The Oxford Dictionary of English Grammar - Softcover

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9780198613145: The Oxford Dictionary of English Grammar

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0198613148 ISBN 13: 9780198613145

Publisher: Oxford University Press, 1996

This major new reference offers the general reader, student, and professional clear and immediate A-Z access to 1,000 grammatical terms and their meanings. All currently accepted terms are included, as well as traditional terms, more controversial newer terms, and terms belonging to linguistics. Each term is accompanied by a concise definition and detailed explanations, including examples of language in use and frequent quotations from existing texts.

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About the Author:

About the Editors: Edmund Weiner is co-editor of the OED, Second Edition, and author (with Andrew Delahunty) of the Oxford Guide to English Usage. Sylvia Chalker is the author of Current English Grammar, and a contributor to the Oxford Companion to the English Language.

From Booklist:

Defined here are 1,000 terms used within the current mainstream of grammar, as well as within the related fields of phonetics and semantics, generative grammar, and linguistics. Examples of terms include fricative, linking verb, participial adjective, and plupluperfect.

Entries provide cross-references to synonyms (with the definition placed following the preferred term), indications of terms that enjoy a contrastive relationship, and cross-references to related and overlapping words. Entries include part-of-speech labels and illustrative quotations (sometimes with an indication of a phrase's earliest recorded appearance). The definitions constitute an interesting combination of telegraphic writing style (for the formal definition of a word) and narrative writing style (for explanations of the formal definition). Where British and American English differ, explanations for both are provided. For example, the definition for present perfect explains that American English often uses simple past, while British English prefers present perfect.

This is a remarkable resource. It is not a usage dictionary, but its definitions of grammar terms include usage information. The illustrative quotations are superb at facilitating understanding of complicated concepts; the format is unusually clear; and everything seems to be included, from A ("adverbial as an element of clause structure") to Z ("any of the functional parts into which clause and sentence structure is analysed"). This book will be used often by teachers, students (high school through college), writers, and of course, students of grammar. It is highly recommended for purchase by public and academic libraries; school librarians will want to preview before making a purchasing decision.

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