My favourite talk was Erin McKean’s funny, geeky and intelligent plea for the lexicographical world to redefine itself.
Erin calls herself a dictionary evangelist. She focuses on the inadequacy of the paper dictionary as a reference form – it’s clumsy, it’s difficult to search, it’s constricted by its physical size – it cannot encompass every word, which is why lexicographers choose the bestest words for inclusion.
Erin then points out that we have the Internet. A publication medium without boundaries. Yet what do most dictionaries do? They replicate the print medium.
Erin observes that lexicography isn’t rocket science. But that the field of rocket science is now aided by hordes of passionate, well-informed amateurs, as are astronomy and ornithology and others. Yet lexicography continues its shut-off, closed in approach to collecting, defining and choosing those words that are ‘good’ enough or ‘important’ enough to get in the dictionary.
James Murray was the first editor of the Oxford English Dictionary, a post he took up in 1879. Murray’s quite the fossil. But Erin points out that if he were transported from the Victorian era to today, Murray would have no problem in getting a job. Lexicography has not evolved with the times.
So she makes a passionate plea for lexicography to open its doors to user participation, to open source, to not excluding words, to letting the passionate amateurs and word lovers and professional lexicographers to work together towards creating a big online dictionary.
What struck me when I watched this TED talk was that Erin states that computers haven’t revolutionised the dictionary – they’ve just basically strapped a modern combustion engine onto a very ancient bike. Sure it goes faster, but it’s not much better beyond that. Dictionaries need to change. They need to become more than print-based copies with easier, faster search fields.
But it’s not just lexicographers who are guilty of this sin. Any established learning or communication method does this. Check out TV or radio professionals who squash their broadcasting tradition into ‘digital media’. Much academic endeavour on the Internet has been stymied and slowed by centuries-old traditions being replicated online, instead of freestyling and making the most of new technologies. Sometimes things really do just seem to go back to a lecturer standing in an empty lecture theatre in Second Life, talking to themselves.
But this sounds like a rant now. I suggest you skip over to TED and watch Erin. Her talk is clever, funny, passionate and engaging. You’re probably not a lexicographer, but I’m pretty sure what she’s saying applies in many fields.
NOTE: My favourite Erin McKean quote ‘a little-known technological fact about the Internet is it’s actually made up for words and enthusiasm.’
