lexicographer

And there was a big court case going on at the time, where a slang lexicographer, Stephen Farmer, was being sued for putting in the c-word and the f-word in his dictionary.

While spending time in the Dictionary archives at Oxford University Press, Ogilvie — a linguist, lexicographer, current director of Oxford University's Dictionary Lab, and a former OED editor herself — came across the address books Murray kept for his volunteers, which to her knowledge had not been fully unpacked in any other OED histories.

All of these shows are also airing during a sea change in the way Americans speak, according to lexicographer Jesse Sheidlower.

“The further back in history, the less we can find Black people having agency over how we’re written about,” said Bianca Jenkins, a lexicographer working on the project.

That is according to responses to a tongue-in-cheek tweet from Countdown wordsmith and lexicographer Susie Dent.