Modern English Dictionaries Research Articles

Jürgen Schäfer: 1933-1985

JÜRGEN SCHAFER 1933-1985 Shortly after his return home from the meeting of the Dictionary Society, Professor Jürgen Schäfer died of kidney failure in Augsburg on September 25, 1985. Known personally to many scholars in North America, he was even more widely known through his contributions to Dictionaries (on whose editorial board he had agreed to serve) and through his other scholarly work. He is survived by his wife Loretta (whom he met while a teacher at the University of Pittsburgh and who was his constant helper in his research and writing) and by their daughter Sarah. At the Ann Arbor meeting, he presented a paper characteristic of his grasp of large principles and minute details—"Early Modern English: OED, New OED, EMED"; it is now scheduled for publication in the papers of the Symposium on English Lexicography held in connection with the DSNA meeting. Born August 1, 1933, Jürgen Schäfer studied English, history , and romance languages at the Universities of Tübingen, Santander, Leicester, Pittsburgh, and Münster and at Münster completed his doctoral dissertation in 1964 with a study of humour in Elizabethan comedy. He then joined Marvin Spevak's research project to work on the Shakespeare Concordance, taking time in 1968 to visit Ann Arbor to examine the materials of the Early Modern English Dictionary and .to reflect oh the special challenges and opportunities involved in bringing that dictionary to completion. His Habilitationsschrift on Shakespeare's style and his other publications and research work led to his appointment in 1974 to the Chair of English and American Literature at the University of Augsburg. At the time of his death he was Dean of his Faculty at Augsburg. Readers of Dictionaries will be aware of his Documentation in the O.E.D.: Shakespeare and Nashe as Test Cases (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1980), and his breadth is expressed in other publications appropriate to the chair he held: books on Commonwealth literature and twentieth-century American drama as well as articles ranging from Shakespeare to Anthony 284 Jürgen Schäfer285 Powell to contemporary Canadian novelists. The work that will be the capstone of his too brief scholarly career will appear from Oxford University Press (probably in 1986): Elizabethan Lexicography: A Survey of Monolingual Printed Glossaries and Dictionaries, 1475-1640. Several of us gathered in Ann Arbor for the DSNA meeting had the pleasure of hearing him explain the scope and format of this work. Like his Documentation, it provides essential background for the enormous task of completing a dictionary of Renaissance English. No better assessment of his contributions can be written than these following words (sent to me in a letter from his widow, who supplied some of the biographical information recited here): "Please emphasize that he was a philologist in the time-honored sense: a man unable or unwilling to separate language from literature, impervious to -isms of all kinds, yet Jürgen Schäfer, 1933-1985 286Jürgen Schäfer forward-looking in his methods and his means—above all, catholic and progressive in his perceptions of literature in English. His feet were firmly planted in the twentieth century, but his heart belonged to Shakespeare and the English Renaissance. At the very center of his scholarly universe was the word in all its shimmering vitality, and everything evolved from that center." Yet one more trait should, however, be mentioned: his generosity and eagerness to share his scholarship with others. It is to be found, among many other places, in the last sentence of the last scholarly paper he presented: "Only by distributing the enormous task onto various shoulders will it be possible to create dictionaries which will have a life expectancy comparable to that of the OED." His vision, intelligence, and companionship will be greatly missed. Richard W. Bailey The University of Michigan ...

