The shrinking of the english language

heypaulie | 15:42 Thu 27th Dec 2007 | Arts & Literature

3 Answers

I've heard a few people saying the english language is constantly shrinking?? Can anyone point me in the right direction to finding more info. I'd like to see a list of words which no longer appear in the Oxford dictionary; words we no longer use etc..... please help!

Aristotle, political animal

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Quizmonster

I very much doubt that the language is shrinking if, by that, you mean there are fewer and fewer words in use. Certainly, words do become archaic or obsolete but others are constantly crowding in to replace them. Not so long ago "a mobile" was a dangly art-form...now, it is almost inevitably a form of telephone, for example.
If you mean that people are nowadays more prone to abbreviation, then shrinking may, indeed, be taking place. You need consider only text-speak...an offshoot of mobile phones...with messages such as "CUL8R" for "(I will) see you later." That is surely an example of shrinkage in that the idea occupies less space.

fredpuli47

I don't think any words no longer appear on the full Oxford Dictionary.The editors keep them all . If a word is rare, archaic or obsolete when they revise the Dictionary they then mark it accordingly .They constantly add words because new words are constantly being created in English and imported into English.They are more conservative than the editors of some other dictionaries, in that they don't include a word unless it has gained currency and has appeared in print with some clear indication of its meaning. All that means, in the end, is that they don't add as many new words as some editors do.

Doctor Johnson was particular about obsolete words.. In the Preface to his Dictionary he explained that he omitted obsolete words unless they were found in works which were not themselves obsolete . He was quite fussy about his sources. We may imagine that an obsolete word that he found in some old broadsheet or pamphlet was not included but one occurring in Milton was !

Surely the English language is growing, not shrinking.