Sunday, May 13, 2012

Is It Time to Stop Using the Word 'Textbook'?


by  - Huff Post
Posted: 05/07/2012 1:33 pm
"Text" is another powerful word. The word text comes from "textum," the past participle of the Latin word for weaving, braiding, joining together, or making. A text is a fabric or web of ordered words. Many modern uses of the word "text" distinguish the text from other, less important words attached to it, such as notes, commentaries, appendices, translations, or paraphrases.

So what happens when we put these two powerful words together? Despite the resonance of its components, the compound word "textbook" has always sounded peculiar and awkward to me. Don't both words mean more or less the same thing? Isn't "textbook" redundant?

Unsurprisingly, a textbook used to be something very different than, say, Human Biology: Concepts and Current Issues, by Michael D. Johnson, 6th Edition (list price $162.80, $120.99 new on Amazon, $81.95 in digital form from Coursesmart, $79.90 used from Bookbyte, and $47.99 to rent from Chegg at the moment I write this). The Oxford English Dictionary offers this as its oldest citation of the use of the word, from Nathan Bailey's 1730 dictionary:
 Text-Book (in Universities) is a Classick Author written very wide by the Students, to give Room for an Interpretation dictated by the Master, &c. to be inserted in the Interlines.


Full story at HuffPost
   

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