Customer Reviews

Oxford English-Hindi Dictionary

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I just have to clarify some aspects of this book. Since it has been designed to help people whose mother tongue is Hindi learn English, it does not translate all the words directly from English to Hindi. However, often there are rather explanations of the English terms provided in Hindi, while some words do not have the requisite English-to-Hindi translation (one word to one word) one would expect from such a dictionary. Further more, the words which are directly translated, do NOT contain the crucial information on their grammatical gender in Hindi (again, it is clearly not a bilingual dictionary and not a "companion" to the Hindi-English dictionary by R.S. McGregor). Still, the book has helped me a lot in learning Hindi's written language.

The reason why this book does not always offer one-word translations of English words, is that they simply do not exist in Hindi. As a native speaker with full proficiency in Hindi (but only the oral language, hence trying to learn the written language), I can affirm that fact. A lot of words relating to Western concepts do not have equivalents in Indian culture, and therefore no real Indian words. Still, the majority of the English words are given direct Hindi translations.

This book does give some colourful and generally humorous translations of concepts which are quite recent or alien in India - for instance pizza (not the best example) is translated roughly as "a round piece of dough on which one may put tomatos". Quite funny to read those kinds of entries!

This dictionary is made in India for people whose native tongue is Hindi and who wish to learn English. That is why there is no information provided on the Hindi nouns' genders. The publication is therefore not intended for non-Hindi speakers to use as an English-Hindi dictionary.

Still, being an Oxford dictionary, I will highly recommend it. The book is excellent in its coverage of Western terms and concepts and gives explanations and translations in the finest form of Hindi I have probably ever read, clearly adhering to Oxford's renowned standards. It still serves as a bilingual dictionary, and serious students will most surely have profit from using it. I have three other English-Hindi dictionaries (and they are, in contrast to this one, marketed as English-Hindi dictionaries for Anglophones learning Hindi) and none of them can compare with the breadth and quality of this Oxford work.

For a formal review and synopsis, consult the product information page for this dictionary at the British version of Amazon, at www.amazon.co.uk . This American version has not added that information.

First, I am an American English speaker, but one who was trained at the University of Wisconsin in Hindi and have several years of Hindi language experience, including a year in India in Varanasi. This is the best such dictionary around. This English-Hindi dictionary is the best one out there, though with caveats noted below.

This is not a good sole reference for beginners. I would advise learning Hindi by taking a class, by using Bhatia's Colloquial Hindi audio course, by watching plenty of Bollywood and by regular tutoring from a native Hindi speaker. You can supplement that with the increasingly plentiful resources on the Internet. The study of Hindi is not an easy thing, though there are some good phrase books for travelers. It is still easier studying Hindi than other Indian languages, if you are not in India.

There is a great deal that still needs to be done before Oxford has a superb English-Hindi dictionary. This dictionary is bereft in contemporary usages. More Hinglish urban/Bollywood, and urban slang typical of Bombay and Delhi should be in this dictionary. Also, urban usage frequently includes words and expressions from regional languages such as Marathi or Urdu. I would like to see more commonly used words from other languages included in a useful dictionary.

An example: under the English word, "god", there is no suggestion of "bhagwaan". I don't understand this. It is in the MacGregor Hindi-English dictionary. I suggest that Verma/Sahai work with MacGregor to cross-reference both dictionaries more extensively, and start making the English-Hindi dictionary more indicative of contemporary usage.

Oxford, you are in the lead. Keep moving ahead with better references please.

I bought this book hoping that it would allow me to look up words in English and find an equivalent word in Hindi. This dictionary seems to be meant for native Hindi speakers who need English words translated for them. I say this because rather than giving equivalent Hindi words, the book gives a description of the entry in Hindi. For example (this is not a real entry) for a sun flower, rather than giving the Hindi word (if any exists) for sun flower, it will say (in Hindi) "A flower with yellow petals...".

I'm somewhat of a native speaker, but this dictionary doesn't help me at all since my goal isn't trying to get a description of things in Hindi. I totally wasted my money.

This dictionary is indeed rather complex. I read the script perfectly and even still can't make much sense out of a great deal of it. Whether or not its in script or not is not the issue here. The issue is alot of the words aren't really the words used in Hindi. They are more words adopted from English than the sanskritized words. So for those of us wishing to learn the traditional truely Hindi words this could pose a problem. Another thing that is ridiculous is alot of basic words such as "Spanish" aren't in this dictionary. For a dictionary that is supposed to be so concise I'd hardly consider basic words like "Spanish" a word to leave out. I am sure there are better dictionaries out there and wouldn't really recommend it, but I suppose it's better than nothing.

What you get from this dictionary is along the lines of what you'd expect from a pocket dictionary in any language. That's the dictionary I would give to a Hindi-speaker who just started learning English. It's a five dollar value. The kind you'd throw away for a better English-English dictionary after half a year of learning the language. Now... If you are trying to learn Hindi (my case), it's pretty useless, and here's why: You look for a word in English, now say there are three, four Hindi translations. Now, we know that the meaning of the word is dependent on context, so that only one out of the four translations applies to your case. Well, but how can you tell which?! The only way, is to look at each of them independently in The Oxford Hindi-English Dictionary (which I liked a lot), and only then make a choice. ... So.. All in all, it narrows your search to only four words or so, which is far better than the alternative (thousands of words). On the other hand, it is quite impractical. Too bad I don't know of a better book (although there are a few real good online dictionaries).

PS1:Once you look at the dictionary (Intro 100% in Hindi, etc), you quickly realize this was designed for Indians ONLY, not with any students of Hindi in mind at all, so really, you'd be crashing the party on this one.

PS2: If you are wondering why this book sells for USD 54, and you happen to come across the answer, let me know. I paid USD 10 for a hardcover printed in India (a strange combination of a hardcover and paperback quality paper on the inside), where apparently the real price is Rs 162, or about two dollars. It is definitely worth two dollars!

I thought this dictionary would help with finding the right Hindi word when I needed it. It will be helpful but it is designed for people who already speak Hindi fluently. All the explanations are in Hindi. If used with the Oxford Hindi-English dictionary (made for native English speakers) this book is useful. However, if you lack patience this dictionary, while comprehensive, is not the most conducive to learning Hindi. It's much better for helping a Hindi speaker learn English.

not as good as Oxfords Hindi-English dictionary for an English speaker; however it is a good companion to the Hindi-English. For example get the word you need from the English-Hindi then look it up in the Hindi-English for a better understanding and grammar. I am glad I got it for that but I would not rush to get it b/c it is expensive and not very big.

No good for beginner since no prononciation in romanized characters and a bit short. for hindi speaking people no problem
that is why i put a medium note. Depends on who uses it

If you can read the Devnagari script, this dictionary will be useful. However, if you can't read it you will not be able to translate a single word. Even the introduction that describes how the dictionary is organized is written in Hindi, and the key that describes how words are listed is written in Hindi. There is no English introduction or key. There is no transliteration or phonetic spelling of the Hindi words into English. The Devnagari script is clear and crisp. I would only recommend this dictionary if you can easily read Devnagari.

There is a dictionary printed in USA that sells for $45 or so. This one was listed for much less, but as it turns out, this one is printed in India and much smaller size (more like an abridged version), and not exactly the same. Once you order it, return is not worthwhile as shipping charges can add up.