Street slang such as thang, innit and grrl (in addition to internet words such as Wiki and Myspace) can now be found in an “official” reference for Scrabble players.
The Collins Official Scrabble Words also added phrases from Indian cookery like: keema, alu, or aloo, and gobi. Other various words permitted into the reference book are kinds of drugs like: tik, gak and tina. The list of the newest words was assembled by a staff at Collins Dictionaries, located in Glasgow.
According to the publishers, it is the “most comprehensive Scrabble wordlist ever produced.”
Robert Groves, the editor revealed: “The latest edition adds nearly 3,000 new words to the existing quarter of a million available to Scrabble players. These additions are an eclectic mix of new technological jargon, overseas English, recent colloquialisms, street slang, and a few fairly well-established phrases that had not made it onto the list until now.
“It is the essential reference for all Scrabble players, from tournament enthusiasts to families battling it out in their front rooms.
“Over half of British homes own a Scrabble board, over four million games are sold worldwide each year, and nearly anyone who has played it has been involved in a dispute over which words can and can’t be used. Now all those arguments can be settled, with the latest official wordlist from Collins – the authority on Scrabble.
”While compiling this list we looked at dictionaries dating back to 2006. The wordlist was also compiled using the Collins Corpus – the world’s largest language database of written and spoken English.”
It’s been four years since a new scrabble reference book has been created.
Mark Nyman, the man who was world Scrabble champion in 1993, said: “It’s like the ‘bible’ really for Scrabble players. It’s what we use to avoid any major arguments. It’s fundamental, really.”
No need to fret though Americans, Collins is not used in the United States or Canada where Webster’s Dictionary is predominant.
