Customer Reviews

The Oxford Spanish Dictionary

5 star:		(58)
4 star:		(15)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(3)
1 star:		(6)

 

 

My Master's thesis was a review and rating of large Spanish-English dictionaries. Since then, I have conducted follow-up studies to keep up with the market.

I find the leaders in the field to be Collins (HarperCollins), Larousse, and Oxford. Each publisher appears to be trying to one-up the others with the newest and best edition. The real winner is the consumer. My joint review of these three dictionaries is found here and duplicated under both of its competitors.

Here are a few of the factors which distinguish a good bilingual dictionary from a bad one.

To begin with, ignore certain publishers' marketing ploys such as entry and translation counts. They says nothing about the value of the words chosen. Likewise, ignore the word "unabridged" in the title. No work is truly unabridged except the monumental monolingual Oxford English Dictionary.

The first valid factor to consider is lexicographic technique. A bad dictionary simply lists translations. Take, for example, the entry in the Cassell's Spanish Dictionary under the English headword loop: "lazo, gaza, nudo; ojal, presilla, alamar; anillo; recodo, comba, curva, vuelta," etc. For the English reader writing in Spanish, this is hopelessly inadequate, as the dictionary provides no clue as to which translation to use in which situation.

Compare the treatment of the same word in the far superior American Heritage Spanish Dictionary. "(length of line) lazo; (coil) vuelta; (bend) curva; (circular path) vuelta, circuito; (fastener) presilla" etc. Here, the user is given glosses in the native language to assist in identifying the right word for the context. Example sentences are also a tremendous help. The Collins, Larousse, and Oxford are all excellent in this respect, presenting a wealth of practical information to guide users through the semantic and syntactic complexities.

The second factor is organization, which is important in large desk dictionaries. In an entry for a complex word like "get," a bad dictionary may force users to lose time searching for their translation through unbroken columns that can extend for more than a page. This was a problem--now corrected--in previous versions of the large Larousse dictionary. Today, the current editions of the Larousse, Collins and Oxford divide long entries by meaning into well-titled paragraphs. This scheme makes these dictionaries a joy to use.

Third, a good dictionary should maintain an up-to-date lexicon, including such cultural and technological additions to the language as "baby sitter," "FAQ's," "hostile takeover," "software," "flash drive." Larousse, Collins and Oxford are leaders in this respect; their frequent revisions are more than mere window dressing and do a creditable job of covering the most recent additions to the language.

Fourth, idioms, slang, and cusswords can present real problems to the language learner, and a dictionary needs to handle them in a clear and frank fashion. All three dictionaries get it right, giving stylistic equivalents for translations as well as clear advice to the user.

One complaint about the Collins is that it often presents Britishisms without labeling them as such. Revisions have only partially corrected the problem. For this reason, I would not recommend this dictionary to native Spanish speakers in the US.

Oxford and Collins contain excellent "language in use" sections which give formulas for language functions such as asking for information, agreeing, disagreeing, etc., as well as formulas for letters and documents.

The bottom line on large dictionaries? Avoid Vox, Velasquez, Langenscheidt, and Cassell's. Simon & Schuster's is unsuitable as a user's only dictionary but may serve some use as part of an advanced collection. I will report on the large Harrap's when I examine it, but my opinion of their other dictionaries is quite favorable. While not perfect, Collins, Oxford, and Larousse are the best large Spanish-English dictionaries I have examined. Except as noted here, most users would be well served by any of the three.

Absolute best Spanish-English dictionary on the market. This dictionary was recommended to me as a graduate student in Spanish by my advisor, one of the leading Spanish linguistics professors in the country-and it has never disappointed me.

When buying a foreign language dictionary, it is extremely important to look up a variety of words with multiple definitions, and see whether you are clear which Spanish word corresponds to which definition. A good test case is a word like "kid": be sure that you know the word in Spanish that corresponds to "child" and the word meaning "young goat".

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This is a very nice dictionary at an amazingly affordable price. I like the extensive definitions and examples and the blue-colored words for ease of search.

However--here comes the reason for my giving this product 4 stars--, while I was looking through pages, the cover page just ripped right off. This is a new, big dictionary so I was very gentle with it. However, the cover page was not very well fortified.

I taped it and now it's okay (who knows maybe the back side will fall off later), but from this incident I became very dissatisfied with the dictionary, although the content is excellent.

I really wanted this dictionary to last long. It's been only a couple of weeks after purchase.

I am a native speaker of English, fluent in Spanish. I have several dictionaries, including that of the Real Academia (Spanish only). I find this Oxford to be the best bilingual dictionary I have used. It is precisely by context and examples that one learns to avoid mis-use of words. It is not always possible to just translate them. Take the word "free"--in Spanish it can be "libre" (political) or "gratis" (no charge). This is also the best at specifying Latin American usages--it does not just say "Latin America," lumping all countries together--it specifies which countries say what. The Larousse, on the other hand, lumps all together, favors Spanish over Lat. Am. usage, and is oriented toward British English. I have not had trouble with the cover, as some others have mentioned. If I did, I'd complain directly to Oxford.

