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Marsh, George Perkins

(Encyclopedia)Marsh, George Perkins, 1801–82, American diplomat and scholar, b. Woodstock, Vt., grad. Dartmouth (1820). He was admitted to the bar in 1825 and began practicing law in Burlington, Vt. A member of t...

dialect

(Encyclopedia)dialect, variety of a language used by a group of speakers within a particular speech community. Every individual speaks a variety of his language, termed an idiolect. Dialects are groups of idiolects...

Mayröcker, Friederike

(Encyclopedia) Mayröcker, Friederike, 1924-2021, German-language poet, b. Vienna, Austria. Mayröcker served in World War II as a secretary in the German airforce a...

Gollancz, Sir Hermann

(Encyclopedia)Gollancz, Sir Hermann gŏlˈənts [key], 1852–1930, English rabbi and authority on Hebrew language and literature. He was professor of Hebrew (1902–24) at University College, London. In 1902 he ed...

Backus, John Warner

(Encyclopedia)Backus, John Warner, 1924–2007, American computer scientist, b. Philadelphia, grad. Columbia (M.A. 1950). Trained as a mathematician, he was hired (1950) by IBM Corp. as a computer programmer. From ...

Palsgrave, John

(Encyclopedia)Palsgrave, John pălzˈgrāv, pôlzˈ– [key], d. 1554, English scholar, educated at Oxford and at the Univ. of Paris. Palsgrave was tutor to Henry VIII's daughter Mary (later Mary I), who used her i...

Barnes, William

(Encyclopedia)Barnes, William, 1801–86, English poet and philologist. After a career as a schoolmaster, he took holy orders in 1847. He is best known for his poems in Dorset dialect, which began to appear in loca...

Safire, William L.

(Encyclopedia)Safire, William L. săfˈīrˌ [key], 1929–2009, American journalist and speechwriter, b. New York City as William Safir. A former reporter and public-relations executive, he became a speechwriter (...

Wyatt, Sir Thomas, c.1520–54, English soldier and conspirator

(Encyclopedia)Wyatt, Sir Thomas, c.1520–54, English soldier and conspirator; son of the poet Sir Thomas Wyatt. In Jan., 1554, when Queen Mary's intention to marry Philip II of Spain was announced, Wyatt joined a ...

dictionary

(Encyclopedia)dictionary, published list, in alphabetical order, of the words of a language. In monolingual dictionaries the words are explained and defined in the same language; in bilingual dictionaries they are ...