The National Endowment for the Humanities and its Support for Lexicography

THE NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR THE HUMANITIES AND ITS SUPPORT FOR LEXICOGRAPHY Dorothy Wartenberg The following is a list of dictionary projects and data bases supported, in whole or in part, by the Research Division of the National Endowment for the Humanities from 1967 to date. The dates given are those during which the projects have received funding from NEH. While the Endowment's budget has decreased somewhat since 1 980, there has been no significant reduction in the funds available for research tools and reference works (such as dictionaries), and the Endowment expects to award at least $3 million in outright and matching funds in this area alone in fiscal years 1984. You are invited to look through this list in order, first, to get a sense ofthe variety and range ofprojects that have received funding up to now, and second, to see where there are gaps, particularly in regard to major reference works, for which outside funding may be necessary. The Endowment would appreciate having your comments and suggestions. Prospective applicants should discuss their projects with NEH and ask for staff comments on a preliminary draft before submitting a formal proposal. The next deadline for Research Tools (dictionaries, encyclopedias , data bases) is October 1, 1984. Please write or call: Dorothy Wartenberg, Assistant Director for Reference Works, Research Division, National Endowment for the Humanities, 1 100 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington, D.C. 20506 (202-786-0210). 115 1 16NEH and Lexicography DICTIONARIES ARCHAEOLOGY Stillwell, Richard, Princeton University Press, Princeton Dictionary of Classical Archaeology Project, 1 968-70; 1970-76. FILM Eskino, Andrew H., International Museum of Photography , Planning Project for a Biographical Dictionary on Photographers, 1980-81. HISTORY Near and Middle East—Middle East Bonebakker, Seegar, A., University of California at Los Angeles, Computerization ofArabic Biographical Dictionaries for the Onomasticon Arabicum, 1977-84. Herzog, Marvin L, Columbia University, Preparation and Publication of Language and Atlas of Ashkenazic Jewry, 1978-83. European—Medieval Worth, Dean S., University of California at Los Angeles, Dictionary of the Novgorod Birchbark Letters (Medieval Russian), 1982-84. Asian Hucker, Charles O., University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, Historical Dictionary ofChinese Official Titles, 1976-78; 1980-82. Dorothy Wartenberg117 LANGUAGE AND LINGUISTICS Native American Krauss, Michael E., University of Alaska at Fairbanks, Alaska Native Languages Dictionary Project, 1978-84. Mattina, Anthony, University of Montana, Colville Dictionary , 1980-83. Rhodes, Richard A., University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, Eastern Ojibwa-Ottawa Dictionary, 1981-84. Rood, David S., University of Colorado, Siouan Languages Archive, 1977-8 1 . Salzmann, Zdenek, University of Massachusetts at Amherst, Dictionary of Contemporary Araphano Usage , 1981-83. Siebert, Frank T., Penobscot Nation, Research and Preparation of Penobscot Dictionary Project, 1979-83. Taylor, Allan R., University of Colorado, Gros Ventre Dictionary, 1979-83. Thompson, Laurence, C, Pacific and Asian Linguistic Institute, Salish Indian Lexicography, 1979-83. Thompson, Laurence C, University of Hawaii at Manoa, Salish Indian Dictionaries: Klallam and Tillamook, 1982-84. Yound, Robert W., University of New Mexico, Navajo/ English-English/Navajo Dictionary, 1974-76. Hispanic American Boyd-Bowman, Peter M., Research Foundation of SUNY Buffalo, The Linguistic Analysis of Spanish Colonial Documents, 1974-82. Boyd-Bowman, Peter M., Research Foundation of SUNY Buffalo, Spanish-American Lexicon of the Nineteenth Century, 1982-84. 1 1 8 NEH and Lexicography American/British Bailey, Richard W., University of Michigan, The Early Modern English Dictionary, 1973-76. Cassidy, Frederic G., University ofWisconsin, Dictionary of American Regional English, 1971-84. Fraser, Russell A., University of Michigan, Early Modern English Dictionary, 1971-72. Nicolaisen, Wilhelm, SUNY at Binghamton, A Concise Dictionary of Scottish Place Names, 1983-86. Robinson, Jay L., University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, The Middle English Dictionary, 1980-85. Sherman, Donald, Unaffiliated, Dictionary ofEarly Modern English Pronunciation 1500-1800 (including a computer version) 1 974-77. European—French Valdman, Albert, Indiana University, Preparation of a Dictionary of Creole French, 1974-81. European—German Lehmann, Winfred P., University of Texas at Austin, A Gothic Etymological Dictionary, 1980-84. Lloyd, Albert L., University of Pennsylvania, An Etymological Dictionary of Old High German, 1978-84. Wells, John C, Tufts University, Dictionary of the Old High German Glosses, 1967-73; 1976-81. European—Greek Georgacas, D. J., University of North Dakota at...

Dictionary Editor's Lingo

ALEXICOGRAPHER might well seem the last person in the world to be an innovator in language. Yet, like other specialized groups, the staffs of the Middle English Dictionary and the Early Modern English Dictionary now in preparation at the University of Michigan have gradually developed a cant which reveals several tendencies common in the process of linguistic change. These special meanings and uses may be more easily seen in relation to the actual procedure of editing, say, the Early Modern English Dictionary. Since this, like the great Oxford, is a historical dictionary (1475 to 1700), this procedure has its inception with the mass of historical evidence already available in the files in the form of 4,500,000 slips of paper, each about four by seven inches in size. When an editor or sub-editor (a term borrowed from Oxford practice) takes the slips comprising the illustrative evidence for a word or group of words, he finds, of course, that they have already been alphabetized and chronologized. Such work has been done principally by N.Y.A.-ers (or N.Y.A.'s) and W.P.A.-ers assigned by the local divisions of the National Youth Administration and the Works Progress Administration. For an extremely rare word, such as the adverb 'tutelarly,' there may be only one slip, a oncer; for a common word such as 'lay' there may be nearly 4,000 slips. Most of these slips bear quots [kwots] or quotations, illustrating a particular use of the catch-word written in the upper lefthand corner. An occasional slip bearing two or more catch-words is known as a send-on, for extra copies must be made and sent on for each of the other significant words in the quot. Many of the slips with which the editor works are from the more than 2,ooo,ooo OD slips made available from the collections of the Oxford English Dictionary. Others, called readers' slips, are from the mass of more than 1,ooo,ooo gathered for the dictionary by the corps of volunteer readers, chiefly English scholars in American colleges, and by various staff members. Only a volunteer is ordinarily termed a reader, although all such slips are readers' slips. Besides these are hundreds of thousands of slips prepared by various mechanical duplicating processes. Stenciled slips are what the name implies; photographed slips are not, being really facsimiles made by blueprinting or by the offset process. If in cutting up facsimile pages into

LXIII. Influence of Superstition on Vocabulary: Two Related Examples

During the period covered by the Early Modern English Dictionary, witchcraft occupied the mind of the average man, and became the subject-matter of literature (dramatic, theological, philosophical, legal) to an extent probably not known in any other epoch. It is natural that such a predominating interest should have its effect on the vocabulary. There can now be described, with more detail than has hitherto been available, one instance in which the beliefs and practices of contemporary charlatans, pretending to supernatural connections, made an interesting development of meaning for a common word. This instance will be illustrated at length, for the sake of the analogies which it suggests as to possible starting points for studying other words. The discussion seems to indicate that elements in the problem go back to learned tradition and at the same time to primitive Teutonic folk-lore.