Twentieth Century Words

A landmark book for the end of the century, presenting an overview of the development of English vocabulary from 1900 to the present day. There will be ten chapters, one for each decade, that will provide an introduction to the decade, with areas of particular importance and interest noted,and a presentaion of new words for that decade. The selected entries will be both new words, and words that have important new meanings. They will be listed alphabetically in a dictionary-style presentation, with the earliest recorded date of each word entered, and an exemplary quote also given.The source for the entries will be the OED2, and the Additions Series, as well as unpublished material from the New Words group in the OED Department. In addition to the main alphabetic sequence of entries, there will also be boxed panels covering specific aspects of a decade's vocabulary e.g.words arising directly from World War II for the 1940s. There will also be cross-chapter panels, for example 'insults of the century'. Examples of new words and their, perhaps surprising, earliest recorded dates: 'astronaut' - first coined in the 1920s when it was still an ambition. 'fruit machine' - 1930s; 'discotheque' - 1950s; 'pager' - 1960s