The Oxford English-Urdu Dictionary

The Oxford English-Urdu dictionary is an extremely welcome development to the field of lexicography in Urdu studies. Dictionaries up to now have been usually out-of-date, poorly printed and/or edited and unsuitable for use for today's students.

This tome therefore fills an important gap and is a magesterial effort, with an extremely impressive range of coverage and an editorial team obviously at home in Urdu. Unfortunately, this is also its biggest weakness - a blingual dictionary needs a bilingual production team yet it appears that no native speakers of English were on the Editorial Board. There are therefore several infelicities in translation, with inappropriate register being a major problem and in some cases, incorrect renderings reflecting a native Urdu-speaking editor's lack of familiarity with the actual modes of usage of modern English. In some cases, long-winded explanations are given for terms in English when the reader is expecting a succinct Urdu equivalent which does exist (eg 'contempt of court'), in other cases an equivalent is given but it is an obscure Arabic term which would not be considered part of the vocabulary of an educated native speaker (eg 'funduq' for 'hotel' when surely 'musaafir xana' would be more appropriate). At other times, the most obvious translation is also missed - for 'consequently', I would have expected to see 'le haaza' but no luck!

However, the skill and dedication with which the dictionary has been prepared cannot and must not be denied in the main and there are some masterly renderings, putting to excellent effect the composite resources of the Urdu language (eg 'subliminal advertising' as 'zer-sho'uree ishtaharaat'). There are of course other printing/proofing/editing slips but surely it would not be generous to place undue emphasis on these in a work of this size where such errors are bound to occur. The Second Edition would be a wonderful opportunity to build upon this excellent first step.

Faithful and accurate translations (2/2 people found this helpful)

An excellent publication with linguistically accurate definitions in Urdu. I have several English-Urdu dictionaries which I have acquired from the UK and abroad but none of them come anywhere near to this one. Definitions given are in up-to-date yet accurate Urdu with English phrases exemplifying usage. Having simple English definitions, in addition to the Urdu, would certainly add value to the faithfully translated language. Although the print is of good quality, one other minor niggle is the somewhat flimsy paper on which it is printed. This, however, takes nothing away from the quality of language presented.

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The Oxford English-Urdu Dictionary

Shanul Haq Haqee

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Desperately needed but room for improvement (3/3 people found this helpful)

Faithful and accurate translations (2/2 people found this helpful)

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