Without a doubt the most complete dictionary of its kind. It truly opens the door to conceptual understanding of expressions, slang and idioms that would otherwise remain misunderstood. It is an advanced dictionary. College level.

I am not giving it the 5 stars because the dictionary was poorly put together, tends to come apart rather easily and this is the Hardcover edition (2003).

I purchased this dictionary because the other that I have a) did not have definitions for many Spanish words I found in use. b) the definitions given did not describe the word as it was being used. That dictionary was rated a 4+ on Amazon. This dictionary so far has proven much much more comprehensive.

It does have three drawbacks that a purchaser needs to be aware of.
1) it is a very large book--at least twice the volume of my other. You will not be carrying it around with you unless your name is Arnold 2)the print is very, very small. My best guess is 6 point. Therefore, unless you are young with good eyesight you may need a magnifying glass to read it. 3) Now for my biggest complaint. There are a lot of examples of usage with translations. In many cases there is no definition of the Spanish word actually given, only examples of usage. However, many translations are no where close to being literal. This presents a problem because when one sees the Spanish word usage and the translation, one wonders what a particular Spanish word used in the phrase really means. It obviously does not mean any of the words of the translation so then one must look up the words in question.

I am a native Spaniard working in US English, in a somewhat technical field. That said, this is the dictionary that gives me the most correct equivalents. Even that review someone posts about "encimeras" (kitchen counters) and "barras" (counter in a bar) being messed up would actually be correct if you were looking for the words in Spanish from Spain. I have even tried some other dictionaries specific for engineering related terms and I still like this one better; the examples and nuances presented are the most helpful thing to me. A list of possibilities without indicating differences between the options would not dissipate the doubt. Often, it is not only the word that I look for, but how I can place it in a sentence and what prep it goes with, and this dictionary continues to fulfill my expectations.

En resumen: Es el que más acepciones presenta, con escritura fonética y muchos ejemplos de uso práctico en los que las palabras aparecen con sus preposiciones correspondientes. Incluso a nivel técnico, el más completo -y útil- que conozco.

I needed a new dictionary. My Random House and Univ of Chicago dictionaries are excellent, in their way, but I needed something on a larger scale. Well, the Oxford is it: the real deal. A wonderful dictionary. My mind boggles at the effort involved in producing a work like this. I have a mental picture of an editor being called into the boss's office and being told; "Your assignment is to translate "get", in all its senses, into Spanish, with suitable examples." (Four pages in this edition, in case you're wondering.) I also own the New Oxford Shorter English dictionary (5 stars) and I had high expectations for this volume. I was not disappointed. It covers peninsular, Mexican, and latinamerican Spanish with notations for individual countries. I note that some reviewers have reservations about the way this dictionary defines a word by giving examples of usage but I think this is one of its strengths. This is a big dictionary's job: give more detail, more nuance. My favorite feature is the blue box. With certain important words, phrases, concepts, in addition to a definition the authors give you a more detailed, fleshed-out treatment set off in blue border and title line. Especially I like the boxes titled "Algunas Observaciones Generales". They carry out the the highest mission of a dictionary: not simply to define, but also to clarify, amplify, and elucidate. If you have this dictionary you don't need grammars, verb books, etc. Everything is here. Highest possible recommendation.

My main reason for purchasing this dictionary is that I volunteer to translate documents for a non-governmental organization in Colombia. While I was there, we had the book version of this dictionary which is very helpful, but it takes a lot of time to find the word you're looking for and it weighs a TON. My fellow translator and I both dreamed of a CD-Rom dictionary for speed and ease of look up as well as many different useages of the word, and that's exactly what this dictionary supplies.

Like many others have posted, I LOVE this dictionary, but there are a couple things to keep in mind when deciding on this dictionary:
1)The audible pronunciations are only in Spanish, which is great for native English speakers, but not so great for Spanish speakers looking to improve their English. (Note: When you find yourself needing to take a little break, try typing some words/sentences in English and then listen to them as a native Spanish speaker might pronounce them. Its quite fun!)

2) When you highlight and click on a word in your word-processing program, the dictionary doesn't auto-select the language that the word is in. Is it a big deal? Absolutely not, but it does add another step that takes just a little bit more time.

Although I am a business translator, I sometimes have non-business assignments. This dictionary is by far the best! It is the most complete, and the most current. Even during my spare time when I read books in English and Spanish, this dictionary is a valued companion, and I can even find most of the slang words I come across. I really recommend it highly!