The Oxford English dictionnary

The OED defines and illustrates how a word has been used, where it came from, when it first entered the language, and how its meaning has changed over time and around the world,

http://www.oed.com/
the words in the English language change very fast and it's very interesting to know all about their evolution.
When did the expression "To go to the loo" for instance first appear. The OED can tell you. I have seen an article about that in Vocable and I wanted to write about it.

Hi Muriel, hi everyone,

I do appreciate the Oxford dictionaries.

I personaly have a paper Oxford dictionary and a French-English Hachette-Oxford one.

This free Oonline Oxford Dictionary is very well -> http://oxforddictionaries.com/
As an online dictionary, it provides several free and very useful resources to help learn English such as A comic quotation quiz, a Blog, Grammar and writing help, Word of the day, Quote of the week, etc.


I also appreciate the Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary with here as weel, several handy resources: How Strong Is Your Vocabulary? Take our 10-question quiz to find out, Spell It The commonly misspelled words quiz, Name That Thing Take our visual vocabulary quiz, True or False? A quick quiz about stuff worth knowing

Hello Everyone,
I own an old electronic version from 1996. It's very useful !

Hi François, hi everyone,

I've got this version (still "DOS style" with a dedicated folder for the program LOL) and still use it on a few computers.

I also have the version of the same program, that follows: "Grand Dictionnaire Hachette Oxford".

This dictionary is very helpful.

Hi Gerard, François everyone
I have also read that oxford dictionary has a website which gives answers to people about language. what is reassuring is that Oxford Dictionary accepts new words. Of course any language is evolving but one can wonder if there is not a tendency to dump down the English language. Of course people write email or chatspeak and don't concentrate on grammar and spelling.Gerard has already written about that because he is very interested in this aspect of the language. Anyway i do wonder if this oversimplified chatspeak language expresses feelings or emotions as well as the older English language ?
What do you think ?

Hi Muriel, hi everyone,

I'll respond more later but right now I would say English language has a tendancy to "keep everything" so that words evolve to different meanings thus false cognates and the fact that English people speak a poor language with only a few men/women of letters knowing words which are rare.

I would also like to remind you of "International English" that is the language spoken by businessmen, politicians and foreign travelers leading to dodgy accent and very limited vocabulary... what are the consequences? English natives whom I asked don't worry much about this.

gerardM a écrit:Hi Muriel, hi everyone,

I'll respond more later but right now I would say English language has a tendency to "keep everything" .

Thanks Gérard, I understand why English language has the most vocabulary words of any language and faux ami study so important !

Hi Muriel, everyone,

> English language has a tendancy to "keep everything"
These are my own words.
Given your knowledge and experience of English, do you have a similar opinion?

I remember when I was telling my sister that English had more words than French.
Jeannine -American friend of my family living in Sonoma, near SF, CA, teaching French there for several decades-. Unfortunately we didn't speak for long on this subject but Jeannine asked: "So you also think there're much more words in English" with a tone and additional words that showed she totally agreed with me but my sister was skeptic (Am. spelling) tho my sister's English is just medium level... but our conversation move to something else as we were driving to Sausalito

Hi Gérard,

I would say there are more words in the English language, but I may be wrong.
The English have sometimes a large range of words to convey an idea (more than in French), but on the other hand, the French has a large range of words to convey some other idea. I'd like to have examples, but I must think about it.

I have, for example, the ROGET'S THESAURUS which gives plenty of words to cover an idea, but I have no similar book in French. And therefore I cannot compare.

P.S. please check your spelling : tendency. And also : more later ????

Hi Ghislaine, hi everyone,

Thanks for your words.

Yes, I agree.
Like a domain of work has got more specialized words ("jargon") to express technical knowledge, a language also has more words in domains it is an expert in. For example in the domain of cooking, the French -due to this expertise- will have more precise words hence more words.
I think that all in all, English language has got "useless" words because they keep the words they borrowed to French, to German, to Swede, etc. and they get many synonyms that they use in specific cases.

> P.S. please check your spelling : tendency. And also : more later ????
No, I guess I didn't make any spelling mistakes:
- "tendency" is well the correct spelling
- with "I'll respond more later but...", I meant that I was going to say more words a few hours later... would a comma have been necessary?

~~ edit
On the other hand Muriel and I incorrectly wrote "tendancy"
(I wrote 'English language has a tendancy to "keep everything"': that is a misspelling.

Thank you "you two" for helping me improve my English

Hi Gérard,

Thank you for your words. Indeed It took some time before I understood what you meant
"I'll respond more... later".
Now I've got it !!
I had a friend in England who always made the mistake : he used to say "it is more better...".
That's why I caught you, but of course, you were quite right. Sorry !

Hi Ghislaine,

Guilaine a écrit:... Sorry !

No problem.

he used to say "it is more better...".

did he say this with a smile?
Krystyna often says "Betterer!" but, of course, it is a joke. It's a bit like when in french, we say "C'est plus mieux !".