The story of ain't: America, its language, and the most controversial dictionary ever published

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Skinner, David, 1973-

Skinner, David

Cary Regional
Duraleigh Road Community

Adult Non-Fiction

Cary Regional - Adult Non-Fiction
Duraleigh Road - Adult Non-Fiction
North Regional - Adult Non-Fiction

"In 1934, Webster's Second was the great gray eminence of American dictionaries, with 600,000 entries and numerous competitors but no rivals. It served as the all-knowing guide to the world of grammar and information, a kind of one-stop reference work. In 1961, Webster's Third came along and ignited an unprecedented controversy in America's newspapers, universities, and living rooms. The new dictionary's editor, Philip Gove, had overhauled Merriam's long held authoritarian principles to create a reference work that had "no traffic with...artificial notions of correctness or authority. It must be descriptive not prescriptive." Correct use was determined by how the language was actually spoken, and not by "notions of correctness" set by the learned few. Gove's editorial approach had editors and scholars longing for Webster's Second. Reporters across the country sounded off on Gove and his dictionary. The New York Times complained that Webster's had "surrendered to the permissive school that has been busily extending its beachhead on English instruction," the Times called on Merriam to preserve the printing plates for Webster's Second, so that a new start could be made. And soon Dwight MacDonald, a formidable American critic and writer, emerged as Webster's Third's chief nemesis when in the pages of the New Yorker he likened the new dictionary to the end of civilization."--

Book

Books

8c052ef9-cd7d-0c3b-8ff8-d6ed41cf10ae

9780062027467

2025-04-26T09:16:08.493Z

-1

Non Fiction

Non Fiction

423.09 SKINN

Wake County Public Libraries

Cary Regional
Duraleigh Road Community
North Regional

9780062027467

2012

Harper

grouped_work

Encyclopedias and dictionaries -- History and criticism
English language -- Lexicography -- History -- 20th century
Gove, Philip Babcock, -- 1902-1972
Webster's third new international dictionary of the English language unabridged

The story of ain't : America, its language, and the most controversial dictionary ever published

The story of ain't : America, its language, and the most controversial dictionary ever published / David Skinner

The story of ain't

America, its language, and the most controversial dictionary ever published

Encyclopedias and dictionaries
English language
Gove, Philip Babcock
History
History and criticism
Lexicography