The Lexicographer's Rules

Somehow, I missed this bit with British slang lexicographer Jonathon Green last year. There’s a short text summary and a 57-minute audio interview in MP3 format. Thanks to “Barrington A” on the Slang mailing list for bringing it to my attention.

Note that at about four minutes in Jonathon (whom I know professionally and communicate with via email from time to time) talks about his upcoming historical dictionary of slang. Since then, it has been announced that Oxford University Press will not be publishing that dictionary, and, alas, it cannot go by the acronym of GODS, the Green Oxford Dictionary of Slang. Most major dictionaries have fairly standard acronyms among lexicographers, you see, and it would be rather nice to get one like that.

Instead, it was announced in October that Chambers Harrap would be publishing it. So perhaps the acronym will be CHUDS, the Chambers Harrap Universal Dictionary of Slang. (The article misspells Jonathon’s first name, by the way, even though Bookseller.com have since been sent a correction.)

As long as SOMEBODY publishes it. I have been heartbroken every time I’ve needed to look up slang beyond the letter “O.”

Enjoying your blog. Good stuff.

As regards the multi-volume dictionary the state of play is that Chambers will publish it, all being well, in late 2009. The name will be _Green’s Dictionary of Slang on Historical Principles_. Given the absolute unacronymity of these initials, this of course implies that I’m going for the ultimate prize: eponymy. In anglophone dictionaries only ‘Johnson’, ‘Webster’ and in slang lexicography ‘Partridge’ have achieved this on a generally acknowledged scale. So I’m not holding my breath. In the meantime I have the single-volume Chambers Dictionary of Slang (as ‘Green’, no cites, being edited even as I type), scheduled for Fall ‘08.

PS. CHUDS, or rather chuddies, means underpants in London’s immigrant-created version of Urdu.

When I speculated that the work might instead get the acronym of CHUDS, I had this ridiculous 1984 movie in mind. Note its tagline: “Ugly. Slobbering. Ferocious. Carnivorous.” :)

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