- Anglosphere
- Anglo-Saxon
Grammar

- English declension
- English plural
- English verb conjugation
- Initial-stress-derived noun
- Present progressive tense
Usage

- Dictionary
- Like
- List of archaic English words and their modern equivalents
- List of unusual English words
- Longest word in English
- Misspelling
- Gender-neutral language
- Singular they
- Siamese twins (English language)
External links

- [http://www.abroadlanguages.com/al/english/ Learning English abroad] and online. With dictionaries, games, penpals, etc.
- [http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/routesofenglish/index.shtml BBC - Radio 4 - Routes of English]
- [http://www.englishtenseswithcartoons.com Short Discriptions of the English Tenses]
- [http://www.ego4u.com/ English Grammar Online] free exercises, explanations, games and teaching materials on English as a foreign language
- [http://www.eslbase.com/ TEFL] - Teaching English as a Foreign Language - information and advice
- http://www.teach-yourself-english.com/ Easy-going learning aid
- [http://www.englisch-hilfen.de/en Learning English Online] grammar, vocabulary, exercises, exams - English as a second language.
- [http://www.english.hb.pl Pako's English Page - Articles and advice on learning English]
- [http://www.ethnologue.com/show_language.asp?code=eng Ethnologue report for English]
- [http://www.LanguageMonitor.com LanguageMonitor] - Watchdog on contemporary English usage
- [http://www.vec.ca/english/1/english.cfm Development of English]
- [http://www.esu.org English Speaking Union]
- [http://www2.ignatius.edu/faculty/turner/languages.htm The World's Most Widely Spoken Languages]
- [http://www.antimoon.com/ Antimoon - How to learn English] - Advice and inspiration for learners of English.
- [http://www.zozanga.com/ Zozanga ESL - Learn Online English] How to learn English.
- [http://www.quiz-tree.com/English_Spelling_main.html Free English spelling quizzes]
- [http://inenglishofcourse.pl Conversation and Resource Point for Learners of English]
- [http://www.globalenglishsalon.com Global English Salon] - Listen to English online free.
- [http://www.loecsen.com/travel/discover_pop.php?lang=en&to_lang=2&learn-English/ Learn and listen to useful expressions in English] Each expression is presented with an audio recording and an illustration
- [http://www.whatdoesthatmean.com What Does That Mean?] A wiki based lexicon of English idioms from around the world
- [http://www1.ku-eichstaett.de/SLF/EngluVglSW/ELiX/bge.pdf Basic Global English]
Dictionaries

- [http://www.oed.com Oxford English Dictionary] The definitive record of the English language
- [http://dicts.info/dictlist1.php All free English dictionaries] Collection of many free English dictionaries.
- [http://dictionary.cambridge.org Cambridge Dictionary]
- [http://www.freelang.net/dictionary/french.html Freelang - French-English Dictionary made by Bertrand Cornu]
Further reading

- Baugh AC and Cable T. A history of the English language (5th ed), Rouledge, 2002 (ISBN 0415280990_
- Crystal, D. The Cambridge encyclopedia of the English language (2nd ed), Cambridge University Press, 2003 (ISBN 0521530334)
- Halliday, MAK. An introduction to functional grammar (2nd ed), London, Edward Arnold, 1994 (ISBN 0340557826)
- McArthur, T (ed). The Oxford Companion to the English Language, Oxford University Press, 1992 (ISBN 019214183X)
- Robinson, Orrin, "Old English and Its Closest Relatives", Stanford Univ Press, 1992 (ISBN 0-8047-2221-8) English language Category:Languages of Fiji Category:Languages of Guam Category:Languages of Hong Kong Category:Languages of Singapore Category:Languages of the Philippines Category:Languages of the United Kingdom Category:Languages of the United States Category:Languages of Canada Category:Languages of New Zealand Category:Languages of India als:Englische Sprache ko:영어 ms:Bahasa Inggeris zh-min-nan:Eng-gí ja:英語 nb:Engelsk språk simple:English language th:ภาษาอังกฤษ

Dictionary

For the sister project Wiktionary, see [http://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/Main_Page http://wiktionary.org/]. A dictionary is a list of words with their definitions, a list of characters with their glyphs, or a list of words with corresponding words in other languages. In some languages, words can appear in many different forms, but only the lemma form appears as the main word or headword in most dictionaries. Many dictionaries also provide pronunciation information; grammatical information; word derivations, histories, or etymologies; illustrations; usage guidance; and examples in phrases or sentences. Dictionaries are most commonly found in the form of a book.

Word order

Today, dictionaries of languages with alphabetic and syllabic writing systems list words in alphabetical or some analogous phonetic order. Words and characters in ideographic writing systems such as Chinese are sorted according to one of numerous schemes based on the components, number of strokes, overall shape, or pronunciation of each character. Due to the nature of Chinese characters, linear sorts are particularly unsuitable for Chinese dictionaries. (See collation for more information on linguistic sorting). The first English alphabetical dictionary came out in 1604 and alphabetical ordering was a rarity until the 18th century. Before alphabetical listings, dictionaries were organized by topic, i.e. a list of animals all together in one topic.

