NASPA Word List: Difference between revisions
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To provide additional value for tournament players, the OWL includes words whose base or inflected forms have up to nine letters, rather than the OSPD's eight. |
To provide additional value for tournament players, the OWL includes words whose base or inflected forms have up to nine letters, rather than the OSPD's eight. |
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OSPD3 was created from OSPD2 by adding all appropriate words that had been added to Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (MWCD) in the interim; OWL was then formed by restoring the possibly offensive words removed from OSPD3, and adding nine-letter words from MWCD. |
OSPD3 was created from OSPD2 by adding all appropriate words that had been added to Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (MWCD) in the interim; OWL was then formed by restoring the possibly offensive words removed from OSPD3, and adding nine-letter words from MWCD. |
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The 2014 update (OTCWL2014, also known as OWL3) added several thousand words from two new sources, Oxford Collegiate Dictionary Second Edition (COD2) and Canadian Oxford Dictionary Second Edition (COD2). |
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A minor update in 2016 (OTCWL2016, also known as OWL3.1) added over a thousand nine-letter words. |
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==Other word authorities== |
==Other word authorities== |
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Revision as of 23:41, 6 August 2019
Official Tournament and Club Word List (recently renamed NASPA Word List), referred to as OTCWL, OWL, TWL, or NWL, is the official word authority for tournament Scrabble in the USA, Canada[1] and Thailand. It is based on the Official Scrabble Players Dictionary (OSPD) with modifications to make it more suitable for tournament play. Its British counterpart is Collins Scrabble Words.
Current edition
North American tournament Scrabble currently uses the fourth edition of OTCWL (officially NWL2018, but variously referred to as OWL4, OTCWL2018, TWL4, and TWL2018). This version was created by the North American Scrabble Players Association (NASPA) Dictionary Committee in 2018 and took effect on March 1, 2019; it is the first version published autonomously by NASPA rather than by Merriam-Webster under their copyright.
OWL4 contains every word in the sixth edition of the Official Scrabble Players Dictionary, but also includes words considered unsuitable for that book.
Past editions
The decision to bowdlerize the OSPD's third edition by removing a large number of possibly offensive words necessitated a separate, unabridged word list for tournament use. The first edition of OWL was created by the NSA Dictionary Committee, chaired by John Chew, and took effect on March 2, 1998. To avoid controversy, it was available for sale only to NSA members, and unlike the OSPD, did not include definitions. To provide additional value for tournament players, the OWL includes words whose base or inflected forms have up to nine letters, rather than the OSPD's eight. OSPD3 was created from OSPD2 by adding all appropriate words that had been added to Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary (MWCD) in the interim; OWL was then formed by restoring the possibly offensive words removed from OSPD3, and adding nine-letter words from MWCD. The 2014 update (OTCWL2014, also known as OWL3) added several thousand words from two new sources, Oxford Collegiate Dictionary Second Edition (COD2) and Canadian Oxford Dictionary Second Edition (COD2). A minor update in 2016 (OTCWL2016, also known as OWL3.1) added over a thousand nine-letter words.
Other word authorities
Unlike the Official Scrabble Players Dictionary, OWL is a list and does not include definitions. OWL also contains words not included in OSPD because they are considered offensive,[2] and a number of other additional words (mostly registered trademarks). Print versions of OWL can be procured from Merriam-Webster's customer service department by NASPA members only.[3]
OWL is supplemented by the NSA Dictionary Committee's Official Long List, which includes all acceptable 10- to 15-letter words not already included in the OWL. The word list was compiled using Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, 10th edition.[4]
Word count
| Letters | Word count |
|---|---|
| 2 | 105
|
| 3 | 1,081
|
| 4 | 4,214
|
| 5 | 9,403
|
| 6 | 16,564
|
| 7 | 25,257
|
| 8 | 31,475
|
| 9 | 30,307
|
| 10 | 23,124
|
| 11 | 16,958
|
| 12 | 12,084
|
| 13 | 8,264
|
| 14 | 5,411
|
| 15 | 3,385
|
See also
References
- ^ NASPA Dictionary Committee & Its Word Sources
- ^ "Expurgated Words". Retrieved 2007-12-10.
- ^ John Chew, Tapani Lindgren; Rebecca Slivka. "NASPAWiki: OTCWL". Retrieved 2013-09-14.
{{cite web}}: Unknown parameter|lastauthoramp=ignored (|name-list-style=suggested) (help) - ^ Chew, John; Tapani Lindgren. "Long List". Retrieved 2012-02-06.
{{cite web}}: Unknown parameter|lastauthoramp=ignored (|name-list-style=suggested) (help) - ^ Internet Scrabble Club word lists
- Unscramblerer TWL06 and SOWPODS Scrabble dictionary word search tools and word lists.