Table of Contents

Part I. Mind, word and world: 1. Knowing, referring and recording: storing information beyond the brain; 2. Information and World 3: in the beginning was the Word; Part II. The Ancient World: 3. Containers of knowledge: the first reference technologies; 4. Systems for knowledge: school and letter, book and library; 5. The taxonomic urge: class, classic and classification; 6. Missionaries and monasteries: reference and reverence; Part III. The Medieval World: 7. Faith versus reason: summations of truth; 8. The elites of knowledge: universitas; Part IV. The Early Modern World: 9. All knowledge for all men: the omne scibile and the printing press; 10. Theme versus alphabet: the roots of lexicography; 11. A blurring of languages: Latin and the vernaculars; Part V. The Modern World: 12. The legislative urge: authoritative wordbooks; 13. Reference and revolution: the encyclopedia proper; 14. Thematic lexicography: word order and world order; 15. Alphabetic lexicography: the unendable dictionary; 16. Universal education: dictionaries for the people; 17. Semantic fields and conceptual universes: the unshapeable lexis; 18. Tensions and trends: overt alphabet, covert theme; Part VI. Tomorrows World: 19. Shaping things to come: the priests of High Technology; 20. Knowledge, knowledge everywhere: planetary network, global book.

Promotional Information

Worlds of Reference is a history of dictionaries, encyclopedias and reference materials.