Pronunciation

Dictionaries have had a variety of means of expressing the means of pronouncing words in those languages that are not entirely phonetic. Three different methods are common. The earliest was simply to indicate the syllables that have greater stress using accent marks, such as in Samuel Johnson's eighteenth century dictionary. Here the accent mark followed the stressed syllable. This is analogous to the tonal marks for Chinese or the accent nucleus for Japanese. Regular languages such as Spanish do not need any special marking for this purpose. For languages that have no official standard pronunciation, like English or German, a system of respelling was introduced with the letters given diacritics, also known as accent marks, (e.g., macrons, tildes, breves, circumflexes) that do not occur in ordinary writing to assist the reader in pronouncing the words. These had the additional capacity for accepting regional differences, especially in a federal society. For example, most Americans pronounce the first vowel in one group of words such as "ask" and "dance" in one manner, while it is a standard for the English to pronounce them in a consistenly different manner. Some dictionaries before 1970 added an accent mark of one dot atop the letter "a," which specifies this choice, rather than either one definitively. Finally, totally new phonetic alphabets such as IPA were devised, especially for those languages like French which have an official pronunciation. These use an accent mark that precedes a stressed syllable. It is also used to indicate only one preferred pronunciation, such as RP or General American, for foreigners to learn the language or for domestic people to alter their dialect. Currently this system has prestige, but it cannot easily interrelate dialectic variations.

Coverage

Dictionaries vary wildly in size and scope. A dictionary that attempts to cover as many words from a particular speech community as possible is called a maximizing dictionary (e.g. the Oxford English Dictionary), whereas a dictionary that attempts to cover only a limited selection of words from a speech community is called a minimizing dictionary (e.g. a dictionary containing the 2000 most frequently used words in the English language).

Special-purpose dictionaries

There are many different types of dictionaries, including bilingual, multilingual, historical, biographical, and geographical dictionaries.

Bilingual dictionaries

In bilingual dictionaries, each entry has translations of words in another language. For example, in a Japanese-English dictionary, the entry tsuki has the corresponding English word, moon. In dictionaries between English and a language using a non-Roman script, entry words in the non-English language may either be printed and sorted in the native order, or romanized and sorted in Roman alphabetical order.

Specialized dictionaries

Specialized dictionaries (also referred to as technical dictionaries) focus on linguistic and factual matters relating to specific subject fields. A specialized dictionary may have a relatively broad coverage, in that it covers several subject fields such as science and technology (a multi-field dictionary), or their coverage may be more narrow, in that they cover one particular subject field such as law (a single-field dictionary) or even a specific sub-field such as contract law (a sub-field dictionary). Specialized dictionaries may be maximizing dictionaries, i.e. they attempt to achieve comprehensive coverage of the terms in the subject field concerned, or they may be minimizing dictionaries, i.e. they attempt to cover only a limited number of the specialized vocabulary concerned. Generally, multi-field dictionaries tend to be minimizing, whereas single-field and sub-field dictionaries tend to be maximizing. See also LSP dictionary.

Character dictionaries

In East Asian languages, a dictionary form for Han (Chinese) characters has developed, called Kan-wa jiten (literally 'Han-Japanese dictionary') in Japanese and Okpyeon ('Jewel Book') in Korean. Each entry has one Chinese character with information about stroke count and order, readings (pronunciations), and a list of words using that character.

Glossaries

Another variant is the glossary, an alphabetical list of defined terms in a specialized field, such as medicine or science. The simplest dictionary, a defining dictionary, provides a core glossary of the simplest meanings of the simplest concepts. From these, other concepts can be explained and defined, in particular for those who are first learning a language. In English the commercial defining dictionaries typically include only one or two meanings of under 2000 words. With these, the rest of English, and even the 4000 most common English idioms and metaphors, can be defined.

