Well, not bad. It’s just well known for being descriptive.
As dictionaries are supposed to be, no?
To a degree. However, there’s a difference between pointing out a common corruption, and including it in your dictionary without comment. The Random House Dictionary tends toward the latter.
[QUOTE=Raymond E. Feist]
She pursued his last comment. “That beautiful blond man who was with you a few minutes ago? Who is he?”
[/QUOTE]
Those are the adjective. If Feist had written the noun, it would have been “that beautiful blond who was with you…” Which, I’m sure, would have confused some people.
Okay, that’s one.
I think I would have wanted to rewrite the sentences.
Perhaps. But that wasn’t the case in this case. There’s an extensive comment on it. At any rate, I’ve offered up both a descriptive (dictionary) and prescriptive (style book) take on blond vs. blonde usage. I believe Chicago Manual of Style probably prefers “blonde woman” to AP’s “blond woman,” but, like I said, I don’t have it handy.
Frankly, I’m surprised the OED doesn’t list “blonde” as a noun form.
I think it might be an American versus British English. First choice in the American Heritage Dictionary is “blond,” but it also says “also blonde.” The second choice usually, but not always, shows British style.
Along the same line, the OED shows “blonde,” then says “also blond,” and I’ve noticed that OED’s second choice is almost always American usage.
The online OED does list “blonde” as a noun. See here. The Usage Note at the end also identifies the absence of an E as American style.
That’s not the OED, though. It says it’s the World Dictionary, or something like that.
At any rate, I cannot believe the OED would miss reporting the “e” variant of the noun, which actually appears to be the more popular noun form when describing women. The OED is a descriptive dictionary, if there ever was one.
Odd, because from here, that’s where it takes you if you click on the first choice at the top, which it says is the Compact Oxford English Dictionary. I always thought that was the online version.
Still, American vs. Brit is how I’ve always taken it to be before, right or wrong.
In fact, I’m not seeing any “World Dictionary” designation. Says its Oxford Dictionaries, and the copyright is Oxford University Press.
Another vote for blond=male, blonde=female.
It says:
I don’t know what “World dictionary” is, but that doesn’t look like an OED entry. An OED entry typically looks like this.
This is very odd, because that simply does not appear in the link I’m looking at. Again, the link is here. Could it be taking you to a different link for some reason? Not only does this one say Oxford, if I go to Contact Us, the address is at Oxford University Press at Oxford University.
American Heritage still uses “blond” as first choice for Americans, and that’s good enough for me.
Sam: Are you sure it’s not right under the big, orange word “blonde”?
And it says “Oxford Dictionaries” as the title. Perhaps the World dictionary is different from the OED, yet still produced by the Oxford University Press.
In fact, since the official online version of the OED is available at http://www.oed.com/, I’m almost certain it’s from a different dictionary.
Still, I sent a request for clarification to both the contact email of your site and using the contact form on oed.com.
Does it not say “Entry from World Dictionary” right under the big orange “blond” heading for you? Oxford University Press prints a number of dictionaries. The OED is one of them. Do not confuse it with The Oxford Dictionary of English, which is also printed by Oxford University Press, but is not the OED. It seems according to the FAQ, World content is pulled from the Oxford Dictionary of English (Revised Second Edition).
The OED’s entries look a lot different than what that site is giving me. Did you click on the link I had in my last post? That’s what an OED entry seeks to be: providing notable uses of the word (including the first known written use), as well as memorializing all the most popular variants of a word, in all varieties of English.
No, I have it open now, and it says nothing like that anywhere. That’s very strange. And no, it is definitely not under the big orange word “blonde,” which IS there. It just says, underneath it, “Pronunciation” and below that it gives the various definitions. I can only assume this page appears differently to different systems or even geographic locations, which I’ve not heard of before.
All very strange. But yes, I saw the OED example, and that does indeed look different from this. However, I have always thought the two spellings a difference in American versus Brit.
“Blondie,” however, gets the same treatment on both side sof the pond. 
(Or do Brits not use that?)
Hope they reply! Even though I do recognize now it’s really not the OED.
Interestingly enough, when I type “blond” or “blonde” into the search box, I get a different (more abbreviated) result than what you’ve linked to, and that result does not contain “from World Dictionary” on it.
I’m fairly sure I had good reason to spell my username this way when I signed up. Can’t remember what it was though.
I almost always use “blond” as an adjective no matter the sex. I am a woman, and actually a real dishwater blond, but enhanced.
The OED has, and provided me a link to the site that explains what two dictionaries are. I went ahead and pulled up both pages for the U.S. version, since it was the easiest to navigate quickly.
Oxford English Dictionary Online
It seems to me that the latter is just a searchable version of the published text dictionary, while the former is their attempt to make a dictionary for the web, with full multimedia features. The ODO also includes a free version that has limited capabilities, which is what we have been using. The free version does not include text from the actual OED.
At least, that’s what I got out of it. The email only said there is a free version of the ODO, and that the ODO has a thesaurus, and here’s a website where you can read more. The rest is my interpretation of what the links above say.
I have not yet asked about missing attribution text at your location. They did say, “Please let us know if we may be of further assistance,” so I can if you’d like. But I’d think the ODO people would be a better choice, and they have not gotten back with me yet.
ETA: Woah. I got response from the ODO people at almost the same time, and didn’t realize it. I’ll just quote it:
Oxford Dictionaries Online (ODO) is a new current English dictionary and language reference service. In ODO, only present-day senses are covered and the most common meanings or senses are described first. The OED is a historical dictionary: the senses are dealt with in chronological order according to the quotation evidence. Also, unlike current English dictionaries, senses are never removed from the OED.
Unless, of course, she is Mary Ann. :rolleyes:
Thanks for the trouble, but nah, no need to ask further. I’m satisfied there’s at least a connection and that my long-standing belief of American vs. British is justified. (That means “blond” for men and women in American and “blonde” for both in Britspeak.)