Dictionary News

The Oxford English Dictionary (OED) adds new terms four times a year, and this week roughly 900 words made their first appearance including "bathroom-break," "bestie", and four adjectives that refer to the highly offensive c-word.

Barcelona - It is well-known that Spaniards are a little football crazy. Now it has been proven in print, as Lionel Messi's name becomes immortalized in the Santillana dictionary as a brand new adjective, ‘inmessionante’

Springfield - The latest English words to be added to the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary, which consists of more than 200,000 words, are quite reflective of modern day society. The editor announced some new words: "f-bomb," "sexting" and "bucket list."

Lake Superior State University has compiled their annual list of words they believe should be banned because of their "misuse, overuse and general uselessness." The words "amazing" and "baby bump" were two notable choices.

As children read less and fail to build up a vocabulary, the author of a new book says in an interview the vocabulary deficit is a worrying trend that threatens confidence, future job prospects, relationships, and even the ability to understand jokes.

Bob Dylan said it best, ‘The times they are a-changin.’ That was 1964. Fast forward 46 years and it’s worth repeating. Technology has altered much of what was and has created a new way of living.

Millions of rejected words lie in a vault owned by the Oxford University Press. Although they have not been accepted for print, there is still hope for many of them.

Next time you are playing a game of Scrabble think twice before reaching for the Oxford Dictionary because errors do exist, as proven by an Australian professor who recently found an error that was almost a century old.

A school district in the U.S. state of California has temporarily banned the use of a dictionary that contains a definition for oral sex, a permanent ban being a real possibility.

A judge in New York takes his oath of office with his left hand on a dictionary, rather than the customary Bible; officials could not locate a Bible for the ceremony.