Staff and Contributors HOW TO USE THE DICTIONARY To look up an entry in The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language, use the search window above. For best results, after typing in the word, click on the “Search” button instead of using the “enter” key. Some compound words (like bus rapid transit, dog whistle, or identity theft) don’t appear on the drop-down list when you type them in the search bar. For best results with compound words, place a quotation mark before the compound word in the search window. guide to the dictionary THE USAGE PANEL The Usage Panel is a group of nearly 200 prominent scholars, creative writers, journalists, diplomats, and others in occupations requiring mastery of language. Annual surveys have gauged the acceptability of particular usages and grammatical constructions. The Panelists NEED HELP SOLVING A CROSSWORD PUZZLE? Go to our Crossword Puzzle Solver and type in the letters that you know, and the Solver will produce a list of possible solutions. -- AMERICAN HERITAGE DICTIONARY APP The new American Heritage Dictionary app is now available for iOS and Android. THE AMERICAN HERITAGE DICTIONARY BLOG The articles in our blog examine new words, revised definitions, interesting images from the fifth edition, discussions of usage, and more. OPEN DICTIONARY PROJECT Share your ideas for new words and new meanings of old words! Start Sharing Now! -- See word lists from the best-selling 100 Words Series! Find out more! INTERESTED IN DICTIONARIES? Check out the Dictionary Society of North America at http://www.dictionarysociety.com Editorial and Production Staff Senior Vice President, Publisher, Adult Trade and Reference Bruce Nichols Vice President, Executive Editor (1997–2011) Joseph P. Pickett Executive Editor (2011–    ) Steven R. Kleinedler Vice President, Managing Editor Christopher Leonesio Senior Lexicographer Patrick Taylor Senior Editors Peter Chipman Louise E. Robbins Susan I. Spitz Editor Catherine T. Pratt Associate Editors Elizabeth Kassab Emily A. Neeves Consulting Editors Valerie C. Coffey Nicholas A. Durlacher Benjamin W. Fortson IV Erich M. Groat Uchenna C. Ikonné Katherine M. Isaacs Robert Knippen David R. Pritchard Hanna Schonthal Vali Tamm Proofreaders Diane Fredrick Katherine M. Isaacs Julia Penelope David R. Pritchard Database Production Supervisor Christopher J. Granniss Art and Production Supervisor Margaret Anne Miles Editorial and Production Coordinator Sarah Iani Production Associate Darcy Conroy Administrative Coordinators Ashley Gilliam Mary Huot Editorial and Production Assistance Sophie Blum Harley Gorton Catherine Hawkins Mary Lempert Katharine Manko Print Production Director Donna Baxter McCarthy Lead Print Production Coordinator Diane Varone Designers Catherine Hawkes, Cat & Mouse Deborah Hodgdon Stoltze Design Pre-Press Development PreMediaGlobal The staff wishes to acknowledge Margery S. Berube, Publisher of the Fourth Edition, for her invaluable guidance in the development of the Fifth Edition. Special Contributors and Consultants UsageSteven Pinker, PhD Harvard College Professor and Johnstone Family Professor, Department of Psychology, Harvard University Indo-European Roots and Indo-European LanguagesCalvert Watkins, PhD Victor S. Thomas Professor of Linguistics and the Classics, Emeritus, Harvard University, and Professor-in-Residence, Department of Classics and Program in Indo-European Studies, University of California, Los Angeles Semitic Roots and Semitic LanguagesJohn Huehnergard, PhD Professor, Department of Middle Eastern Studies, University of Texas at Austin Semitic Languages and Development of the AlphabetJo Ann Hackett, PhD Professor, Department of Middle Eastern Studies, University of Texas at Austin Language Variation and ChangeJohn R. Rickford, PhD J.E. Wallace Sterling Professor in Linguistics and the Humanities and Pritzker University Fellow in Undergraduate Education, Stanford University Special ConsultantsAstronomyLuke D. Keller, PhD Associate Professor, Department of Physics, Ithaca College BiologyRufus W. Burlingame, PhD Director of Technology & Development, INOVA Diagnostics, Inc., San DiegoTodd R. Disotell, PhD Professor, Center for the Study