Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, 11th Edition

Rating:
Summary: Just so much stuff?
Review: . . . . . . .

It is interesting to consider just how much stuff depends on a book such as this.

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Rating:
Summary: Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, 11th Edition
Review: At first glance the eleventh edition does not differ much from the tenth (CH, Oct'93): definitions and derivations are nearly identical to those in the tenth. However, this is no mindless reissue, and where new information has surfaced, it is included. The 225,000 headwords include 10,000 new words and meanings, and the volume includes 40,000 usage examples. The considerable encyclopedic elements include 12,000 geographical and 6,000 biographical names, as well as brief sections of foreign words and phrases, signs and symbols, and a handbook of style. Abbreviations and symbols for chemical elements, a separate section in the previous edition, are alphabetized with the main entries. This is a serious dictionary, not unabridged but very serviceable for both student and scholar. Unfortunately the format is crowded and the font uncomfortably small. The price is favorable, however, especially since the volume includes a CD-ROM of the contents and also offers a one-year free subscription to the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Web site.

Rating:
Summary: Still much to be desired
Review: Being a user of Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary for about 20 years, I am disappointed with this new edition. To be more specific, I am disappointed with the free CD-ROM came with the dictionary.

Using dictionaries for me means sitting in front of a PC monitor with fingers on keyboard. When I can find the definitions of words in less than a second, why should I waste 20 to 30 seconds in turning the pages. Accordingly, my review here focuses more on the interface of the CD-ROM dictionary than on the contents itself.

In my PC, I installed Collins Cobuild ver 3.1, Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English 4th Edition, Macmillan English Dictionary, ver 1.1, Cambridge International Dictionary of English ver 1.03, The New Penguin English Dictionary 2001, The American Heritage Dictionary 2000, Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary ver 3.0, Bookshelf 98, and Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary & Thesaurus, Deluxe Audio Edition ver 2.5. On another hard disk, I had an older Oxford English Dictionary on the legacy Windows NT 4.0. I have virtually all CD-ROM dictionaries available in the world. For this reason, I would say MW11 CD-ROM still has much to be desired.

There had been the MW Deluxe Audio Edition ver 2.5 installed in my PC. When I tried to install the free CD came with MW11, I was requested to remove the ver 2.5. Unfortunately, the ver 3.0 free CD is a dumb one, which ironically expelled the deluxe edition. I later tried this on another hard disk, on which ver 2.5 could be installed after ver 3.0 had been installed. Both versions could coexist harmonically. With multi-version CD-ROM dictionaries running in my PC, I can easily learn that the wonderful features with this MW11 CD-ROM mentioned by other reviewers were just old ones in most of the others.

MW might never know how fancy and user-friendly the other CD-ROM dictionaries are, how colorful the others are, and how fast the others are running. MW might never know corpus integration is now a trend in making CD-ROM dictionaries. MW might never know audio function is now a must for CD-ROM dictionaries. The free CD-ROMs came with LDOCE, MED, and RHWUD have wonderful audio function. LDOCE and MED even contain both British and American accents.

Some other awkward designs worth mentioning here are that for continuous looking up in this CD-ROM, one has to use mouse to highlight the searching box prior to a new search, which is very annoying when you are looking up a lot of words. On Cobuild, CIDE, MED, etc, you just key in work, then press Enter. Repeating this sequence, the definitions were retrieved one after one, and the searches keep going without a single move of the mouse.

For the same word, you have to toggle between dictionary and thesaurus, followed by a click on Search button to retrieve the contents in either reference. On Bookshelf 98, and Cobuild one search can retrieve all the information in each reference.

Now you see how premature the MW11 free CD-ROM is. The unabridged Webster's Third New International Dictionary share the same interface with the collegiate edition, and has been challenged by users for years. There is no need to argue about how far MW is lagging behind its competitors. MW had better thoroughly investigate the market status and redraft its roadmap. Sidney Landau has stated in his book Dictionaries, The Art and Craft of Lexicography, 2nd Edition:

Unabridged dictionaries in print will largely become a thing of the past; if produced at all in print form, they will be limited editions for collectors and libraries. Desk dictionaries, which include the American college dictionaries, will remain attractive commodities in print, as will shorter versions, but will suffer from increased competition from electronic alternatives produced by the print publishers themselves or by others whom they license.

Rating:
Summary: Best dictionary ever
Review: Best dictionary ever.. that describes it. A great dictionary for the house, school, or work. Will always help you to spell the words and find the definitions.The 11th edition includes 10,000 new words and more than 100,000 new meanings and revisions among its 225,000 definitions. And it is at a great price. Finding the words are a snap and it gives you nice clear definitions. The Win/Mac CD-ROM, and a free, one-year subscription to a new premium Web site, Merriam-WebsterCollegiate.com is great to helping you find the words quick, easier, and when i dictionary is not usefull. I great buy. Recomend it to teachers, students, College grads, or anyone!

Rating:
Summary: Excellent Dictionary
Review: Excellent concise dictionary. Definitions are clear and succinct. I find myself frequently referring to it.

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Summary: Nice updating for the standard shorter American dictionary
Review: For several decades now, THE MERRIAM-WEBSTER'S COLLEGIATE DICTIONARY has served as the standard American English dictionary. I have done a good deal of copyediting over the years, and every publisher I have worked with has specified this dictionary (along with the Webster's Unabridged) as the standard governoring the way that American English words are spells and defined. Although one can feel overwhelmed by the sheer number of dictionaries in the reference section of any good bookstore, this volume is as close to authoritative as we have in the United States. One might have a preference for another, but this is the only one that enjoys widespread authoritative acceptance.