Variations between dictionaries

Prescription and description

Dictionary makers apply two basic philosophies to the defining of words: prescriptive or descriptive. The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) is descriptive, and attempts to describe the actual use of words. Noah Webster, on the other hand, intent on forging a distinct identity for the American language, altered spellings and accentuated differences in meaning and pronunciation of numerous words. This is why American English now uses the spelling "color" while Commonwealth English uses "colour". (See American and British English differences.) While not always accepted in the UK, the American spellings are universally understood; likewise the British spellings are not acceptable in America. While descriptivists would charge that prescriptivism is an unnatural attempt to dictate usage or curtail change, prescriptivists would argue that to document, without judgment, usages which they consider improper or inferior sanctions those usages by default, causing the language to deteriorate in practice. Although much is made of these differing views, they usually apply to a very small number of controversial words, while not affecting the vast majority for which there is common agreement. But the softening of usage notations, from the previous edition, for two words, ain't and irregardless, out of over 450,000 in Webster's Third in 1961, was enough to provoke outrage among many with prescriptivist leanings, who branded the dictionary as "permissive." The prescriptive/descriptive issue has been given so much consideration in modern times that most dictionaries of English apply the descriptive method to definitions, while additionally informing readers of attitudes which may influence their choices on words often considered vulgar, offensive, erroneous, or easily confused. Merriam-Webster is subtle, only adding italicized notations such as, sometimes offensive or nonstand (nonstandard.) American Heritage goes further, discussing issues separately in numerous "usage notes." Encarta provides similar notes, but is more prescriptive, offering warnings and admonitions against the use of certain words considered by many to be offensive or illiterate, such as, "an offensive term for..." or "a taboo term meaning..." Because of the broad use of dictionaries, and their acceptance by many as language authorities, their treatment of the language does affect usage to some degree, even the most descriptive dictionaries providing conservative continuity. In the long run, however, usage primarily determines the meanings of words in English, and the language is being changed and created every day. As Jorge Luis Borges says in the prologue to "El otro, el mismo": "It is often forgotten that (dictionaries) are artificial repositories, put together well after the languages they define. The roots of language are irrational and of a magical nature."

Other variations

Since words and their meanings develop over time, dictionary entries are organized to reflect these changes. Dictionaries may either list meanings in the historical order in which they appeared, or may list meanings in order of popularity and most common use. Dictionaries also differ in the degree to which they are encyclopedic, providing considerable background information, illustrations, and the like, or linguistic, concentrating on etymology, nuances of meaning, and quotations demonstrating usage. Any dictionary has been designed to fulfil one or more functions. The dictionary functions chosen by the maker(s) of the dictionary provide the basis for all lexicographic decisions, from the selection of entry words, over the choice of information types, to the choice of place for the information (e.g. in an article or in an appendix). There are two main types of function. The communication-oriented functions comprise text reception (understanding), text production, text revision, and translation. The knowledge-oriented functions deal with situations where the dictionary is used for acquiring specific knowledge about a particular matter, and for acquiring general knowledge about something. The optimal dictionary is one that contains information directly relevant for the needs of the users relating to one or more of these functions. It is important that the information is presented in a way that keeps the lexicographic information costs at a minimum.

History

The art and craft of writing dictionaries is called lexicography. One of the earliest dictionaries known, and which is still extant today in an abridged form, was written in Latin during the reign of the emperor Augustus. It is known by the title "De Significatu Verborum" ("On the meaning of words") and was originally compiled by Verrius Flaccus. It was twice abridged in succeeding centuries, first by Festus, and then by Paul the Deacon. Verrius Flaccus' dictionary was an abridged list of difficult or antiquated words, whose usage was illustrated by quotations from early Roman authors. Shuo Wen Jie Zi (说文解字), written in the early 2nd century, was the first Chinese language dictionary. The author Xu Shen first organized Chinese characters by radical. The first true English dictionary was the Table Alphabeticall of 1606, although it only included 3,000 words and the definitions it contained were little more than synonyms. The first one to be at all comprehensive was Thomas Blount's dictionary Glossographia of 1656. This was followed by Samuel Johnson's famous and more complete dictionary of 1755. In 1806, Noah Webster's dictionary was published by the G&C Merriam Company of Springfield, Massachusetts which still publishes Merriam-Webster dictionaries, but the term Webster's is considered generic and can be used by any dictionary. The most complete dictionary of the English language is the Oxford English Dictionary. The first edition was properly begun in 1860 and was completed in 1928, by which time a supplement that took an additional five years to complete was already necessary. Also see [http://angli02.kgw.tu-berlin.de/lexicography/data/b_history.html A Brief History of English Lexicography]

Miscellaneous

The Irish mathematical physicist, J. L. Synge, created a game, Game of Circ, to emphasize the circular reasoning implicit in the defining process of any standard dictionary.

List of major dictionaries

Arabic

- Kitab al-Ayn
- Al Mujam al waseet
- Dictionary of Modern Written Arabic

Catalan

- [http://www.grec.net/home/cel/dicc.htm Diccionari de l'Enciclopèdia Catalana]
- [http://pdl.iec.es/entrada/diec.asp Diccionari de l'Institut d'Estudis Catalans]

Chinese

- Shuowen Jiezi
- Kangxi Zidian
- Rime dictionary

Dutch

- [http://www.vandale.nl Van Dale]
- [http://blackorwhite.nl/woordenboek Online Nederlands Woordenboek]

English

- Oxford English Dictionary (descriptive)
- Concise Oxford Dictionary
- New Oxford Dictionary of English
- New Oxford American Dictionary
- The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language
- Webster's New Universal Unabridged Dictionary
- Samuel Johnson's A Dictionary of the English Language (prescriptive)
- Noah Webster's An American Dictionary of the English Language (prescriptive)
- Webster's Third New International Dictionary (descriptive)
- The Century Dictionary
- The Macquarie Dictionary, a dictionary of Australian English
- The Chambers Dictionary
- The Collins COBUILD
- The Collins English Dictionary
- [http://www.romlawonline.com Dean's Law Dictionary] - includes 145,000 plus terms, over 170,000 case cites, 26,000 Latin Words,65,000 plus synonyms, its digital and created with artificial intelligence.
- Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
- [http://lawyerintl.com/modules/dictionary/ Law Dictionary] - includes legal terms from the Bouvier Law Dictionary.
- [http://www.w3dictionary.com/ W3Dictionary] - incorporates several popular and reliable dictionaries into one online source.

