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[furio]

Does anyone have a thesaurus they'd like to recommend for academic writing in the humanities?

[stapler]

I don't have suggestions for a good hardbound source for the humanities, but as a relevant side note I've found that that electronic sources (e.g., "thesaurus.com") can, in practice, be very convenient alternatives to leafing through hardcopies.

[larryc]

No no no! The thesaurus is the work of the devil. The basic organizing principle is that there are clumps of words that all mean the same damn thing. In fact there are few or no words in English that mean exactly the same thing. Using a thesaurus to write with leads to a paper full of strangely misused words--what we in the humanities call "the thesaurus syndrome" and recognize in an instant.

The way to enlarge your vocabulary is to read widely. There may be shortcuts, but a thesaurus is not one of them.

(Who was the idiot poster we had here for a bit who kept misusing words and when called on it declared that the thesaurus said they meant the same thing?)

[historian]

Does anyone have a thesaurus they'd like to recommend for academic writing in the humanities?

well, I'll give a qualified endorsement---the Oxford is good but ONLY if you use it to prompt your own thinking. That means, you have to look at the suggested alternatives and think about whether or not it is a true substitute or if it is a more exact word for what you mean to say than the original word. This means...don't get the thesaurus without a good dictionary to go with it.

Otherwise? Well, read larryc's comments on the wacky world of thesaurus substitutions without thought.

[jackie_d]

LarryC comment made me recall an old episode of friends:


Monica: It doesn't make any sense.
Joey: Of course it does. It's smart! I used a thesaurus!
Chandler: On every word?
Joey: Yep.
Monica: All right, what was this sentance, originally?
Joey: Oh. "They're warm, nice people with big hearts."
Chandler: And that became, "They're humid, pre-possessing homosapiens with full-sized aortic pumps?"


cheers,
jackie

[namazu]

No no no! The thesaurus is the work of the devil.

I have to disagree with you here, LarryC.  They can be a boon to those of us who know that there exists a word, with some particular nuanced meaning and connotation, that we'd love to use if only we could retrieve it. 

I agree, though, that using a thesaurus to spice up one's writing, in the absence of a command of the language, is a recipe for clumsy prose.

I've been using online sources lately, since my last paperback thesaurus (Roget's, from the '70s) bit the dust.

[seniorscholar]

I've been using online sources lately, since my last paperback thesaurus (Roget's, from the '70s) bit the dust.

And I'm sure you use online sources intelligently, too -- but the availability of an instant thesaurus while writing in Word has led to many undergraduate papers that are funnier than they used to be, to the great amusement of faculty when grading but not to the great improvement of undergraduate grades.

[scribbler]

I'm a journalist, and my favorite word crutch is "The Synonym Finder," by J.I. Rodale.

[infopri]

I can't believe that I'm going to disagree with the great larryc.  Larry, please forgive me.

We are not undergraduates.  Anyone participating on these fora is surely savvy enough (I hope) to know enough to use the thesaurus in the way namazu suggests, not the way larryc describes.  In a former life (before grad school), I was a writer and editor, and my colleagues and I would have been lost without the thesaurus.  Because we had read widely, we knew that there existed exactly the word we wanted for a particular sentence, but sometimes we just could not remember what that word was.  The thesaurus, by grouping words with shared similar meanings (agreed, not "exact synonyms"), enabled us to retrieve the specific word with the precise connotation required by the sentence at hand.

Then again, there was my free-lance editing client who used to write in his native Portuguese, then painstakingly translate his work into English, word by word.  Then he'd give the manuscript to me for editing.  I'd read in amazement, thinking, "That's not what that word means, silly man!" only to find, after looking the word up, that this meaning was in fact included there, but listed perhaps fifth or sixth, after the word's more common meanings.  Of course, there was almost always a better word choice; this client kept me very, very busy.

I've been a lifelong fan of the original Roget's--the version with the numerical index, not the one in dictionary format, which I find to be sadly inferior.  But now I usually look first in J.I. Rodale's Synonym Finder because it's easier to use and therefore faster.  Unfortunately, it doesn't always have the word I'm looking for, so I still keep my Roget's close by.

[trabb]

No no no!  The thesaurus is the elbow grease of the imp.  The substratal adjusting theorem is that there are blobs of lexemes that all betoken the duplicate thing.  In fact, there are inconsequential or no vocables in English that portend the same thing.  Exploiting a thesaurus to sign with brings on a dissertation full of idiosyncratically manipulated locutions – what our cohort in the literature proclaim “the thesaurus sickness” and descry in a twinkle.

[namazu]

...the availability of an instant thesaurus while writing in Word has led to many undergraduate papers that are funnier than they used to be, to the great amusement of faculty when grading but not to the great improvement of undergraduate grades.

Fair enough!  This is not too dissimilar, I imagine, from the comical text that often results from the use of BabelFish (online translation software).  But I'll assume that Furio (the OP - probably not an undergraduate, but if an undergraduate, one who visits CHE and asks for a good thesaurus) would use appropriate discretion.

I'll also note, in reference to my previous post, that unduly long sentences of the kind I am wont to construct (with many comma-separated clauses and parenthetical asides), do not make for good prose either.  ;) 

And Trabb (channeling LarryC), that gave me a good laugh.  Now translate it into Portuguese and back.  :)

[furio]

I'm aware (all too aware) of the problems that lame thesaurus use can produce in undergraduate papers, but my question was directed toward academics publishing in the humanities--as infopri suggests.  Interesting that many don't ever use a thesaurus.  I refer to a dictionary and thesaurus often--trying to capture the right nuance--or when my brain fails me and I just can't conjure up the word I'm looking for, though I know it's rattling around in my head somewhere.  Also, I find a thesaurus helps me clarify my thinking when I'm not yet sure what I'm trying to say.  For example--do I mean reify or reinforce?  Or, I've used coerce twice in this paragraph; is that what I really mean here?--Though I know the definitions of these words, of course, looking up synonyms helps me get to what I'm implying but not saying.

So, what that explanation--I've been using Roget's--the one organized by number--but I've been wishing for a more comprehensive thesaurus, one that gives me more food for thought.  I've tried Meltzer's The Thinker's Thesaurus and been disappointed.  Has anyone tried Oxford American Writer's Thesaurus?  OUP Thesaurus?  Etc...

[infopri]

The thesaurus, by grouping words with shared similar meanings (agreed, not "exact synonyms"), enabled us to retrieve the specific word with the precise connotation required by the sentence at hand.

Ugh.  That should have said, "with shared meanings".  Alternatively, I could have lived with "with similar meanings."  I did not intend to use both adjectives.  Sometimes my typing fingers get ahead of my brain, or, more accurately, my brain takes a momentary snooze.  These brain snoozes are precisely why I need such tools as a good thesaurus.