Thomas Dalton wrote:
I don't think "notability" has anything to do with it. Is "argue" a non-notable word? What about "of" or "notable" or "many" or "describe"?
The point is, encyclopedias are supposed to be about concepts. Dictionaries are supposed to be about words.
It's the notability of the word as a concept that is the issue. Generally a word is only important because of the concept it represents. Occasionally, it is important in its own right. I think "thou" is a good example of a notable word, I'm not entirely sure, though - I fear its notability stems (partially) from the fact that it is no longer used, which isn't really a good measure of notability, it's more a measure of interest. Should we be writing articles about words simply because they are interesting? Maybe, maybe not...
I don't think that notability is the right test here; notability has become an overused concept in Wikipedia. The encyclopedic interest remains in the concept behind the word, while the dictionary interest has to do with the word itself. Only after that has been decided should the dictionary and encyclopedia look at notability, because these will be based on different criteria. Where there are synonms the encyclopedia has no need to repeat the same article for each of these words; it must choose which best carries the concept. That's not so much a notability issue. A dictionary, however, must include separate articles for the synonyms, and the notability issue is more likely to arise when dealing with obscure spelling variants or neologisms. It is up to the dictionary to distinguish between the shades of meaning that differentiate the synonyms.
I think that "thou" is validly included in the encyclopedia, but there would be no need to include separate articles on its inflected forms, "thee", "thy", or "thine". It remains important in the linguistic development of the English language, and the evolution of the second person singular in the language.
BTW the use of the second person singular has not completely disappeared. It's most familiar modern English use is in the Lord's Prayer. It continues to be found in other religious or poetic circumstances, and in various dialects.
A dictionary defines words, and sometimes gives their etymologies.
Not just sometimes; a good dictionary should include the etymology as a part of the history which defines the word.
It doesn't usually discuss the significance of the word in the culture of the people using it, for example. That is more suited to an encyclopedia. For example, the fact that a group of people use the same word to refer to two seemingly distinct concepts is something that would simply result in two sections to the definition in a dictionary, it could spawn several paragraphs of discussion in an encyclopedia.
A dictionary is better equipped to deal with the distinctions between American and British usage An encyclopedia, when explaining the underlying concept, would do better to choose a word which avoids such ambiguities.
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