The New Oxford English Dictionary and the Uses of Machine‐Readable Dictionaries Available to Purchase

Any major dictionary needs to be continuously updated to keep current with the rapid growth of language. Faced with the need for such endless supplementation, Oxford University Press, in considering the available choices, concluded that automating the Oxford English Dictionary offered the only practicable solution. Traditional “cut‐and‐paste” methods of revision were ruled out as inadequate to meet the requirements of a task of such staggering proportions. But even if Oxford University Press had not planned to revise or enhance the Oxford English Dictionary, automation would still have brought enormous benefits to those who make extraordinary demands on dictionaries, for a traditional printed dictionary is a very unsatisfying reference tool in many ways, serving only if its conditions of strict lineality are accepted. If, on the other hand, an unreasonable demand of a dictionary is made, such as “Print out two carefully dated lists of all English adjectives ending in ‐ic and ‐ical,” then the traditional dictionary is about as useful as a sling‐shot or a royal command that the tides cease. Computerization, thus, can transform the linear reference tool into a versatile research tool with multiple points of access and provide scholars with a lexicographical research tool of unparalleled subtlety and power.