of Human Origins, Department of Anthropology, New York UniversityBenjamin Minault Fitzpatrick, PhD Assistant Professor, Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Tennessee, KnoxvilleDouglas H. Goldman, PhD Herbarium Associate, Harvard University HerbariaW. Matthew Sattley, PhD Associate Professor, Department of Biology, Indiana Wesleyan UniversityDaniel Simberloff, PhD Nancy Gore Hunger Professor of Environmental Studies, University of Tennessee, KnoxvilleJohn H. Van Drie President, Van Drie Research LLC CartographyDavid Deis Staff Cartographer, Department of Geography, California State University, Northridge ChemistryLinda C. Bush, PhD Computer Science and TechnologyJeannine Mosely, PhD Condensed Matter PhysicsJacob J. Krich, PhD Ziff Environmental Fellow, Harvard University Center for the Environment DanceThomas “T-Bopper” Guzman-Sanchez Urban Dance Scholar, Historian, and Anthropologist, Senior Director, International Urban Dance Masters Association, Los AngelesJanice E. Haws Roberts, MFA Professor and Chair, Department of Dance, St. Olaf College EgyptologyDavid Lorton, PhD French HistorySuzanne Desan, PhD Professor, Department of History, University of Wisconsin–Madison General and Subatomic PhysicsStuart D. Anderson, PhD Lecturer, Department of Physics, Ithaca College LawMichele Cotton, PhD, JD Assistant Professor and Graduate Program Director, Legal and Ethical Studies, University of Baltimore MathematicsChristopher D. Goff, PhD Associate Professor, Department of Mathematics, University of the PacificWilliam I. Johnston StatisticsRobert J. Rovetti, PhD Assistant Professor, Department of Mathematics, Loyola Marymount University Etymology ConsultantsBantu LanguagesSam Mchombo, PhD Associate Professor, Department of African American Studies, University of California, Berkeley Cariban LanguagesSpike Gildea, PhD Associate Professor, Department of Linguistics, University of Oregon Chinese and Other East Asian LanguagesZev Handel, PhD Associate Professor, Department of Asian Languages and Literature, University of Washington Inuit/Eskimo LanguagesJerrold M. Sadock, PhD Glen A. Lloyd Distinguished Service Professor, Emeritus, Department of Linguistics, University of Chicago Iranian LanguagesP. Oktor Skjærvø, PhD Aga Khan Professor of Iranian, Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, Harvard University Northwest Pacific LanguagesAlan H. Hartley Persian and Other Near Eastern LanguagesWheeler Thackston, PhD Retired Professor in the Practice of the Persian Language, Harvard University QuechuaMary Antonia Andronis Slavic LanguagesMichael S. Flier, PhD Oleksandr Potebnja Professor of Ukrainian Philology, Harvard UniversityYaroslav Gorbachov, PhD Lecturer, Department of Slavic Languages and Literatures, University of Chicago Contributors and Consultants, Fourth Edition James S. Ackerman Michael Adams Beth Anderson Christopher D. Bedford Jim Boyle Susan S. Chicoski Chryssostomos Chryssostomidis Keith Conrad Mark Garrett Cooper Bryan E. Dutton Tamar Szabó Gendler Edmund J. Goehring William A. Graham Maura Hadro William S. Haubrich Houghton Mifflin Company School Division Design Department Ann-Marie Imbornoni Susan Innes David A. Jost Rosemary A. Joyce Sanford N. Katz Ivan Kreilkamp Alexander Lehrman Miriam L. Levering Merryl Maleska-Wilbur William McCloskey Ann Marie Menting Mike Meserole Allan A. Metcalf Geoffrey Nunberg Joseph M. Patwell Jacquelyn Pope Rosemary Previte Jun Qian R. Dwayne Ramey Carol Rigsby Natalie Schilling-Estes Marion Severynse Richard Sherwood Dennis E. Showalter Nada Stotland Lawrence G. Weathers Timothy Webster William H. Wilson Indo-European & Semitic Roots Appendices Thousands of entries in the dictionary include etymologies that trace their origins back to reconstructed proto-languages. You can obtain more information about these forms in our online appendices: Indo-European Roots Semitic Roots The Indo-European appendix covers nearly half of the Indo-European roots that have left their mark on English words. A more complete treatment of Indo-European roots and the English words derived from them is available in our Dictionary of Indo-European Roots. 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