French

- Le dictionnaire de l'Académie française (prescriptive)
- Dictionnaire alphabétique et analogique de la langue française ("Le Robert") (descriptive)
- Petit Robert (abridgement)
- Dictionnaire de la langue française (Littré)

German

- Duden
- Der Große Muret Sanders by Langenscheidt
- Deutsches Rechtswörterbuch http://www.rzuser.uni-heidelberg.de/~cd2/drw/
- Deutsches Wörterbuch by Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm http://www.dwb.uni-trier.de/
- Wörterbuch der deutschen Gegenwartssprache http://www.dwds.de/?woerterbuch=1&qu=
- PONS Großwörterbuch Englisch

Italian

- [http://www.demauroparavia.it De Mauro] Italian definition
- [http://www.oxfordparavia.it Oxford Paravia] Italian«--»English
- [http://www.garzantilinguistica.it Garzanti Linguistica] Italian definition, Italian«--»English, Italian«--»French (free registration is required)

Japanese

:Main article: Japanese dictionaries
- Shin Meikai kokugo jiten (新明解国語辞典), a medium-sized Japanese-Japanese dictionary
- Kōjien (広辞苑), a large, often quoted Japanese-Japanese dictionary
- Nihon Kokugo Daijiten (日本国語大辞典), the largest Japanese-Japanese dictionary, in 14 volumes
- Shogakukan Progressive Japanese-English Dictionary (小学館プログレッシブ和英中辞典), a medium-sized Japanese-English Dictionary
- Kenkyusha's New Japanese-English Dictionary (新和英大辞典), the largest Japanese-English Dictionary
- Dai Kan-Wa jiten (大漢和辞典), a comprehensive kanji dictionary containing about 50,000 characters.
Norwegian

- Norsk Ordbok
Portuguese

- Dicionário Aurélio
- Dicionário Houaiss
- Michaelis
- Dicionário do Português Contemporâneo (Lisbon Academy of Sciences)
- Grande Dicionário da Língua Portuguesa (Porto Editora)
- [http://www.priberam.pt/dlpo/dlpo.aspx Priberam]
Romanian

- Dicţionarul explicativ al limbii române
Spanish

- Diccionario de la Real Academia Española
- Diccionario de uso del español de María Moliner
Swedish

