The smallest member of the Oxford dictionary family, The Oxford Minidictionary offers a compact guide to the spelling and meaning of the most common words of present-day English. Ideal to carry in the pocket, briefcase, or handbag, this flexi-cover dictionary also serves as the perfect dictionary for desk-top reference or school use.Despite its small format, the Minidictionary contains a vast number of words with derivations provided in full whenever possible, as well as indicating comparative and superlative forms, plurals of nouns, and inflections of verbs. It uses the International Phonetic Alphabet to indicate pronunciations, and includes an appendix that lists the names of independent countries with the adjective and noun used to refer to each country and its people.Now available in a completely revised and updated edition seven years after its first publication, the second edition of The Oxford Minidictionary contains 34,000 entries and 44,000 definitions in a completely new format that makes each page even easier to read. It also includes new appendices on chemical elements, weights and measures, temperatures in Celsius and Fahrenheit, English usage, and punctuation, as well as an updated appendix on the countries of the world.