It occurred to me that we have a major problem: linguistic ineptitude. As testimony to this allegation, witness the following situation…
Bill Calmont stands at the front door to the abode of his sweetie, struck with terror that future mommy in-law has answered instead of his dearest. Hoping to assuage the mounting panic he feels to his very innards he pulls the following line out of some mystical land of gluk in the back of his mind. "That scarf you are wearing is simply moribund, Mrs. Robinson." That quote sounds the educated boyfriend part but, on closer inspection, we find that Bill has just remarked that the scarf of his lover’s mother is "in terminal decline". Major loser points.
Then again, this does not affect the anecdote as duly as it might have. Let's view this situation from the perspective of Mrs. Robinson. "Moribund? Do you really think so? I've always thought it more of a chartreuse..." Mrs. Robinson! Gone is your chance to eliminate the new boyfriend as you just ignorantly poured it down the garbage disposal! Failure, at best.
Finally, we have Sweetie standing by. "Did he just offered my mother more abund. I know what THAT means. Boy is he gonna get it!" Since everyone in this scenario seems to have the same linguistic short comings. The senario ends with Sweetie slamming the door, Mrs. Robinson having actually "liked this one" and young Bill very confused and without a date. Well done folks.
Quite clearly, the above is a work of fiction. The problem of prolific poor vocabularies, however, is not. Situations abound whereby the proper term could have avoided oodles of embarrassment. The problem largely stems from the average English speaker simply not having instant access to the proper linguistic resources. With the advent of the iPhone and iPod Touch, however, I have discovered a solution to this atrocity.
There are now several Concise Oxford apps on the iPhone. I have found the
Concise Oxford English Dictionary, developed by
Prelude Mobile, to be most conducive to rapid language assimilation. Put bluntly, this app allows you to pull off the smarty-pants moves without the humiliation of being dead wrong. It finally supplies the English language in a medium that allows for instantaneous learning of new words. The “analogue” dictionary is simply too bulky and slow to have everyone using it whenever they want. With this digital version to hand, however, who wouldn’t take the opportunity to look up a word they don’t know so that they too can be counted among the intelligent? Imagine how the above situation could have gone if Bill had know the definition of the word he was using...
In conclusion, Prelude Mobile has done a great job of presenting the full Concise Oxford content (without an internet connection, by the way). It’s fast, highly functional and looks great. I sincerely hope and believe that through this iPhone app the state of English usage will improve vastly, leading us all into a bright new age of linguistic accuracy and verve. What do you think?
You can find this app on the App Store by searching for "Prelude Oxford" or by
clicking here.
