The New Oxford American Dictionary

Produced by Oxford's American Dictionaries Program, and drawing on the expertise of scores of American scholars and advisors, The New Oxford American Dictionary sets the standard of excellence for lexicography in this country.

Here is the most accurate and richly descriptive picture of American English ever offered in any dictionary. Oxford's American editors drew on our 200-million-word databank of contemporary North American English, plus the unrivaled citation files of the world-renowned Oxford English Dictionary.  We started with American evidence -- an unparalleled resource unique to Oxford.  Our staff logged more than 50 editor-years, checking every entry and every definition.  Oxford's ongoing North American Reading Program, begun in the early 1980s, keeps our lexicographers in touch with fresh evidence of our language and usage--in novels and newspapers, in public records and magazines, and on-line, too.

To provide unprecedented clarity, the entries are organized around core meanings, reflecting the way people think about words and eliminating the clutter and confusion of a traditional dictionary entry.  Each entry plainly shows the major meaning or meanings of the word, plus any related senses, arranged in intuitive constellations of connected meanings.  Definitions are supplemented by illustrative, in-context examples of actual usage.

This major new edition of The New Oxford American Dictionary includes a guide to the pronunciations on every page, a new etymology essay by Anatoly Liberman, completely updated and revised maps, and more than a thousand new entries, covering everything new in our language from low-carb to warblog and beyond .

The New Oxford American Dictionary is designed to serve the user clearly, simply, and quickly, with the precise guidance you expect from Oxford University Press.  With in-depth and up-to-date coverage that all users need and expect -- for reading and study, for technical terms, for language guidance -- it continues the tradition of scholarship and lexicographic excellence that are the hallmarks of every Oxford dictionary.

Features:

• 250,000 entries and definitions -- with more than 2,000 new entries in this edition
• The most accurate and richly descriptive picture of American English ever offered in any dictionary
• Provides unprecedented clarity in which the entries are organized around core meanings, reflecting the way people think about words and eliminating the clutter and confusion of a traditional dictionary entry
• Each entry shows the major meaning or meanings of the word, plus any related senses, arranged in intuitive constellations of connected meanings
• Definitions are supplemented by illustrative, in-context examples of actual usage