- Svenska Akademiens Ordbok
Urdu

- Feroze ul Lughat
Publishers

- Cambridge University Press
- Chambers Harrap
- Collins
- Funk and Wagnalls
- Merriam-Webster
- Oxford University Press
- PWN
List of online dictionaries
# Online versions of printed dictionaries #
- [http://www.m-w.com/ The Merriam-Webster Dictionary] #
- [http://www.oed.com/ The Oxford English Dictionary] (requires subscription) #
- [http://www.askoxford.com/dictionaries The Compact Oxford English Dictionary] #
- [http://dictionary.cambridge.org/ Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary etc. (Cambridge Dictionaries Online)] #
- [http://www.ldoceonline.com/ Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English] #
- [http://eedic.naver.com/ Collins COBUILD Advanced Learner's English Dictionary 4th edition (note: Korean site, but all results in English)] #
- [http://www.cooldictionary.com/ Talking, fully crosslinked dictionary using Webster, Wiktionary and Wikipedia] #
- [http://www.bartleby.com/61/ The American Heritage® Dictionary of the English Language Fourth Edition] #
- [http://www.macquariedictionary.com.au The Macquarie Dictionary] Australian English (requires subscription) #
- [http://www.americana.ru Americana English-Russian Dictionary] - the first bilingual dictionary about the United States, over 20,000 entries #
- [http://www.dwds.de/wdg Wörterbuch der deutschen Gegenwartssprache] (Dictionary of contemporary German language) #
- [http://www.blueray.com/magic/ Magic Words: A Dictionary] (free online version, 500+ essay-style entries) #
- [http://dictionary.goo.ne.jp/ Four Japanese Dictionaries] published by Sanseido, including the EXCEED EJ/JE dictionaries and the big Daijirin monolingual dictionary #
- [http://kod.kenkyusha.co.jp/service/ Kenkyusha Online Dictionary] featuring several major print dictionaries including the 5th edition New Japanese-English Dictionary (subscription) # Online-only general dictionaries #
- [http://www.doubletongued.org Double-Tongued Word Wrester] A dictionary of new and old words from the fringes of English, professionally collected, researched, and defined. Includes slang, argot, jargon, and colloquialisms. #
- [http://www.dendanskenetordbog.dk/netdob/ Netordbogen] #
- [http://www.giantpicturedictionary.com/ Picture Dictionary] Online Picture Dictionary with search function. Uses pictures and symbols from Universal Picture Language. Grasp the meaning of a word with just a glance at its representative picture. #
- [http://open-dictionary.com/ Open Dictionary] Offers various definitions, translations and pronunciations in many languages (uses Wiktionary and WordNet for most of its entries). #
- [http://www.wordwebonline.com WordWebOnline.com] A dictionary/thesaurus and meta-search (also available as a [http://wordweb.info/free/ free download]) #
- [http://www.thefreedictionary.com TheFreeDictionary.com] A dictionary, a thesaurus, a literature reference library, and a search engine all in one. #
- [http://www.hyperdictionary.com hyperdictionary.com] One of the more comprehensive online dictionaries. #
- [http://www.elook.org/dictionary/ eLook Dictionary] A dictionary with synonyms, antonyms, and related words. #
- [http://lookword.com/ Lookword free online Dictionary] English dictionary. #
- [http://www.webster-dictionary.org/ www.webster-dictionary.org] A dictionary and a thesaurus. A republisher of existing Internet dictionaries. Appears to be an attempt at a portal site. #
- [http://www.dictionary.com Dictionary.com] A dictionary and thesaurus and other language aids. #
- [http://www.dictionary.co.uk Dictionary.co.uk] A British English online dictionary. #
- [http://www.dictionarydefinition.net/ Dictionary Definition] #
- [http://www.english-dictionary.us/ English dictionary] Fast and simple English dictionary with US and UK spellings. #
- [http://www.objectgraph.com/dictionary ObjectGraph.com] Suggestive dictionary, Suggests words as you type. #
- [http://www.misspelled.com/ Misspelled.com Dictionary Definitions of English Words] #
- Portuguese: [http://www.priberam.pt/dlpo/dlpo.aspx] # Dictionary Collections #
- [http://www.dicts.info All free dictionaries project] Vast collection of all existing free dictionaries. #
- [http://dmoz.org/Reference/Dictionaries/ Dictionaries listed on DMOZ] #
- [http://www.freesearch.co.uk/dictionary/ freesearch dictionary] British English dictionary provided by Cambridge University. #
- [http://www.HavenWorks.com/dictionary HavenWorks] #
- [http://www.netzdino.de/woerterbuch.html Woerterbuch] List of available Online-Dictionaries. #
- [http://www.onelook.com OneLook] Searches almost 1000 online dictionaries for more than 6 million indexed words. #
- [http://www.dictionary.info Dictionary] #
- [http://www.yourdictionary.com Yourdictionary.com] Large list of online dictionaries. #
- [http://www.majstro.com/Web/Majstro/wboek_zoek.php?gebrTaal=eng&bronTaal=eng&doelTaal=eng Majstro's dictionary database] Dictionary search #
- [http://www.a-z-dictionaries.com A-Z-Dictionaries] Large collection of dictionaries and resources. #
- [http://www.xrefer.com xrefer] Offers access to dictionaries and other reference works. Pay site. # Specialty Dictionaries #
- [http://www.romlawonline.com Dean's Law Dictionary] - includes 145,000 plus terms, over 170,000 case cites, 26,000 Latin Words, 65,000 plus synonyms, its digital and created with artificial intelligence. #
- [http://www.washjeff.edu/capl/ CAPL: Culturally Authentic Pictorial Lexicon] German-English bidirectional visual dictionary with authentic images of German speaking world #
- [http://www.blueray.com/dictionary/ Dictionaries of All-Consonant and All-Vowel Words] Several thousand definitions of unusual words, with copious literary examples of usage. #
- [http://www.dict.pl e-DICT] English-Polish, Polish-English dictionary #
- [http://www.dep.pl DeP] German-Polish, Polish-German dictionary #
- [http://www.sprog.asb.dk/sn/cisg/ Danish-English Law Dictionary] The only on-line dictionary covering Danish and English legal language. #
