The Oxford Junior Dictionary for British children aged 7 and older, as mentioned in my husband's latest blog post and elsewhere, has recently been updated. Such is the potency of words, that the list of vocabulary considered irrelevant to our grandchildren dismays Britons of my generation.
OK, it's reasonable to banish "Empire", "Pentecost" and "duchess" these days, and probably even "christen" (I won't get side-tracked into discussing that provocative verb)—gone are the days when the majority of adolescents queued up in a church "aisle" for "confirmation" by the local "bishop"—but to eliminate the word "monarch" while the UK still has one, and "abbey" (where the nation's next monarch is likely to be crowned), seems a bit much.
What's really disturbing though is the cutting out of vocabulary for children's Nature Studies (sorry—why use short words when words of four or five syllables will do?—I mean Environmental Education): moss, fern, bluebell, ash, sycamore (and their keys, presumably), primrose, minnow, kingfisher, lark, thrush. Reading such a resonant list puts me in a state of mourning: that's the essence of my childhood gone! Where will today's children find their mental sanctuary? Not in words like "vandalism", "committee", "compulsory" or "voicemail", that's for sure. Ironically, I see that the word "endangered" is also being added to the dictionary, but if our grandchildren can't tell one species from another, what's the point? How can we ever teach them the appreciation of a world that's become verbally extinct? Before we know where we are, the concept of "sunset" will soon have gone, too, if it hasn't already, and if we aren't careful, so will "sun", "moon," and "stars". Or is "star" now cross-referenced under "celebrity" for the modern child's edification?
What I believe the English-speaking world needs is not a Junior Dictionary full of trendy jargon, but a Seniors' Dictionary, written to enlighten people like my octo-(nearly nona-)genarian mother who hasn't a clue what "broadband" or "chatroom" means, nor what an MP3 player is. At the same time, the OUP ought to be publishing another dictionary, equally educational, aimed at those intelligent 7- and 8-year olds of whatever cultural background who might be on the brink of discovering British fiction from the old days, crammed full of the enticingly strange vocabulary that some unimaginative academic, or more likely academic committee, full of self-importance, has chosen to condemn, the vocabulary of Minnow on the Say, Wind in the Willows, The Secret Garden, Alice in Wonderland, The Weirdstone of Brisingamen, The Railway Children, The Borrowers, Treasure Island. I've never read any of the Harry Potter series, but have a sneaking suspicion that those recently written and hugely popular stories, too, are more about elves, goblets (or goblins) and newts than about boring old "block graphs" or "file attachments".
What, no more catkins? No more conkers? Don't make me angry. And please don't tell me there aren't any wild primroses in big cities like London, either, because I saw them there last spring, flowering on the railway embankments. Let's continue to tell the children what they are.
2 comments:
Today, 18th Dec., having also contacted the OUP directly, I received the following reply:
"Dear Alison Hobbs
Thank you for your email regarding our Oxford Junior Dictionary, expressing your concerns about this title. We are always pleased to receive customer feedback.
Oxford University Press publishes 17 dictionaries for children, aimed at different ages. All of our dictionaries are based on rigorous lexicographical research and analysis, and take into account educational curriculum requirements for children of different ages. The Oxford Junior Dictionary is a relatively small dictionary aimed at 7 year olds as an introduction to language and the practice of using dictionaries for the first time. Our Oxford Primary Dictionary for example (at more than twice the length and word-count than the Oxford Junior Dictionary) is much more comprehensive and aimed at children aged 8 through to age 11. The Oxford Primary Dictionary includes all the words that have been cited in recent media coverage as not being in the Oxford Junior Dictionary.
I hope this goes some way to addressing your concerns.
For further details about our dictionaries and about the content of the Oxford Junior Dictionary and Oxford Primary Dictionary please see the attached statement.
Yours sincerely
Oxford University Press"
The section of their attached, all-purpose statement that relates to the Junior Dictionary reads as follows:
"This dictionary [...] should be regarded as an introduction to language. The editorial content of the Oxford Junior Dictionary reflects language children will come across today at home, and at school. Headword coverage links in with curriculum requirements (especially the National Literacy Strategy). It also gives words covering the main religious faiths, e.g. Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Sikhism; there are headwords relating to places of worship, e.g. church, mosque, synagogue, temple; the main festivals, e.g. Christmas, Easter, Eid, Diwali, Passover, Hanukkah. As required by schools, it pays special attention to IT, and gives a more global coverage."
I feel that a response is called for, but I just don't have the words.
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