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Keeping up to date with the Australian language
Whether we are consciously aware of it or not, the Australian language (like any other language) is constantly changing and evolving.
An effective way of keeping up to date with the Australian language is to buy a copy of the latest edition of the ‘Collins Australian Dictionary’.
It is a very impressive reference dictionary. And now in its fifth Australian edition, it certainly lives up to its reputation of being the ‘only dictionary to speak our language’.
Here’s just a few examples of the more than 5,500 new words (and their meanings) that have been added to the dictionary:
‘Affluenza’: guilt experienced by people who’ve made or inherited large amounts of money
‘Bleeding edge’: the very forefront of technological development
‘Breatharian’: a person who believes it is possible to subsist healthily on air alone
‘Dad rock’: classic rock music that appeals to adults, often played by middle-aged musicians
‘Horlicks’: to make a mistake
‘Kitesurfing’: standing on a surfboard while being pulled along by a large kite
‘Superwaif’: very young and thin supermodel
So how is a dictionary, such as the latest release of the ‘Collins Australian Dictionary’, compiled?
To find out, we put the following questions to Dr Ruth Wajnryb, an Australian language consultant, applied linguist, researcher and writer.
Dr Wajnryb’s involvement with the dictionary is to act as a watch-dog for new words, and as she finds them, she enters them into a data base with the extra information, such as grammar, contextual factors, and so on, that’s required. She also gives advice on the currency of words and facts about Australian life and culture.
Here are the questions and answers:
Q. Who and what determines which new words are added to the latest edition of the ‘Collins Australian Dictionary’?
A. The ‘Bank of English database’ is used to determine which words are new, how frequently they are used, and how widespread the usage is. A team of lexicographers make decisions about new entries. The ‘Bank of English database’ is a database into which thousands of words from a wide variety of sources are fed. It holds in excess of 500,000 words, with 100,000 from books (fiction and non-fiction); about 60,000 from magazines of all sorts; 260,000 from newspapers from all over the world; 68,000 from ‘ephemera’, that is, material from everyday life, for example, advertisements, bus timetables, letters, diaries, brochures, etc; 67,000 of spoken English, which is comprised of recorded conversations from a wide range of sources.
Q. How long does it usually take for a new word to appear in the dictionary?
A. That’s hard to say because it’s only really in the last ten years that the Bank of English has had the power and resources to do the task it now does. So words that have existed in Australian English for a long time are being added just now – not as new words, but as first-time entries, for example, baggy green, Godzone, feral.
Q. On average, how many words that are now obsolete are deleted from a new edition of the ‘Collins Australian Dictionary’?
A. The number will vary for each edition. It is worth noting that it is much easier to add new words than to delete old ones. Even archaic words (like alas) are included because they’re still used for dramatic or historical effect.
Q. How is it determined if a word has become obsolete?
A. This is most relevant in scientific or technological fields where the pace of change and new invention renders past things and their words obsolete. Even here, the dictionary makers would rather tag a particular word as ‘obsolete’ than delete it! They might add ‘formerly used to mean’ to show that the word in question has been superseded.
Q. How many words does an average person have in their vocabulary?
A. I’m not sure that such a figure exists, partly because ‘average’ is such an unreal and rubbery concept. Some things to consider though are:
1) A person’s active lexicon is much smaller than their passive/receptive one. Note: Although a lexicon is another word for vocabulary, lexicon is often used in preference to vocabulary because it applies to a specific demarcated area, for example, specialist lexicons in medicine, politics, law, and so forth. And the difference between an active lexicon and a passive/receptive one is that active refers to the words that we use (‘produce’), while passive refers to the words we understand but don’t use (‘receptive’)
2) We keep adding to our lexicons (active and passive) through our life.
3) A person’s lexicon can be quite unbalanced in the sense that they might know a huge amount of words in one field, for example, information technology, but very few in another, for example, linguistics!
4) Predictably a person’s lexicon is functional, and therefore reflects their life and pursuits, that is, our language does what we want it to.
Q. Does a person's vocabulary change much as they age?
A. Like much about the aging human, their vocabulary gets less flexible and less innovative over time. A teen, by contrast, is much more open to new words and willing to try them on, especially if their peers are doing the same. Older people tend to continue using expressions and slang of their youth, much to the chagrin of their embarrassed offspring!
To find out more about the Collins Australian Dictionary, drop into the HarperCollins.com site and initiate a search by title on its home page using the keywords ‘Collins Australian Dictionary’.