- [http://netdob.asb.dk/iasdkgb/ Danish-English Accounting Dictionary] The authoritative dictionary on Danish and English accouting terminology with collocations and phrases. #
- [http://www.chass.utoronto.ca/english/emed/emedd.html The Early Modern English Dictionaries Database] A collection of the earliest English language dictionaries. #
- [http://www.pseudodictionary.com Pseudodictionary] Slang, colloquialisms, and made-up words. Accepts new entries. No intent to be a serious reference work. #
- [http://www.urbandictionary.com/ Urban Dictionary] Slang dictionary that you can edit. #
- [http://skepdic.com/ The Skeptic's Dictionary] Dictionary taking a cynical view on new age and occult words. # Multilingual Dictionaries #
- [http://www.dicts.info/ud.php Universal dictionary] Multilingual dictionary interconnecting more than 35 languages. #
- [http://www.popjisyo.com/WebHint/Portal_e.aspx POPjisyo is an Online Japanese/Chinese/Korean/English dictionary] which adds pop-up hints to other sites and generates study-lists/matching games based on content. #
- [http://www.majstro.com/Web/Majstro/dict.php?gebrTaal=eng&bronTaal=epo&doelTaal=eng Majstro Multilingual Translation Dictionary]: An on-line translation dictionary that uses Esperanto as a bridge language #
- [http://www.online-dictionary.biz/ Online dictionary] free multi-lingual online dictionary between English and one of seven other languages. #
- [http://www.shabdkosh.com English-Hindi Dictionary ] #
- [http://education.yahoo.com/reference/dict_en_es/ Yahoo! Spanish-English Dictionary] #
- [http://www.websters-online-dictionary.org/ Webster's Online Dictionary] – the Rosetta Edition. Over 3,000,000 terms across 90 languages. #
- [http://dict.leo.org/ Leo] - English-German (and vice-versa) dictionary; English-French (and vice-versa) dictionary, cf. leo.org #
- [http://www.ego4u.com/en/dictionary English-German Dictionary] (and vice-versa) with IPA pronunciation information #
- [http://europa.eu.int/eurodicautom/Controller Terminology database of the EU], with 11 EU languages #
- [http://www.sprawk.com/ Sprawk Semantic Dictionary], based on WordNet with over 20 languages #
- [http://www.woerterbuch.info woerterbuch.info] - English-German Dictionary with over 600.000 translations #
- [http://www.dict.cc/ dict.cc] - English-German (and vice-versa) Dictionary #
- [http://www.ilexer.org/ ilexer] - English-German (and vice-versa) Dictionary #
- [http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~jwb/wwwjdic.html WWWJDIC] online Japanese-English/German/French dictionary. Has text-glossing, verb conjugations, etc. #
- [http://www.spanish-translator-services.com/dictionaries/finance-english-spanish/index.htm English - Spanish Financial Dictionary] English to Spanish Dictionary of Finance Terms. #
- [http://www.spanish-translator-services.com/dictionaries/finance-spanish-english/index.htm Spanish - English Financial Dictionary] Spanish to English Dictionary of Finance Terms. #
- [http://www.spanish-translator-services.com/dictionaries/accounting-spanish-english/index.htm English - Spanish Accounting Dictionary] Spanish to English Dictionary of Acounting Terms. #
- [http://www.spanish-translator-services.com/dictionaries/accounting-english-spanish/index.htm Spanish - English Accounting Dictionary] English to Spanish Dictionary of Acounting Terms. # Downloadable Dictionaries #
- [http://www.dicts.info/uddl.php Universal dictionary download] - Hundreds of downloadable free dictionaries. #
- [http://www.romlawonline.com Dean's Law Dictionary] - includes 145,000 plus terms, over 170,000 case cites, 26,000 Latin Words, 65,000 plus synonyms, its digital and created with artificial intelligence. #
- [http://msowww.anu.edu.au/~ralph/OPTED/index.html Online Plain Text English Dictionary] – based on the Gutenberg Webster's Abridged Dictionary #
- [http://www.gutenberg.net/cgi-bin/search/t9.cgi?author=&title=webster%27s+abridged&subject=&ntes=&whole=yes&language=&filetype=&class_lc= The Gutenberg Webster's Abridged Dictionary] – In parts. First 200 pages available without copyrights, rest available. #
- [http://wordweb.info/free/ WordWeb] Free international English dictionary for Windows (Pro version also available) #
- [http://www.ifinger.com/shop/productpresentation.asp?pID=44 iFinger: FREE Merriam-Webster Concise Dictionary] Free registration is required after clicking on DOWNLOAD #
- [http://www.ego4u.com/en/lingo4u-dictionary Lingo4u Dictionary] - English-German Dictionary for Windows (Freeware) The DICT protocol is a client/server model for dictionaries. Many free dictionaries are appearing in the dict format.
List of collaborative dictionaries
An open content dictionary project is the Collaborative International Dictionary of English, using Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913) and WordNet as its sources. The GNU version of it, GCIDE, is being developed collaboratively under the terms of the GNU General Public License. Other collaborative dictionary projects:
- Papillon Multilingual Dictionary with a Pivot Structure [http://www.papillon-dictionary.org]
- EDICT Digital Japanese-English dictionary. [http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~jwb/edict.html]
- Everything2 Contains, among other things, an entire Webster 1913 dictionary
- freedict Bilingual dictionaries, released under the GPL
- PseudoDictionary New coinages and unusual words, mostly slang
- [http://akira.arts.kuleuven.ac.be/waran/tools_e.html Reading Tutor] - Digital multilingual dictionary: Japanese-Japanese, Japanese-English, Japanese-German, Japanese-Dutch
- [http://www.1st-dictionary.com Free Online Dictionary] Easy to use dictionary, containing over 170,000 terms and definitions, and also a large thesaurus with related words for each term
- Urban Dictionary Slang dictionary
- Wiktionary A sister project of the well-known collaborative encyclopedia Wikipedia
See also

