Word by word
by Kory Stamper · first published 2017
2mentions
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2HN commenters
2018–2024first – last mentioned
100% neutral
"Brimming with intelligence and personality, a vastly entertaining account of how dictionaries are made - a must read for word mavens. Have you ever tried to define the word "is?" Do you have strong feelings about the word (and, yes, it is a word) "irregardless?" Did you know that OMG was first used in 1917, in a letter to Winston Churchill? These are the questions that keep lexicographers up at night. While most of us might take dictionaries for granted, the process of writing dictionaries is in fact as lively and dynamic as language itself. With sharp wit and irreverence, Kory Stamper cracks
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"Word By Word" by Kory Stamper, an editor of the Mirriam-Webster Dictionary, includes a section and conveys a culture around coordinating a team of definition writers from paper citations using intra-office mail/notes…
on “Computing Before Computers (1990)” ↗Those aren’t syllable divisions, they’re hyphenation points! From the footnote on page 219 of Word by Word by Kory Stamper (formerly a lexicographer at Merriam-Webster): > Here is the one thing that our pronunciation editor wishes everyone knew: those dots in the headwords, like at “co·per·nic·i·um,” are…
on “The Typeset of Wall·E (2018)” ↗