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Does anyone know where the OED draws the line on niche jargon and slang? There’s a lot of self-conscious neologism and silliness in in publications such as The
by jl6 8y ago
Does anyone know where the OED draws the line on niche jargon and slang? There’s a lot of self-conscious neologism and silliness in in publications such as The New Hacker’s Dictionary and Urbandictionary, but also a lot of genuine words that have genuine meaning in niche communities.
- oldcynic 8y agoIt seems to avoid niche and profession specific coinages pretty well so they must be looking for candidates to spill over into more general usage. I wonder if they're uniq -c everything lodged at the British Library each year. They're descriptive rather than prescriptive so are constantly adapting to new usages, and spellings. Which probably means that it's only a matter of time before "loose" is an accepted spelling of "lose" rather than an entirely different meaning. :(
- lgessler 8y agoI was going to write something more cranky, and then I looked at your username and had a laugh. Irregardless of your perceptive on this, it is good to be self-conscience.
- oldcynic 8y ago> Irregardless of your perceptive on this, it is good to be self-conscience Well played! Perfectly acceptable internet usage. Especially in a world with auto-correct. :) Yet somehow lose/loose grates a little when a they're/their or it's/its doesn't. Possibly as the mental pronunciation has already led me down a blind alley. Or possibly I have no idea why. I almost never make comment.
- ghaff 8y agoI tend to suspect that lose/loose, break/brake, etc. are often a case of the user not knowing the difference as they often appear consistently in a comment. Whereas, even though I know the difference between it's and its (for example), I still just make a mistake now and then because of mental pronunciation. But I don't comment either although I notice and twinge a bit :-)
- sixothree 8y agoWe have whoadie which means you're from the same ward (or any ward) eg. 7th Ward.
- ghaff 8y agoThis is what they say: https://www.oxforddictionaries.com/our-story/creating-dictionaries https://www.oxforddictionaries.com/our-story/creating-dictio... "Before adding a word to one of our dictionaries we have to see evidence that it is widely used in print or online." Which doesn't really answer the question but "widely used" tends to suggest something beyond technical jargon or niche slang.
- kevin_thibedeau 8y agoIs "doh" still relevant today. 50 years from now?
- astrodust 8y agoDon't have a cow, man. It's going to stick around.