- Thesaurus
- Rhyming dictionary
- Pronouncing dictionary
- Monolingual learners' dictionaries
- Encyclopedic dictionary
- Corpus linguistics
- COBUILD, a large corpus of English text
- Pronunciation (simple guide to markup, American)
- DICT, the dictionary server protocol
- Lexicographic error
- Centre for Lexicography
References

- Manual of Specialised Lexicography, Henning Bergenholtz/Sven Tarp (eds.), Benjamins Publishing, 1995
- Diction and Stylistics of the 21st century, Darwin, Charles Schickelgruber Maxis (ed.), Jackson Publishing, 2001
- The Bilingual LSP Dictionary, Sandro Nielsen, Gunter Narr Verlag 1994
- Dictionaries, The Art and Craft of Lexicography, Sidney I. Landau, Simon & Schuster, 1998, hardcover, ISBN 0684180960
- The Professor and the Madman, A Tale of Murder, Insanity, and the Making of the Oxford English Dictionary, Simon Winchester, HarperPerennial, New York, 1998, trade paperback, ISBN 0-06-017596-6. (published in the UK as The Surgeon of Crowthorne) Category:Dictionaries Category:Technical communication tools ko:사전 ms:Kamus ja:辞典 simple:Dictionary th:พจนานุกรม

Non sexist language

Gender-neutral language (gender-generic, gender-inclusive, non-sexist, or sex-neutral language) is language that attempts to refer neither to males nor females when discussing an abstract or hypothetical person whose sex cannot otherwise be determined. This most commonly means using gender-neutral pronouns instead of gender-specific pronouns. In Indo-European and Afro-Asiatic languages, male pronouns have traditionally been used when referring to both genders or to a person or people of an unknown gender.

Reference

Examples

One might state, "Tomorrow I will meet my new doctor; I hope he is friendly."; however, unless one is certain that the new doctor is a man, advocates of gender-neutral language generally argue that it would be better to state, "Tomorrow I will meet my new doctor, whom I hope is friendly". Critics argue that this creates an undue burden on the speaker by forcing a change to the structure of the sentence, with the result often being rather awkward. They would cite the above example as a case in point, as it seems rather contrived, since non-defining relative clauses are extremely rare in everyday speech. (Colloquially speaking, the speech given in this example would often be described as sounding like the speaker was "talking like a book".) A business might advertise that it is looking for a new chair or chairperson, rather than chairman, which gender-neutral language advocates feel would imply that only a man would be acceptable for the position. Some advocates of gender-neutral language see it as unobjectionable to use gender-specific terms provided they are equally applied. For instance (continuing the example), one could refer to a male in such a position as a chairman, provided that a female would be referred to by the equivalent term chairwoman. Others claim, however, that the sex of the occupant of the chair is irrelevant and thus chairperson or chair are the only acceptable terms.

Common positions

Views among advocates of gender-neutral language are spread over a wide range, from passionate argumentation in favour, to consistent use in their own speech and writing, to occasional use. However, most people simply decide for themselves whether or not to use it in their writing. A great many people have no opinion on gender-neutral language and make no special effort to avoid what advocates may describe as sexist language. However, many terms advocated or proposed by advocates of gender-neutral language, such as firefighter or he or she, have entered the common lexicon (in some cases, before advocacy of gender-neutral language began), and may be used by those who do not have any particular feeling about the subject. Still others regard gender-neutral language as revisionist, as promoting poor or heavy writing, excessively "politically correct," or simply a cosmetic change that does nothing to actually repel sexism. They may consciously refuse to use forms of speech advocated by promoters of gender-neutral language. See below.

History

Many of the masculine terms in Modern English come from gender neutral terms in Old English. For example, the word man was originally gender neutral and could be qualified to specify male or female. While the male qualification died out, the female wíf (which produced woman) survived, leaving man with both its original gender-neutral meaning (people), especially in compounds such as mankind, and the gender-specific meaning, male. Both Ancient Greek and Classical Latin show a similar process for anthropos and homo respectively. Both of these words mean "man/humanity in general" or "human being": as in the modern anthropology or homo sapiens. For "male human as opposed to female human", there exist the separate words aner (andros-) and vir (roots of the English androgen and virile, respectively). Most modern descendants of the Latin homo such as French homme, Italian uomo, and Spanish hombre are grammatically masculine and contain two meanings: 1) a male human and 2) any human being (e.g. French Musee de l'homme for an anthropology museum exhibiting human culture, not specifically "male culture"). These languages therefore lack a third, neutral option between the gender-specific words for man and woman as homo or anthropos provided. In Romanian, however, the cognate om retains its original meaning of "any human person", as opposed to the gender-specific words for man and woman (bǎrbat and femeie, respectively). The word human is from Latin humanus, the adjectival form of homo. During the 19th century, attempts to overlay Latin grammar rules onto English required the use of feminine endings in nouns ending with -or. This produced words like doctress and professress and even lawyeress, all of which have faded from use; though waitress, stewardess, and actress persist. Belief in social effects of language was largely a 20th century phenomenon in the English-speaking world, and has been linked to the development of the principle of linguistic relativity by Benjamin Whorf and others.

