I thinking about reorganizing the “resources” section of the web site. It began life as a list of books on etymology, but it has grown in various directions over the years. It is organized by type of source, but the selection of sources is now rather haphazard. I’ve got some ideas on what to do, but I’d like input from others. I plan to do the work over the Xmas/New Year’s holidays when I’ve got some more time.

In particular I’m looking for input on the following (but don’t feel you have to be limited by what I’m asking):

--What general types of resources should I include? Just sources I cite? Generally useful references? How comprehensive should I try to be? (Realizing that the longer the lists, the less useful they tend to be to the general user; comprehensive bibliographies are great for serious researchers, but for the person who just wants to know what are the “good” dictionaries out there, long lists aren’t very helphul.)

--What criteria should I use for determining if an individual work is worth including? Definitely if I cite it several times, but what about others? Criteria could vary depending on category.

--Are the categories I’m currently using helpful? Can some be eliminated/added? Is there a different categorization scheme that would be useful?

--What sources am I missing? (My section on websites and blogs is particularly out of date.)

--What sources should I delete?

I’ve got a tentative outline for how I’m going to restructure the section. Comments are welcome.

Current categories:

General Dictionaries
Specialty Dictionaries
Out-of-Date Sources
General Language References
Historical Linguistic Sources
Oft-Used Sources
Online Databases
Grammar & Style Manuals
Popular Press Language Books
Language Web Sites & Blogs

New categories:

Oft-Used Sources
General Dictionaries
Etymological Dictionaries
Etymology/Historical Linguistics/History of English
Medieval English
Slang
Quotations/Proverbs/Catchphrases
Dialect/Pronunciation
Toponyms
Jargon
Neologisms
Profanity/Swearing/Euphemism
Online Databases
Grammar/Style/Writing
Language Blogs/Sites
Other Languages

I’m going to delete the “Out of Date” category. Instead, I’ll mark the titles of individual resources as “outdated,” which means that it doesn’t reflect current scholarship--although they often remain valuable historical resources (e.g., Samuel Johnson’s dictionary) and are worth keeping on the list.

I’m also going to cull a large number of the existing resources. I’ll create a “deprecated” category that will not show up on the master list of resources. All the deprecated entries will still be available via search and if there are links to them, but they won’t be readily apparent to someone looking at the list.

Resources are deprecated because:
-- They are too narrow in focus. They may be great resources, just really, really specialized and somewhat tangential to the focus of the site (e.g., “Slayer Slang")
-- They are not very good resources, but are there from the days when I had most of my library listed.
-- Moribund or dead websites.
-- Online databases of primary source material. Other than the handful I use regularly (e.g., Google Books, Newspaperarchive.com), I simply cannot keep up to date on archived material on the web.

I wonder if Liberman’s A Bibliography of English Etymology should be included.

I’m completely out of my league here. I just like to read his column. I know nothing about the book.

I’m finally getting around to implementing the changes. Links in the Resources section may be broken during the next few days as I get on with the work.

Revision complete.