NEW ENGLISH LANGUAGE DICTIONARY

The author presents a historical view of Hispanic lexicograophy, from the standpoint of the cultural function of dictionaries, with a special emphasic on the dictionaries of the Spanish Academy, from the Diccionario de Auridades (1771), to a excessively prescriptive period and to a present-day realistic and panhipanic approach. New diccionaries, compiled within the framework of the Asociacion de Academias de la Lengua Espanola are breafly described: the Diccionario Panhispanico de Dudas (2005), and the Diccionario Acadentico de Americanismos (to appear), as well as the Diecionario del Espanol Usual en Mexico (96) aand the Diccionario de Uso del. Espanol de Chile.