Disputed issues

There are a wide range of disputed issues in the debate over 'non-sexist language'. Are there inherently sexist language forms, and if so, what are they? If they exist, should they be changed? If they should be changed, how should this be achieved?

Are some uses of language inherently sexist?

Some advocates of gender-neutral language, including many feminists, argue that traditional language fails to reflect the presence of women in society adequately. In general, they complain about a number of issues:
- Use of what they consider to be exclusively gender-specific pronouns like "he".
- Use of "man" to refer to all people.
- Use of gender-specific job titles.
- Use of Miss and Mrs. (see Ms.).
- non-parallel usage, such as "man and wife".
- Stereotypical words such as virile and ladylike Feminist advocates of gender-neutral language believe the following about language which they deem sexist:
- It marginalizes women and creates the impression of a male-dominated society.
- It can be patronising, for example treating women only as marriage material
- It can perpetuate stereotypes about the "correct" way for a man or woman to behave. A deeper variant of these arguments involves the Sapir-Whorf hypothesis, the suggestion that our language shapes our thought processes and that in order to eliminate sexism we would do well to eliminate allegedly "sexist" forms from our language. Some people dismiss the effectiveness of such a suggestion, viewing "non-sexist language" as irrelevant window-dressing which merely hides sexist attitudes rather than changing them. Most opponents of gender neutral language modification do not accept these arguments as valid.
- Most argue that traditional use of the English language, and other Indo-European and Afro-Asiatic languages, including using male pronouns when referencing both males and females, is not sexist.
- Some argue that the use of grammatical gender in these languages dates back to a time when some believe there were primeval matriarchies, so there is no reason to assume that the traditional linguistic gender hierarchies reflects a bias against women. They argue it could actually reflect women being more valued than men. The female grammatical gender, they say, has historically been a more "marked" subset of the more generic set that is the male grammatical gender. They point to examples such as "woman," which is "wo" added on to "man," "female," often misinterpreted as "fe" added on to "male" (actually from Latin femella, unrelated to male), and the use in many languages of the male gender as a generic gender. In many such linguistic cases, they argue, the subset is actually more valued. One example of this is Cadillacs and automobiles. If there were a parking lot full of Cadillacs, they would usually be called "Cadillacs," whereas if the lot were full of either Cadillacs and non-Cadillacs, or vehicles which were all non-Cadillacs, they would simply be called "automobiles." But this would in no way imply that the Cadillacs were less valued than any of the other cars, and could likely mean that they were more valued. [http://www.friesian.com/language.htm]
- They feel that rewriting text to eliminate gender-specific pronouns results in an awkward and ugly writing style.
- Many regard it as "political correctness gone mad". A very small minority of opponents accepts the validity of the argument that traditional English is sexist, but does not think that this is a bad thing, as they themselves are sexist.

Enforcement, persuasion, or evolution?

Only a tiny minority of advocates for gender-neutral language argue that using allegedly "sexist" language should be illegal. But many advocates do support the enforcement of rules and po

Alumnus

See also

Colleges and universities

See also

Related lists

Reunion

Fundraising

Some prominent charitable fundraising events

External links

Notes and References

English language

History

Classification and related languages

Geographic distribution

English as a global language

Dialects and regional variants

Constructed variants of English

Sounds

Vowels

Consonants

Voicing and Aspiration

See also

Intonation

Tone groups

Characteristics of intonation

Grammar

Vocabulary

Number of words in English

Word origins

Writing system

Basic sound-letter correspondence

Written accents

See also

Dialects

Pronunciation

Social, cultural or political

Grammar

Usage

External links

Dictionaries

Further reading

Dictionary

Word order

Pronunciation

Coverage

Special-purpose dictionaries

Bilingual dictionaries

Specialized dictionaries

Character dictionaries

Glossaries

Variations between dictionaries

Prescription and description

Other variations

History

Miscellaneous

List of major dictionaries

Arabic

Catalan

Chinese

Dutch

English

French

German

Italian

Japanese

Norwegian

Portuguese

Romanian

Spanish

Swedish

Urdu

Publishers

List of online dictionaries

List of collaborative dictionaries

See also

References

Non sexist language

Reference

Examples

Common positions