The dust jacket explains the ways that the new 11th edition has been expanded, but personally, while I am quite certain that it has been expanded, I have not noticed a great deal of difference from the 10th edition. It may be definitive and improved, but most of the improvements will be difficult for anyone to detect. The new CD-ROM included with it, however, is a vast improvement on the previous software that was developed based on the 10th edition. When the 10th edition first came out, CD software was not widely available. A CD version of the dictionary did eventually come out, but it was somewhat rudimentary. The new CD-ROM, however, is a huge improvement. For instance, when looking up any word, a column will display a number of words that approximate the word that your are attempting to look up. If you can merely approximate the spelling, you can frequently find the correct word. Furthermore, by double clicking on any word in the online dictionary, you will pull up the listing for that word. The CD-ROM also has a link to the Internet.

Let's face it. Buying dictionaries for most people is about as exciting as having one's oil changed. But like oil changes, dictionaries are essential. For the foreseeable future, this one is going to remain the definitive American English dictionary.

Rating:
Summary: THIS BOOK IS GREAT
Review: great buy for the price. the book itself is the normal run-of-the-mill merriam-webster. best of all dictionaries. the real treat is the disc it comes with. very helpful when a word is quickly needed.

Rating:
Summary: funky thumb-index tabs
Review: I found the books placement of tabs made them almost useless. I know why Merriam-Webster doesn't advertise the fact that there is a thumb-index. I was told that they started using an automated system in 1978 because it was cheaper. I guess you get what you pay for, a cheap dictionary. I say if you are going to insert thumb-index tabs put them in the right place... at the start of the letter being indicated, not somewhere in the middle. What's that all about?

Rating:
Summary: A very good dictionary, though still a bit quirky
Review: I just got my Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, Eleventh Edition from Amazon and am looking forward to getting to know it better. Past editions of the Collegiate have been in many ways excellent, expecially in the clear, crisp definitions and well-researched albeit brief etymologies. It appears that this edition is no exception.

My summary impression is that this is a dictionary well worth buying, perhaps the best desk dictionary one can find.

The Collegiates, including this one, have been bit quirky, especially as regards pronuncation. For example, this dictionary has a strange relationaship with the schwa sound. In previous editions thre were many apparently inadvertent switches between the schwa (last vowel sound in "circus") and the short u sound (as in "but"). In this edition, however, there are four different sounds (including the short u) that are indicated by easily confusible variants of the schwa symbol.

In addition, the "a" vowels in marry and Mary -- distinguished by many mainstream speakers of American English -- are left undifferentiated, as in previous editions.

As in previous editions, a key to pronunciation symbols is provided on each recto page. Unfortunately, this little list omits perhaps 2/3 of the list of pronunciation symbols that fill one page of the front matter (making it hard to find each time you need it).

(If I were king of Merriam-Webster, I'd put the full pronunciation key where it belongs: on the inside front or back covers, or both.)

Another frustrating aspect for most users *was* that at least in the Tenth Edition, the oldest and often least-used definition of a word was listed first, causing your search for a certain definition usually to be more work.

It *appears* that this practice has now been abandoned with the Eleventh Edition, though I haven't found any explicit reference to it in the explanatory notes. If so, this will noticeably improve the ease of using this book.

Printing-wise, it appears that the darkness of the type has deepened in the Eleventh Edition (although this may just indicate where in a given press run my copy happened to come from). This makes my 11th Ed. distinctly easier to read than my 10th Ed. In addition, the main entries are now in sans-serif type. This isn't necessarily an aesthetic improvement, but far more important is that it makes finding your word easier on the eyes.

Unfortunately, as with the previous edition, the inner margins are too narrow, forcing one to read the right side of a left-hand page and the left side of a right-hand page from paper that is curving into the crease in the middle of the book; almost nothing short of breaking the binding is likely to counteract this problem.

A personal prejudice I have (that you may not share) is that I believe a dictionary owes its readers more than just a description of how language is currently used. (Some of current usage is in my opinion poor, and a dictionary is the right place to try to stem the tide of poor usage instead of merely describing it.) The Eleventh Edition, like recent previous ones, has many Usage Notes at the end of an entry.

I find these to be by and large too permissive, giving excuses for much questionable usage (while prudently reminding the reader that if they go ahead and employ some usages that M-W deems perfectly acceptable, they may be in for some criticism).

For example, one usage note supports the use of "literally" to mean "virtually". Another usage note supports the pronunciation of "nuclear" as "nucular" (lamely trotting out the fact that it has been used that way by members of many respected professions, including U.S. members of congress and even two U.S. presidents!!!!!).

Another drawback of this book for many is the massive inclusion of technical words like chemical names, and especially the names of a huge variety of plants and animals. This is all well and good in itself, of course. But these words are in most cases useful only to specialists in those fields, and given the limited space available, must necessarily drive out other candidates for inclusion that would be useful to a far larger number of readers...

Rating:
Summary: What a bargain!
Review: I just got this as a gift and was pleasantly surprised to find the CD included. The paper dictionary itself is worth the price, but the CD is a real bonus. It installs easily onto your hard disk, you do not need to keep the CD in the drive, and it takes up very little space. The interface is simple, clear and friendly. It has tremendous search features, including rhyming, etymology (for example, you can find words from the Hawaiian), and others. You can double-click any word in a definition and get the definition of that word. It also has a macro system for MS Word, which I don't use so I can't speak to it but many will probably find that useful also. It is very fast at all the functions I have tried. Another reviewer pointed out that a dictionary is not particularly exciting, but this is the kind of gift that will actually be used. The book and CD together make this one of the great buys on the market today.