New Oxford American Dictionary 3rd Edition

I have a Merriam Webster Collegiate that I like a lot. A Random House Unabridged that I also like a lot. The one thing they both have in common are the lettered, indented tabs to assist the user in quickly getting to any given letter within their respective groups. This Oxford Dictionary does not have the tabs, but I am able to find a given letter quickly with no problem. For what it's worth on that subject, I'm 57 years old at present and, looking back I recall being in 5th grade, doing dictionary exercises (for getting to a letter in the alphabet quickly by estimating where the letter's section would likely be)starting. We did that often and it is one of those things that have just stuck with me. I don't know if less experienced dictionary users would share my experience in getting quickly to their letter of choice in using this dictionary, but possibly. So, yes, I find this very easy to use. It's a good size if you're in want of a medium large sized dictionary. (I wanted one similar in size to those found in libraries myself. That size wouldn't be practical for most standard sized two bedroom apartments. With that, I have 3 dictionary's in "my" comfortably sized two-bedroom apartment.) Quite frankly, I like this dictionary a lot. As it turns out, I like all of my dictionaries though. I recommend this one. What would you do if there were a solar flare occurrence that knocked out a satellite or two and caused a disturbance affecting internet access? This is not a far-fetched concept. This is a potential reality we could be confronted with at any time. Cell phones, internet here one day then ZAP, gone. What happened? What's the point? The point is: that with no internet access to google a word, if you need a definition, there's a better chance than not that your good old trusty, hard-copied dictionary(ies) will be there for you to reference in the event of a bad-case scenario. I would definitely recommend this as something to keep around the house. You shouldn't have a problem finding any words. Come to think of it, with the lettered tabs, there's a few letters on each tab and you end up having to go one direction or other usually to get to your letter-section of choice anyway. They're all great if you ask me. Finally, as I recall, none of the dictionaries are ridiculously priced at all: this one included. This is definitely a good one, it has some interesting pictures that the other two I mentioned don't have. I would buy another copyt of this Oxford again if anything happened to the one I have if that's any help.

I bought the New Oxford American Dictionary Third Edition because my experience with its electronic version built in the OS of my MacBook Pro has been helping me a lot with current English Usage when I am using the computer. Apple's built-in edition is slightly different from this Third Edition. Perhaps Apple's is an earlier edition and usage notes are sometimes a bit different from those in the Third Edition. Anyway the Apple Dictionary experience has been so satisfactory and rewarding that I decided to buy a volume in print for other everyday uses when I am not using the computer. I am used to consulting the Shorter Oxford English Dictionary because when I want to look up a word, it's usually from a work of literature and the SOED is an excellent companion for this purpose because of its examples from prominent literary works and definitions from different periods in the history of the English language. But when it comes to everyday usage, especially American usage, the SOED is not so helpful. And that's exactly where the New Oxford American Dictionary comes in. Basically it is aimed at covering the most up-to-date usage one is likely to encounter in everyday life and the editing principles are definitely different from those of the SOED, which is the 20-volume Oxford English Dictionary in short. I find that the SOED and the NOAD can complement each other quite well, as the former takes care of the more formal English and the latter takes care of the more casual everyday English. I also appreciate the fact that there is an encyclopedic element in the NOAD, because it provides illuminating and sometimes entertaining facts about crucial components of modern American culture, which is essential to understanding modern American English. Actually the SOED coupled with the NOAD should be able to cover almost any words or phrases that one would like to look up in almost all normal contexts. And if your purpose is just to clarify everyday usage of American English, the NOAD is the dictionary to buy and it's really worth the money at amazon.com's discount.

One of the earlier reviewers stated that this dictionary acts like it "owns the place." I understand where that is coming from. Not only does mine act like it owns my place, when I got it, and it got acclimated to my house, it started pouting, whining, moaning, throwing fits, temper tantrums, and it wouldn't stop until I got it a furniture quality dictionary stand. Also from Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Design-Toscano-Thomas-Aquinas-Bookstand/dp/B00269EOS2/ Then and only then was it content. Until it turns 16 and starts hitting me up for a car. Of course, this stand gives me plenty of room to keep this book's steady girlfriend, the Oxford American Writer's Thesaurus, underneath it. Really, all jokes aside, if and when you buy and receive this tome, the first thing that will jump out at you is its size. While its listed dimensions, 9 x 2.5 x 11.5, are the truth, those actually underestimate how big the dictionary looks when it's in front of your face. You could take out a ruler and estimate those dimensions in front of you if you don't have the dictionary, but the book "in the flesh" actually seems much bigger, even though it's actually not. By comparison, the Webster's Third New International Dictionary, the ne plus ultra of unabridged American English dictionaries, is only 81% larger in three-dimenson volume. "Only 81%," I say, because just about everyone has seen W3NID, and knows how Baluchitherian it is. Also by comparison, the Merriam-Webster Collegiate, 11th Edition, which is in the same class and price point range and language class (American English) as this Oxford, and is said to be the best selling American English dictionary in the just-slightly-less-than-unabridged category, the Oxford is 70% larger in volume than it. In fact, MWC11 is only slightly more voluminus that the the Oxford Theasurus. Once you get over the physical size, then there's the matter of weight. Seven pounds, officially, but if it weighs only seven pounds, then I weigh only seven pounds. Of course, I don't weigh seven pounds, I'm the sort that can gain seven pounds just by looking at a doughnut. By comparison and officially, W3NID is 12.5 pounds, and MWC11 is 3.8 pounds. Long and short: It's big, and heavy, which means it deserves a quality stand, just to support it and show it off. Now, as for contents, Oxford gives me that sort of authoritative and official feeling of lexicography that I don't get from M-W or American Heritage (Houghton-Mifflin), which makes sense, because Oxford University is where our language pretty much officially lives. Another thing is that Oxford doesn't give me the sense that it's playing the kind of slick diss sneak diss political games with lexicography that M-W and AH are, even though Oxford does it to some extent. To conclude: New Oxford American Dictionary 3rd Edition is now in direct competition with my cat over who has control of my house.

