Dictionary of American Regional English Online

You’re listening to A Way with Words, the show about language and how we use it.

I’m Grant Barrett.

And I’m Martha Barnette.

Recently in the language world, something happened that might be described as the Super Bowl, the Olympics, the 4th of July, New Year’s, three scoops of ice cream, and a new kitten all rolled into one.

Oh, I know where you’re going.

You know what I’m talking about?

I’m talking about the fact that the magnificent six-volume Dictionary of American Regional English is now available online.

It’s digital and searchable, and it’s awesome.

Oh, it is.

And sound clips.

I know, sound clips.

Check this one out.

The hush puppies, well, that’s like ham and eggs. Eggs go with the ham, hush puppies go with fish. Hush puppies are made from cornmeal and onions and a little salt, and you can put an egg in them. And after you cook the fish, then you fry them in the deep grease that you fry the fish in.

Grant, that guy sounds just like my father’s people.

I mean, the hairs on the back of my neck stand up when I hear that kind of thing.

And the online version of this dictionary has 4,000 sound clips like that.

4,000?

Yes.

I mean, if you think American English is getting homogenized, I mean, you’re wrong.

Here’s the evidence that it’s not.

Yes.

Yes.

What a rich, rich cultural heritage we have.

Yeah.

It’s an amazing thing.

So they’ve taken the six volumes. They’ve coded everything. They’ve added it in. You can do a full text search. You can go in and type in any word. And if it pops up anywhere in any entry, it’s going to come back. You can search by region or state. This is how they say it in Missouri versus how they say it in New York.

It’s astonishing.

I’m envisioning that actors in Hollywood are going to sound more authentic from here on out.

Absolutely.

Now, it’s not cheap, but you can go and sample it online at the website.

They have 100 entries for free, right?

And you can see headwords for free.

Yeah.

And their website is?

Daredictionary.com.

Great.

And we’re excited about this.

Oh, yeah.

And a little more serious note because this is what we do on the show.

We take some of what happens in American speech and we try to explain it.

And here is one of our favorite reference works, what I consider to be the second greatest work of dictionary making ever after the Oxford English Dictionary.

Here it is online.

You don’t have to buy the six volumes.

You don’t have to have that paper.

You get full access to it.

I see libraries using it.

I see schools using it.

It’s amazing.

It’s super exciting.

We’re going to talk a lot more about the Dictionary of American Regional English in this show and probably for the rest of our lives.

And if you’ve got a question about regional English or anything having to do with language at all, give us a call, 877-929-9673.

Email us, words@waywordradio.org, or find us on Facebook and Twitter.