Thorndike Barnhart Student Dictionary (Hardcover)

The Student Dictionary has been designed and prepared to supply to high-school and mature junior-high students the essential information about English vocabulary. This information is intended to aid students in reading, writing, listening, and speaking.

Each of the more than 100,000 words entered in this dictionary has been carefully evaluated by a staff of editors long experienced in writing dictionaries for young people. Every year thousands of new words and meanings appear in printed sources. The staff has examined a wide variety of current textbooks and other literature most apt to be read by the dictionary’s users. Scott Foresman citation files record changes in words, definitions, and usage as these first appear in the language and then become accepted. Such a program of reading current English sources is vital to maintain an up-to-date dictionary.

Purchasers and users of a dictionary have a right to expect that it be up-to-date. The copyright date should indicate the currentness of factual material contained therein. Certain classes of dictionary entries are particularly susceptible to going out of date. In this book, special care has been taken to update geographical and biographical entries. The names of current national political leaders, all countries and their capitals, and the most recent population figures obtainable are included. Many scientific entries have been recast to reflect recent scholar-ship.

The Student Dictionary follows the basic precepts of dictionaries prepared for young people that were pioneered by Scott, Foresman over 50 years ago in the Thorndike Junior Dictionary. Definitions are written, insofar as possible, in simpler language than the main entry being defined. Common meanings of words are given first within an entry. Related meanings are placed adjacent to each other, so that the semantic flow of meaning change may be easily observed. And a single alphabetical list enables the student to find any single entry quickly and easily, without first having to decide whether the entry is perhaps to be found in a supplementary listing.

Within entries in this dictionary, illustrative or context sentences and phrases have been written to show the student actual idiomatic English usage as a model. These sentences, showing real situations, have been written to reflect the pluralism of our society, and at the same time to avoid unfortunate stereotypes.

Additional features of the Student Dictionary provide further help for its users. Some 900 synonym studies and usage notes provide extra information dealing with syntax, spelling, and shades of meaning that help students to be more exact in their choice of words for a given context. About 18,000 etymologies, or word histories, have been included for root words. All language names have been spelled out within the simply written etymologies. Etymologies frequently show a root or underlying meaning that helps students gain fresh insights into the words they use or are learning to use.

To show students how words have come into our language from many sources, we have included “Word Sources,” a feature unique to the Student Dictionary. These 43 word sources are lists of words which can be traced back to a common language source or words which were formed in a similar way, such as acronyms and coined words.

Another special feature of this dictionary is the inclusion of Word Families.” These 70 word families are lists of English words that go back to a common root. They can be a means of increasing vocabulary, since a student who knows the root and its meaning should be able to recognize this root in many unfamiliar words. Furthermore, the meaning of the root is often a clue to the meaning of the unfamiliar word. Word families, by teaching students basic roots and by helping them see the relationship between words, are an important tool in language study.

An illustration can and should do more than tell you that something exists. An effective illustration broadens the student’s understanding of the definition. More than 1500 illustrations-photographs, drawings, fine art reproductions, movie stills, maps, charts-were specially chosen to augment definitions, to promote browsing, and to stimulate an interest in language. Many of these illustrations are enhanced by the addition of color. Most of the 80 maps have color overlays to highlight the area being defined. Picture captions give the size of animals both in the customary way and in the metric system.

To help students derive the greatest benefit from dictionary use, a self-teaching guide to using this dictionary is included in the front of the book.