Who\u27s Flaithbhertach Macloingry?

In the November 1989 Word Ways George H. Scheetz presented a list of 51 words ending in -gry. His fascinating article piqued my interest and I immediately set out to find some additions to his list

Webster\u27s Fourth: A Review

1909, 1934, 1961 ... from this series, one might predict that the fourth edition of the Merriam-Webster Unabridged will appear in 1990. Alas, this is no Halley\u27s comet. According to the August 1985 issue of Games magazine, The Merriam-Webster editorial director flatly state there are no plans for such a work , and a noted lexicographer and editor doubts that there ever will be: uneconomical...an unabridged simply doesn\u27t sell enough copies . This article and the following one present two wistful (or, perhaps, wishful?) views of this unlikely work

The Proven Key: Roles and Rules for Dictionaries in the Patent Office and the Courts

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit, in its continuing effort to develop a patent claim construction jurisprudence that yields predictable results, has turned to dictionaries, encyclopedias, and similar sources with increasing frequency. This paper explores, from both an empirical and a normative perspective, the Federal Circuit\u27s effort to shift claim construction to a dictionary-based approach. In the empirical part, we present data showing that the Federal Circuit has, since its own in banc Markman decision in April 1995, used reference works such as dictionaries to construe claim terms with steadily increasing frequency. In addition, and contrary to what one might predict from some of the court\u27s earlier statements justifying reliance on dictionaries in claim construction, the Federal Circuit has relied on general purpose English language dictionaries more than twice as often as it has relied on more technical or specialized reference works. Indeed, the claim construction reference work the Federal Circuit has cited most often is Webster\u27s Third New International Dictionary, which by itself accounts for 25% of all such citations and 36% of all citations to general purpose English language dictionaries and similar sources. After demonstrating that the caprice with which judges currently may choose dictionaries effectively eliminates whatever neutrality and predictability gains the turn to dictionaries can offer, we show that the best route to a dictionary-based approach for settling a claim term\u27s ordinary meaning is an explicit change to the Patent Office rules governing patent examination. Specifically, we propose that the Patent Office require that every patent applicant put her dictionary selections (general purpose and technical) on the record during examination, and that any resulting issued patent state the applicant\u27s dictionary selections on its face. Only with such changes to Patent Office rules can the patent system hope to realize the neutrality and predictability goals that rightly animate the Federal Circuit\u27s turn to dictionaries

Must You Join the Queue?

One of the most enduring pieces of orthographic folklore is the assertion that the letter Q in a word is always followed by the letter U. The staunchest defenders of this rule are unruffled by the counterexample Iraq, for this is a foreign proper name and not a genuine English word; similarly, they quickly dismiss Qantas (an Australian airline) and Qiana (a synthetic fabric) as tradenames designed to attract notice

Kickshaws

Readers are encouraged to send their own favorite linguistic kickshaws to the Kickshaws Editor

Book Reviews

The purpose of this section is to acquaint readers with books of recent vintage, currently in print, and holding special interest for word lovers. All books will be reviewed from the special standpoint of recreational linguistics

How Big is English?

The English language has a complement of somewhere between two million and three million short words ..

The Name of the Concept STUDENT in Russian and English Languages: on Lexicographical Material

One of the key figures in international and national education is a student. In this regard, the article examines the lexical representation of the concept STUDENT in two developed (literary) languages of our time - English and Russian. Attention focuses on the character of interpretation of the words "Student" and "student", which are going back to the same etymon, respectively, in English and Russian dictionaries. As a source of practical material the lexicographical works published in XX - XXI centuries are used. Comparative analysis of the definitions of the named keywords of the concept STUDENT reveals the difference in sememe and seme filling of the word-equivalents in English and Russian

Merriam-Webster: Voice of Authority

Since 1909, the three editions of Webster\u27s New International Dictionary (henceforth to be referred to as N11, N12, and N13) have been the most widely accepted references for the coverage of American English. Their reputation is deserved; not only are they through in their coverage of modern words, they are scholarly in their treatment of obsolete terms,important to readers of older literature. (The coverage of obsolete terms in N13 is not as full as in N11 or N12, however.) Their appeal is to both the scholar and the layman. Unlike earlier dictionaries in both England and America, the N1s have done little to actually shape modern American English: lexicographers have grown to understand, however, that no modern dictionary does have a significant effect on the language. This realization has signaled a trend from prescriptive dictionaries (such as early Websterian ones) to descriptive ones (most notably N13). Although the N1s do not significantly affect the language, they provide an excellent mirror by which to examine the changes and progress of American English in the twentieth century