Concise Oxford American Dictionary

This new dictionary packs an extraordinary amount of information into a handy book that is practical, dependable, affordable, and easy to read.

Based on the groundbreaking flagship dictionary of Oxford's US Dictionaries program, the New Oxford American Dictionary, this concise edition includes more than 180,000 entries and definitions, complete with pronunciations, parts of speech, syllabification, inflected forms, and derivatives.

The Concise Oxford American Dictionary is a convenient and complete dictionary for school, work, and home. The dictionary includes Usage Notes that give helpful information on correct English; hundreds of Word Histories that provide fascinating background on the lives of words; more than 300 carefully chosen illustrations; and a handy Ready Reference section with information about weights and measures, chemical elements, U.S. states and presidents, punctuation, frequently misspelled words, and much more. In addition, like all other Oxford American dictionaries, The Concise Oxford American Dictionary uses an easy-to-use respelling system to show how entries are pronounced.

Discover more on oxforddictionaries.com, Oxford Dictionary's hub for dictionaries and language reference.

Grade 8 Up–Slimmed-down versions of, respectively, The New Oxford American Dictionary (2005) and Oxford American Writer's Thesaurus (2004), these volumes make somewhat more portable resources for student writers. At about 180,000 entries, the dictionary trumps the 165,000-word Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (2004)–though without that volume's online access and continual updating–and enhances its definitions with frequent examples, related expressions in boldface, and brief historical discussions, as well as back matter that includes a long list of frequently misspelled words and common redundancies. There are a very few small illustrations, and no biographical entries. The thesaurus offers about 350,000 synonyms and antonyms within 15,000 main entries, usually with shades of meaning exemplified through in-context phrases or, rarely, more detailed disquisitions dubbed The Right Word. Both volumes include an extensive catalog of Clichés To Avoid, as well as sometimes-opinionated usage notes. Though these volumes do not outshine existing products, libraries with antiquated ready-reference collections may find them appealingly affordable as updates.–John Peters, New York Public Library
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Here is a downsized version of New Oxford American Dictionary (2d ed., 2005), with more than 180,000 entries and definitions, as opposed to 250,000 in the original volume. Some of the entries have been condensed, mainly by offering fewer or truncated examples of usage. The reference section in the back of the encyclopedia has also been scaled down. Larger font size makes this dictionary easier on the eyes than its parent. A good alternative for very small libraries or as a supplemental or circulating dictionary in larger libraries. Also see Concise Oxford American Thesaurus, below. Mary Ellen Quinn
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved