Patrick Hanks

Where did your surname come from? Do you know how many people in the United States share it? What does it tell you about your lineage? From the editor of the highly acclaimed Dictionary of Surnames comes the most extensive compilation of surnames in America. The result of 10 years of research and 30 consulting editors, this massive undertaking documents 70,000 surnames of Americans across the country. A reference source like no other, it surveys each surname giving its meaning, nationality, alternate spellings, common forenames associated with it, and the frequency of each surname and forename. The Dictionary of American Family Names is a fascinating journey throughout the multicultural United States, offering a detailed look at the meaning and frequency of surnames throughout the country. For students studying family genealogy, others interested in finding out more about their own lineage, or lexicographers, the Dictionary is an ideal place to begin research.

Dictionary of American Family Names: A-F

Flavia Hodges

Do you love or hate your name? Do you know what it really means? How do you choose the right name for someone? With well over 6,000 entries, this is the most comprehensive dictionary of first names available. In addition to a new introduction from the authors, it provides the answers to all your questions on the meanings and histories of names, how they have risen or fallen in popularity, and who are the famous bearers from history, fiction, and the screen. There is detailed appendixmaterial which includes European, Arabic, and Indian names, and this new edition now contains detailed coverage of Japanese and Chinese names. Over 150 brand new first names listed, including Aeronwen, Ardal, Calista, Gaia, Macy, Nirvana, and Xena

A Concise Dictionary of First Names

Richard Coates

Peter McClure (Historian)

Paul Cullen (Ph. D.)

Containing entries for more than 45,000 English, Scottish, Welsh, Irish, Cornish, and immigrant surnames, The Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland is the ultimate reference work on family names of the UK. The Dictionary includes every surname that currently has more than 100 bearers. Each entry contains lists of variant spellings of the name, an explanation of its origins (including the etymology), lists of early bearers showing evidence for formation and continuity from the date of formation down to the 19th century, geographical distribution, and, where relevant, genealogical and bibliographical notes, making this a fully comprehensive work on family names. This authoritative guide also includes an introductory essay explaining the historical background, formation, and typology of surnames and a guide to surnames research and family history research. Additional material also includes a list of published and unpublished lists of surnames from the Middle Ages to the present day.

The Oxford Dictionary of Family Names in Britain and Ireland

Dictionary of American Family Names: O-Z

The most comprehensive coverage The New Oxford Thesaurus of English is a new type of thesaurus. It gives you more choice and more help than any other comparable thesaurus, and will enrich your creative writing, essays, or letters, or simply your enjoyment of the English language. The clearest layout Superbly clear layout, with all synonym lists on new lines, and new lines for special sections such as opposite words and related terms The closest and most useful alternative words are given first, with words which are closest in meaning to the entry word given in capitals Special features Unique coverage of related terms such as bear: ursine, blue: cyanic, milk: lactic From folklore to phobias, from actors to assassins, over 450 boxed lists provide information on a vast range of subjects Naturalist or naturist, inherent or intrinsic? Over 150 in-text notes help you make the right choice between easily confused words

The New Oxford Thesaurus of English

Gilles-Maurice de Schryver

In recent years the focus in linguistics research has shifted from the investigation of syntax, phonology and logical semantics supported by intuitions and speculation, to a more hard-nosed analysis of words in text and speech, focusing on how words are actually used. As such, lexicography has moved from the periphery to the centre of language research. At the same time, lexicography itself is in transition from a highly traditional craft, to a new interdisciplinary science. This handbook contrasts traditional methods of lexicography with newly emerging electronic and corpus-driven approaches. The International Handbook of Modern Lexis and Lexicography is a fully international and comprehensive reference work. It deals with every aspect of lexicography in all major languages, together with area studies of lexicography in indigenous languages, as well as rare and endangered languages. Readers will benefit from the comparative study of best practice and future targets in lexicography in all the countries of the world. The Springer Handbook will be of interest to users ranging from general readers and undergraduates to specialists from the fields of lexicography, language teaching, computational linguistics, translation studies, and literary and cultural studies.

