So you have the dictionaries you need for spelling and definitions, but what happens when you come across a phrase like off the beaten path and wonder, “Is it path or track?” And while we’re on that track, is a person said to be from the wrong side of the track or the wrong side of the tracks? Here you need an idiom dictionary.

Idioms dictionaries.
Idioms dictionaries.

Thorns in Your Side

Idioms are phrases whose meanings are not clear from the words they are made up of. And they are not just scattered clichés. A solid idiom dictionary may have 10,000 or more entries including figures of speech, common similes, and phrasal verbs. A quick scan will show that most are, in fact, really common, in both formal and informal uses.

If this sounds like a pain in the neck, imagine being a non-native speaker and wondering why something that’s bothersome causes neck pain.

Idioms pose particular challenges for learners of English, since each phrase is a new (and quite cryptic) piece of vocabulary they need to learn. Imagine an English learner’s surprise at hearing sentences like “Don’t bite my head off” and “I’ll have him for breakfast.”

Idioms pose challenges for writers and editors, too, since these phrases sometimes have their own grammar considerations, as well as different versions. Moreover, people may have different ideas about what phrases mean and how to use them. This point begs the question of what beg the question originally meant. Hint: It wasn’t “makes you want to ask” (a word usage argument chronicled in usages many dictionaries).

Idioms are sometimes used differently or have varying meanings in different regions or countries. For instance, if you pin back your ears in British English, the Collins Cobuild idiom dictionary tells us, you “listen carefully.” Meanwhile in America, the next entry informs us, if you pin someone [else]’s ears back, you “tell them off for having done something wrong.”

All this aside, while idioms can be a pain in the neck (or elsewhere), they make English colorful, adding synonyms, metaphors, and mood. They come from numerous sources: literature, proverbs, ancient Greek and Latin, and topics such as sports, money, and foods.

Basic writing guides sometimes teach that idioms are informal or cliché and are best left as such, but time and again this argument strikes out, since anything from a newspaper report to a business letter can be spiced up with phrases like strike out and spice up, not to mention time and again. Strike out comes from baseball, while spice up comes from food and cooking; both are used everywhere today.

Adding additional thorns in your side, strike out and spice up are examples of phrasal verbs, a type of idiom with special grammatical considerations—and special dictionaries of their own. Thus, in addition to a good idiom dictionary, a phrasal verb dictionary can be invaluable, and there are many to choose from. (See more on phrasal verbs in Part 4.)

When choosing phrasal verb and idiom dictionaries, stick to works created by scholars and editors who have researched phrases as they’ve been used over the years—and centuries. Many free dictionaries and idiom lists are available online. These are useful for quick reference or alternative opinions, but compared with scholarly works, they quickly lose their luster and strike out .

Best Idiom Dictionaries

An excellent dictionary for American idioms is The American Heritage Dictionary of Idioms, by Christine Ammer (Houghton Mifflin Co.). Ammer has written several books on idioms and clichés that reveal a career of active interest and research. (Her look into the cliché a cat has nine lives includes scientific explanation of how cats are able to land on their feet, followed by reference to an ancient Hindu scribe named Pilpay, credited as being the first person to record this characteristic of cats, in about 300 BC.)

The comprehensive American Heritage Dictionary of Idioms offers definitions, example sentences, and, where possible, explanation on where idioms came from and when. Both its definitions and example sentences are excellent, and entries are arranged alphabetically by the first words of phrases, instead of by key words as they are is some dictionaries.

Ammer’s work does not offer parts-of-speech labels to show how idioms function in sentences. To be sure, such labels can be dicey. For instance, it can be uncertain whether an idiom is an adverb phrase or adjective phrase, and many noun phrases are listed in standard dictionaries as just “nouns” (compound nouns).

All the same, parts-of-speech labels do have their uses, especially for English learners.

Barron’s Dictionary of American Idioms (Barron’s Educational Series) does offer parts-of-speech labels (e.g., noun phrase, verb phrase, adjective phrase, etc.). The labeling is not an exact science, but the feature is helpful. Barron’s dictionary is another quality work with more than 8,000 idioms, regionalisms, and informal expressions. Again, importantly, the volume is arranged alphabetically by the first words of phrases.

NTC Publishing Group has produced a whole series of idiom dictionaries, most of them credited to Richers Spears, a professor of linguistics at Northwestern University and director of NTC’s dictionary department. According to one bio, Spears began “collecting words at the age of eight.” He is also credited as the author of excellent dictionaries covering phrasal verbs and slang. Spears can certainly be considered a modern Noah Webster of idiomatic English.

One volume is NTC’s American Idioms Dictionary. This book includes some 7,500 entries, with clear definitions and well-written example sentences. In addition, the entries are arranged by first word, not keyword. NTC also put out a thematic version of this dictionary, which arranges idioms by topic. It’s a great concept, except that there are too many topics, many of them quite narrow. One result: Looking words up can be a pain in the derrière.

The publisher HarperCollins has a winning feature in its line of dictionaries and learners dictionaries: It uses a “Bank of English,” a set of 650 million words from a selection of sources, to provide example sentences that are authentic and demonstrate well the vocabulary in use.

The Collins Cobuild Dictionary of Idioms is one these. It offers other useful features, as well. Very important, it covers both American and British idioms and shows when there are variations in their form or use. It also has the unique Collins Cobuild definition style, which uses if clauses to explain words (e.g., confused, adj. If you are confused, you don’t fully understand something).

While the Collins Cobuild dictionary does not offer parts-of-speech labels, the definition style demonstrates how phrases function in sentences.

One final feature that’s out of this world: The Collins Cobuild dictionary provides grades of a sort showing how common the phrases are.

Other idiom dictionaries worth checking out include:

Tune in for Part 4 of Better Know Your Dictionaries, which will look at phrasal verb dictionaries. (By the way, tune in is a phrasal verb.)

Better Know Your Dictionaries

(C) 2019, by John Sailors. All rights reserved.