atw: Re: Program vs. Programme

Oh dear, Michael (L).

Looks like we have a case here of Maquarie University folk versus
the consultants for the Collins:
A Challis Professor of English Literature at the University of
Sydney, NSW
An Associate Professor in Lterature and communications at
Bond University, Qld.
plus a rather eminent chap, formerly of the University of Birmingham
(UK)

There's nothing so out of date about the CoBUILD body of work
("corpus" - oh please-us! Pretentious, moi?)

The MacQuarie removes all the Zeds from the language, going against
the Oxford and the Collins (If the MacQuarie had its way, soon I'll have
to take my kids to the "soo" to see the "sebras".)

The MacQuarie's etymologies are woefully inadequate.
Plus it is printed on paper so thin, you don't need the CD-ROM version.
(The words on the next page is readable from the one before.)

Sorry, but I just don't like the MacQuarie.
(Apart from a wonderful definition of "cluster headache" in an old
edition, obviously written from someone with first hand experience.)

Now ducking for cover as the salvos fly...

Cheers,

Micky G.
Write Ideas
www.writeideas.com.au

> Michael Granat:
>
>> All prejudice aside - apart from my intense dislike of the
>> contrarie MacQuarie dictionarie...
>
> Tut. We've been here before. All modern dictionaries use the same
> corpus-based
> technology to determine the current state of the language. But our corpus
> is
> bigger and more up to date, so our dictionary better reflects the current
> state of the language.
>
> Of course, if you want a source of direction rather than reflection, you
> don't
> want a descriptive dictionary at all; you want a prescriptive style guide.
> The
> old Fowler is too old (and not Australian), and the Burchfield version of
> Fowler is non-prescriptive (and not Australian). You could always go with
> Pam
> Peters's Cambridge Australian English Style Guide.
>
>
> Michael Lewis
>
> --------------------------------------
> Department of Linguistics
> Macquarie University
> --------------------------------------


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