International Handbook of Modern Lexis and Lexicography

Kate Hardcastle

This Dictionary is part of the Oxford Reference Collection: using sustainable print-on-demand technology to make the acclaimed backlist of the Oxford Reference programme perennially available in hardback format. The fascinating and informative Dictionary of First Names covers over 6,000 names in common use in English, including the very newest names as well as traditional names. From Alice to Zanna and Adam to Zola this book will answer all your questions: it will tell you the age, origin, and meaning of the name, as well as how it has fared in terms of popularity, and who the famous fictional or historical bearers for the name have been. It covers alternative spellings, short forms and pet forms, and masculine and feminine forms, as well as help with pronunciation. The book includes extensive appendices covering names from languages including Scottish, Irish, French, German, Italian, Arabic, and Chinese names. Tables of the most popular names by year and by region are also included. From the traditional to the rare and unconventional, this book will tell you everything you need to know about names.

A Dictionary of First Names

A lexically based, corpus-driven theoretical approach to meaning in language that distinguishes between patterns of normal use and creative exploitations of norms. In Lexical Analysis, Patrick Hanks offers a wide-ranging empirical investigation of word use and meaning in language. The book fills the need for a lexically based, corpus-driven theoretical approach that will help people understand how words go together in collocational patterns and constructions to make meanings. Such an approach is now possible, Hanks writes, because of the availability of new forms of evidence (corpora, the Internet) and the development of new methods of statistical analysis and inferencing. Hanks offers a new theory of language, the Theory of Norms and Exploitations (TNE), which makes a systematic distinction between normal and abnormal usage—between rules for using words normally and rules for exploiting such norms in metaphor and other creative use of language. Using hundreds of carefully chosen citations from corpora and other texts, he shows how matching each use of a word against established contextual patterns plays a large part in determining the meaning of an utterance. His goal is to develop a coherent and practical lexically driven theory of language that takes into account the immense variability of everyday usage and that shows that this variability is rule governed rather than random. Such a theory will complement other theoretical approaches to language, including cognitive linguistics, construction grammar, generative lexicon theory, priming theory, and pattern grammar.

Norms and Exploitations

Lexical Analysis

The Collins Paperback Thesaurus in A-to-Z Form

Dictionary of American Family Names: G-N

Dictionary of American Family Names

Peter McClure

Collins Dictionary of the English Language

"Origins and meanings of over 2,500 names"--Cover.

An A-Z of Baby Names

Where did your surname come from? Do you know how many people in the United States share it? What does it tell you about your lineage?From the editor of the highly acclaimed Dictionary of Surnames comes the most extensive compilation of surnames in America. The result of 10 years of research and 30 consulting editors, this massive undertaking documents 70,000 surnames of Americans across the country. A reference source like no other, it surveys each surname giving its meaning, nationality, alternate spellings, common forenames associated with it, and the frequency of each surname and forename.The Dictionary of American Family Names is a fascinating journey throughout the multicultural United States, offering a detailed look at the meaning and frequency of surnames throughout the country. For students studying family genealogy, others interested in finding out more about their own lineage, or lexicographers, the Dictionary is an ideal place to begin research.

3-Volume Set

The fascinating and informative Dictionary of First Names covers over 6,000 names in common use in English, including the very newest names as well as traditional names. From Alice to Zanna and Adam to Zola this book will answer all your questions: it will tell you the age, origin, and meaningof the name, as well as how it has fared in terms of popularity, and who the famous fictional or historical bearers for the name have been. It covers alternative spellings, short forms and pet forms, and masculine and feminine forms, as well as help with pronunciation.The book includes extensive appendices covering names from languages including Scottish, Irish, French, German, Italian, Arabic, and Chinese names. Tables of the most popular names by year and by region are also included.This is the most comprehensive paperback first names dictionary available. From the traditional to the rare and unconventional, this book will tell you everything you need to know about names.

Patrick Hanks

Books

Your next favorite book is out there