Having just spent a small fortune updating my favorite quick-reference for American English grammar, punctuation and usage, I was delighted and surprised to open the box and find that this bargain-priced scholarly masterpiece is HUGE and that the text is clear, easily readable and offers authoritative definitions with American spellings and modern examples of usage, without the etymological fuss that can bog one down when using the unwieldy two-volume Compact Oxford English Dictionary with its microscopic print and included magnifying glass. Don't misunderstand what I'm saying. If you can afford the Compact OED and revel (as I do) in chasing down the origins of words at times, you must either subscribe to or purchase the OED, but if you are seeking an over-sized, thorough and comprehensive desktop dictionary of American English that provides quick and useful definitions and sample sentences so that you can look up a word and get back to your writing or editing, this third edition of NOAD is a treasure you must add to your collection. Buy it before someone classifies it as a "textbook" and quadruples the price!

My first purchase ever from Amazon was a dictionary, the 1996 Webster's Encyclopedic Unabridged. I chose it because it was the only dictionary I could find that had "bonobo" and "urtext" in it, two words I'd recently found use for. Now I needed (ok, wanted) a newer and equally encyclopedic one for my home office and chose this one because it was the most recently updated and also one of the best choices according to Amazon customer reviewers. Here are a few things I've discovered during initial browsings: This 2010 Third Edition New Oxford reveals its British roots with the inclusion of "gastropub," the exclusion of "second base," and its failure to capitalize the "R" on "Realtor"--a trademarked industry-invented name, like Kleenex, that requires a cap "R" whether we like it or not. While both my '96 Webster and '10 New Oxford have entries for "pimp mobile," only New Oxford has one for "OMG," "dumb blonde," "snotty-nosed" and "Risorgimento," a word you'll need to know before watching the great Visconti-Burt Lancaster classic "The Leopard." (And watch it you should, in Italian with subtitles...but I digress.) "Philamerican," which I have just come across for the first time in Antonia Fraser's new book "Must You Go?" isn't in either dictionary. I'm sure continued browsing will reveal all sorts of words previously unknown to me that I'll not be able to live without--for example, this classy sounding five-syllable word for the willful shirking of duties: "esquivalience." New Oxford's "ready reference" extras include: a glossary of some 700 or so British and American English terminology equivalents; Arabic, Hebrew, Greek and Russian alphabets; chemical elements; standard weights and measures with metric equivalents and conversions; texts of the Mayflower Compact, the Declaration of Independence, the Constitution of the United States and its Amendments, the Gettysburg Address, the New Colossus and the Pledge of Allegiance; US Presidents and their Vice Presidents through Obama/Biden; US Chief Justices through Roberts along with landmark Supreme Court cases 1803-1989; US states and their postal abbreviations, capitals, mottoes, nicknames, dates and order of statehood; Countries of the World with population estimates and 12 pages of black and white world maps. I find the typefaces easy to read, particularly the contrast between the boldfaced words, lightfaced definitions and italic examples. And I like being able to find a pronunciation key in all the right hand corners. This 2,016-page book comes with six months of free access to the Oxford online dictionaries, which I've not yet tried. Update 2/5/12: OOPS & ALAS! Just discovered, quite by chance, while looking for it elsewhere, that the word "esquivalience" mentioned above is not a real word. Several Google sources are reporting that the Oxford editors made it up to protect their copyright of the online version. Too bad. I rather liked it, myself.

Sometimes my internet doesn't work as well as it could and if I need assistance with word finding or spelling, I have this hard copy dictionary in my library. I realize people like the internet and use it for everything, but when it's not there, you notice things like, "How do I spell this?" or "What does that word mean?" and you need a hard copy dictionary. In short, pleased with the font size and the paper thickness. I feel that neither of these are a problem. I am pleased with the completeness of the dictionary.....there are an awful LOT of definitions here; you should be able to find almost anything you need. Price not bad for the completeness. I did a lot of searching before I settled on this book. One caveat: treat with care. Don't muss with the book too hard or roughly because the binding is not looking like it's real well made or long lasting. I have not had this dictionary long enough to really comment on this portion, rather this is just my current observation. I also bought the thesaurus and I actually use that more often and intensely and that binding is holding up better than this dictionary's. This could be single product error though, because I bought them as a set.

Used book: I ordered a used book without the dust cover and with some minor wear added during shipping. The book also has a strong, but not offputting, leather smell to it. Manufacturing on the specific book: The book has a fold built up over the last hundred pages (or so) with an uncut piece of the text block folded over the end paper, like a cute little floppy tail. The edge indexing is functional and desirable, despite thumb or tabs being superior, in my opinion. The font is inviting, there are a reasonable number of quality images in the text as well as usage notes and additional information. The only downside is this odd fascination with not giving American dictionaries the IPA, a system every school student should be taught, however I'll just end up using the web for pronunciation. I'd say it's a very attractive dictionary and I made a solid choice in choosing it as my browsing and reading dictionary.

I've always been a firm believer that every home should be a hard copy of a great dictionary. I'm an avid reader and a lover of words. This dictionary is the only one you will ever need and provides hours of entertainment, full of amazing knowledge that does not need to be plugged into Wifi! It's HUGE...weighs about 8lbs! I've always been partial to the american heritage line of dictionaries, however the colossal edition of the aforementioned seems to be out of print. So, I decided to proceed forward with purchasing my first Oxford American Dictionary and I am beyond pleased. Well worth every penny of the purchase price!