Why isn't 'commotion' in the Scrabble dictionary?

August 1, 2005 3:15 PM

Why is the word "commotion" not in the Scrabble dictionary? I have the paperback official Scrabble players' dictionary, and it's not in there in any form.
posted by mark7570 to sports, hobbies, & recreation (8 comments total)

Do you have an edition that includes nine-letter words? From the Scrabble website:

Is there an "official" dictionary for SCRABBLE Players?
Yes, Merriam-Webster's Official SCRABBLE® Players Dictionary, 3rd Edition (OSPD3). For club and tournament play, it is the Official Tournament and Club Word List (OWL), also published by Merriam-Webster, Inc. It is derived from the Official SCRABBLE® Players Dictionary, Second 2nd Edition and The Official SCRABBLE® Players Dictionary, Third 3rd Edition, supplemented with nine-letter words and their inflected forms taken from Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, Tenth 10th Edition. This book contains words only, no definitions or part-of-speech labels, and includes all inflected forms spelled out in full.
posted by occhiblu at 3:21 PM on August 1, 2005

occhiblu beat me to it.
it only has words with up to 8 letters.
posted by Silky Slim at 3:23 PM on August 1, 2005

Right. But if someone put "motion" on the board, you could add "com", I suppose.
posted by Specklet at 3:40 PM on August 1, 2005

Or if someone put MM on the board, you could add CO and OTION.

The OSPD is not a very good dictionary--quite a few words were removed (for indecency- and/or marketing-related reasons) between the second and third editions, and these days it isn't even authoritative within its own very limited sphere of influence.
posted by box at 3:57 PM on August 1, 2005

Specklet, yes, but from what I remember, the Scrabble dictionary goes up to only eight letters, and then suggests you use the Merriam-Webster for any bigger words. So, they certainly allow "commotion," but it falls outside the sphere of the limited Scrabble dictionary.
posted by occhiblu at 4:20 PM on August 1, 2005

I agree with box. Overall, it's just not a very good dictionary. Imagine my horror having my triple-word score (and the game!) stolen from me because apparently, "zen" isn't a word in the world of scrabble. My scrabble game hasn't been the same since.
posted by ilovebicuspids at 5:51 PM on August 1, 2005

ilovebicuspids: I agree that it's not a good dictionary, but "zen" isn't a word in Scrabble because it's a proper noun (a particular school of Buddhism).
posted by jacobm at 6:02 PM on August 1, 2005

I currently use Moshe Jacobson's Margana to resolve Scrabble disputes and quickly examine positions after a game.

He says it uses OSPD3, but it contains many words longer than 8 letters.
posted by ThePants at 9:54 AM on August 2, 2005