57 min listen
Jonathan Green, “Green’s Dictionary of Slang” (Hodder Education, 2010)
Jonathan Green, “Green’s Dictionary of Slang” (Hodder Education, 2010)
ratings:
Length:
58 minutes
Released:
Jan 26, 2012
Format:
Podcast episode
Description
Over the last thirty years, Jonathon Green has established himself as a major figure in lexicography, specialising in English slang. During this time he has accumulated a database of over half a million citations for more than 100,000 words and phrases, and these are the basis for the vast, authoritative and widely acclaimed Green’s Dictionary of Slang (Hodder Education, 2010), winner of the Dartmouth Medal as the American Library Association’s ‘outstanding reference work of the year’.
Slang’s definition is itself perhaps elusive, but to Green it is ‘counter-language’, by analogy with ‘counter-culture’, and possesses the same vivid qualities: it is irreverent, subversive and fun. It is, however, also important for what it tells us about how people live, interact and think, and is worthy of serious study.
In this interview we do not attempt to summarise the A-Z of slang (nor even the C-F), but we do talk about slang’s relation to culture, the history of its lexicography, and the day-to-day work of its researchers. We talk about the benefits of the internet for this work, as well as the limitations of user-generated alternatives and the challenges they pose to the professional scholar. And inevitably, we bring together the themes of the Oxford English Dictionary, canonical literature and comic-book porn.
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Slang’s definition is itself perhaps elusive, but to Green it is ‘counter-language’, by analogy with ‘counter-culture’, and possesses the same vivid qualities: it is irreverent, subversive and fun. It is, however, also important for what it tells us about how people live, interact and think, and is worthy of serious study.
In this interview we do not attempt to summarise the A-Z of slang (nor even the C-F), but we do talk about slang’s relation to culture, the history of its lexicography, and the day-to-day work of its researchers. We talk about the benefits of the internet for this work, as well as the limitations of user-generated alternatives and the challenges they pose to the professional scholar. And inevitably, we bring together the themes of the Oxford English Dictionary, canonical literature and comic-book porn.
Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices
Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/language
Released:
Jan 26, 2012
Format:
Podcast episode
Titles in the series (100)
Theo van Leeuwen, “The Language of Colour: An Introduction” (Routledge, 2011): Theo van Leeuwen comes to the academic discipline of social semiotics – the study of how meanings are conveyed – from his previous career as a film and TV producer. His interest in the makings of visual communication is hardly surprising. by New Books in Language