The Concise Oxford Dictionary of Current English

by Della Thompson (editor)

This new edition of Oxford's flagship single-volume dictionary brings you the results of the latest research into the real English of today. Oxford is lead partner in the British National Corpus, a massive and constantly expanding hundred-million-word database which allows dictionary editors to sample today's language - newspapers, magazines, books, advertisements, even transcripts of spoken English. With thousands of occurences of each common word available for instant analysis, lexicographers are able to track the latest trends in, for instance, spelling and hyphenation or disputed usages, with greater accuracy than ever before. This rolling, constantly updated `opinion poll of language' combined with Oxford's unparalleled world reading programme (we spend more on language research than any other dictionary publisher in the world), ensures that COD9 is the up-to-date reference for today's English. Bigger and better than ever before, its new features BL The most up-to-date spellings, with improved coverage of meaning and usage based on a computerized `snapshot' of today's language BL 25% more content than the previous edition BL New words, including such items as holiday village, nip and tuck, central locking, ragga, house-sit, Balti, pesto, Cajun, road-pricing, Feyman diagram, supermodel, and slaphead BL New, more up-to-date pronunciation system, representing today's received pronunciation BL Over 300 new boxed usage notes with guidance on good English BL New, clearer etymologies BL easier to use with more compounds as main entries

Genres: Reference, Language, Nonfiction, Dictionaries

1696 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1911

Reviews

[Dora · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another dictionary that meets my criteria for actually buying one: recently updated, lots of usage examples. This one also has a nice reference section, with interesting items such as: biological classification, a style guide, proofreading marks, major divisions of geological time (a good mix of sections you would and wouldn't expect from a dictionary).

I'm unlikely to buy another hard-copy dictionary since the information is so easily accessible on the internet, but it's nice to be able to page through a reasonably heavy tome and discover new information.

[Confucius · Rating 5 out of 5]

In Oxford and David Crystal I trust.

[Howierdg · Rating 4 out of 5]

I'm still using my forty-five year old 6th edition and even though I do sometimes wonder whether I should purchase a newer edition nothing has the same appeal.

[K Stasiak · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is my go-to version of this dictionary, though I have most of the editions up to the 10th, and also the ODE. I noticed that some words started having changed definitions from the 1990's ('mandate' was the word that set me on this thread of research, though I looked up many different words), which was interesting to observe, especially in the context of the world in which we live now. I find up to the 8th edition (1990) the most reliable, but use the more modern editions for comparison. It's also encouraged me to question whether newest is always best.

[i · Rating 3 out of 5]

Turns out the zebra did it.

[for-much-deliberation ... · Rating 5 out of 5]

Just about the best english dictionary I've ever owned

[Mark Mullee]

While in prison, Malcolm X copied the entire dictionary in longhand. All I have to do is read it.