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submitted 9 months ago by MicroWave@lemmy.world to c/news@lemmy.world

A Florida school district has literally banned the dictionary in an effort to comply with Gov. Ron DeSantis‘s (R) book-banning law.

The Escambia County School District has reportedly removed over 2800 books from library shelves as they undergo a review process that will determine if they are inappropriate for students, according to Popular Information. Among the books currently relegated to storage are The American Heritage Children’s Dictionary, Webster’s Dictionary for Students, and Merriam-Webster’s Elementary Dictionary.

The district contends these texts could violate H.B. 1069, which DeSantis signed into law in May 2023.

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[-] BraveSirZaphod@kbin.social -1 points 9 months ago

Given that dictionaries are a relatively recent development in history, and yet people did manage to speak English, I can guarantee you that 'most of them' is a massive over-estimate.

To be clear, I'm not trying to imply that dictionaries aren't useful or that them being inaccessible is a good thing, but the fact of the matter is that the vast majority of people's linguistic knowledge is learned unconsciously through context and simply talking and hearing other people speak.

Just to throw it at you, of your first sentence there:

When I was a wee lad reading something I would ask my parents what words meant and we would look it up in the dictionary

I would essentially guarantee you didn't learn any of those words by looking them up in a dictionary, and you probably knew them all before you could even read, with the exception of 'dictionary'.

this post was submitted on 11 Jan 2024
661 points (98.4% liked)

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