CHEYENNE -— With the new year we also have new words to ponder, like “sportocrat,” and “fleek.”
And the German word, “Backpfeitfengesicht.”
These words are more likely to be found on an internet dictionary than any old Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary paper edition.
In the late 1980s, that dictionary was on the New York Times’ bestseller list for 155 consecutive days. A total of 57 million copies were sold, second only to sales of the Bible.
That was then.
Now Merriam-Webster.com is owned by Encyclopedia Britannica, which has been losing market share since 1993 when Microsoft released its digital encyclopedia, “Encarta.” That's according to a new book, “Unabridged: The Thrill of (and threat to) the Modern Dictionary” by Stefan Fatsis, a former reporter and sportswriter.
Louis Menand wrote a long and engaging review of the book for The New Yorker magazine.
To get material for his book, Fatsis embedded with the struggling lexicographers — the word guys — in the offices of Merriam-Webster in Springfield, Mass.
The dictionary company now is struggling to compete against the nonprofit “Wikipedia.”
A British editor compared that popular web site to a public restroom, according to Fatsis.
Menand concluded the comparison was not far off.
“It’s not the most elegant web site, but everyone uses it,” he wrote in the review.
Of course they do, because it is one of the few free programs left.
Wikipedia is crowd-sourced, so it can move quickly when a new slang word takes hold.
Years ago a set of encyclopedias (usually Britannica) was the sign of a well-off, literate family.
My family never could afford a set, but they did buy a hefty all- in-one book from a door-to-door salesman.
Although it was a bit unwieldy because of its size, it contained a lot of basic information that was valuable to me as a student in grade school.
The one in the family who really liked it was my father. Like so many guys of that era, he quit school after 10th grade to help on the family farm.
Nearly every night he hauled out the monster volume and read and read.
So it is a bit sad to realize the end of the respected old traditional dictionary as the font of information.
Getting information on the internet can be chancy. There can be way too much to wade through, and it can be wrong.
Fatsis’ book describes the problems that lexicographers have in deciding which in the bevy of new slang words should be included in the dictionaries.
One was over the word that rhymes with stuck.
In some quarters people use this world as a noun, adjective, verb, adverb and — a greeting.
Another squabble was over the word “ain’t,” which is really just plain bad grammar.
Both words are now available online.
Fatsis concluded that the dictionary represents permanence, while the English language is slippery - it keeps changing and therefore it doesn’t have much future in traditional dictionaries; they cannot keep up.
Meanwhile, we are stuck with the imperfect internet.
By the way, the controversial word “irregardless” is now OK.
The Australian word “daggy” and the American word “cheugy” mean uncool.
“Sportocrat” is someone wealthy and nutty about sports.
“Fleek” means someone perfectly groomed.
And the German word “Backpfeitfengesicht” means “a face that deserves to be slapped or punched.”
Contact Joan Barron at 307-632-2534 or jmbarron@bresnan.net
