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9009 Shawnee Mission Parkway 913-384-6000 The Hotel Lotus is conveniently located off of I-35 and Shawnee Mission Parkway within walking distance to IKEA and only a short drive to major Kansas City shopping destinations like the Country Club Plaza, Crossroads, and Merriam Town Center.

7400 W. Frontage Road 913-236-0465 Hot breakfast, free Wi-Fi, indoor pool and hot tub, onsite guest laundry and same day laundry service, suites available, meeting room available.

6401 East Frontage Road 913-262-2622 Every day at the Quality Inn in Merriam starts with our free, hot breakfast, including healthy choices. Free WiFi keeps you on top of what you need to know, and our guest laundry helps you to take care of the details. Use our fax, print, and copy services when you need to. Our fitness center is a great way to take some time to yourself and stay healthy.

Serving up fresh and authentic Latin American cuisine, Anita's menu is loaded with breakfast and lunch offerings, plus plenty of to-go deliciousness. Try the famous Pupusas, tamales or the breakfast burritos and see why Anita's has nothing but 5-star reviews!

Enjoy this local laid-back bar and grill with 5-star reviews for great food, great service and an awesome atmosphere. Daily specials and seasonal favorites, plus karaoke in the summer on the patio and parking lot.

The IKEA restaurant is a great way to fuel up for a shopping trip in the aisles of IKEA. Serving the traditional meatball plate (and meatless options, too), along with other Swedish favorites, the IKEA restaurant is an affordable and delicious option when choosing to dine in Merriam.

5847 Merriam Drive 913-832-0565 The Sunflower Market is a modern marketplace specializing in creating one of a kind tee shirts, apparel, and other novelties located in downtown Merriam.

6000 IKEA Way Welcome to IKEA, where you will always find affordable furniture, stylish home décor and innovative modern home solutions, as well as design inspiration and unique home ideas!

5905 Slater St. 913-400-3117 The newest vintage and antique store in Merriam! We have created a fresh new look for this location and offer an eclectic mix of dealers featuring all types of great vintage and antique merchandise for your home or office. You can’t miss us, we are the 2-story historic 1900s house across from IKEA!

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9800 W. 62nd Terrace 913-262-0711 Discover Kansas City's best place to roller skate! Skate City offers fun for all ages. Visit during public skate sessions, special events or call Skate City to schedule a private party.

5500 Antioch Road 913-789-7038 Visit the Cinemark Theater in Merriam and enjoy fast food and fresh popcorn. Experience your movie with DBOX and Cinemark XD!

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A Journey Into the Merriam-Webster Word Factory

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By Jennifer Schuessler

• March 22, 2017

SPRINGFIELD, Mass. — Merriam-Webster , the oldest dictionary publisher in America, has turned itself into a social media powerhouse over the past few years. Its editors star in online videos on hot-button topics like the serial comma, gender pronouns and the dreaded “irregardless.” Its Twitter feed has become a viral sensation , offering witty — and sometimes pointedly political — commentary on the news of the day.

Kory Stamper, a lexicographer here, is very much part of the vanguard of word-nerd celebrities. Her witty “Ask the Editor” video contributions, like a classic on the plural of octopus , and personal blog, Harmless Drudgery , have inspired a Kory Stamper Fan Club on Facebook. One online admirer has carefully tracked minute changes in her hair (which, for one thing, is purple).

But the company remains very much a bricks-and-mortar operation, still based in this small New England city where the Merriam brothers bought the rights to Noah Webster’s dictionary in the 1840s and carried on his idea of a distinctly American language. And this month, Ms. Stamper, the author of the new book “Word by Word: The Secret Life of Dictionaries,” was more than happy to offer a tour of some of the distinctly analog oddities in the basement.

[ Read more: Three Words We Love to Argue About ]

She walked me through a hallway that seemed to double as a museum of superannuated filing cabinet technology. She offered a glimpse of the dungeonlike storage room used as a podcast studio and cheerfully pointed out some of the creepier company heirlooms, like mangy historical dioramas donated by local schoolchildren and an inflatable dictionary with arms and legs, created for a long-ago promotional campaign.

But the real jaw-dropper was the Backward Index , which includes some 315,000 cards listing words spelled … backward.

“It was conceived of as another way of shuffling information,” Ms. Stamper said of the index, which seems to have been produced intermittently from the 1930s to the ’70s. “Basically, someone sat here and typed up all the entries backwards. And then went crazy.”

Craziness is a bit of a leitmotif in “Word by Word.” The book, published last week by Pantheon, mixes memoiristic meditations on the lexicographic life along with a detailed description of the brain-twisting work of writing dictionaries. The Atlantic called it “an erudite and loving and occasionally profane history of the English language” that’s also “a cheerful and thoughtful rebuke of the cult of the grammar scolds.”

Ms. Stamper calls it “a love letter to dictionaries in English,” if one that allows for some mixed feelings.

“People have so many fears about what their use of language says about them,” she said. “When you talk to people about dictionaries, they often start talking about other things, like which words they love, and which words they hate. And it’s perfectly fine to hate parts of the language.”

Ms. Stamper, 42, grew up in Colorado and majored in medieval studies at Smith College. When she interviewed at Merriam-Webster in 1998, she was puzzled to learn the job involved writing definitions.

“I just thought, ‘Why would you need to do that?’” she recalled. “Hasn’t the dictionary already been written?”

“Word by Word” describes her own initiation into the art of lexicography, which involves wrestling with the continuous evolution of language. She walks the reader, chapter by chapter, through different aspects of a definition, including grammar, pronunciation, etymology and more.

Her first definition, by her recollection, was “blue plate.” Since then, she estimates, she has had a hand in hundreds of thousands of others.

“Take,” which she wrestled with for a month, was the longest in column inches. (It’s also one, she notes wryly, that very few people will ever read.)

“God,” which she revised for the company’s unabridged dictionary (now being updated online only), took the longest — four months — and involved not just extensive reading but consultation with clergy members, theologians and academics, who often responded to her email queries with long philosophical disquisitions.

Which leads to an important point. Dictionaries are often seen as argument-settling arbiters of truth. But their job, Ms. Stamper notes, isn’t to say what something is, but to objectively and comprehensively catalog the many different ways words are used by real people.

Ms. Stamper has no patience for self-styled purists who quail at “irregardless” — an actual word, she notes. (She is O.K. with ending sentences with prepositions as well as — brace yourself — split infinitives.) But she also describes being caught up in some higher-stakes fights.

One chapter takes an uncomfortable look at the racial assumptions baked into a Merriam-Webster definition of the color term “nude.” Another recounts the furor that erupted in 2009 when it added a subdefinition to its entry on “marriage,” noting uses to refer to same-sex unions that weren’t necessarily legally sanctioned.

That brought reams of hate mail, but most interactions with readers are friendlier. When Merriam-Webster began its videos, the heavy-breathing fan mail prompted her to create an “Ask the Editor Video Hotness Chart.”

“People would write in saying, ‘The editor with the glasses is so hot,’” she said. “Which is hysterical, since we all wear glasses.”

Stalkers who show up at the offices in Springfield, alas, may have trouble finding actual people. Ms. Stamper telecommutes from her home outside Philadelphia. During the visit, the halls were eerily deserted. No heads popped above cubicles. Only a few faintly murmuring voices were heard.

But at the center of the main upstairs work area stands a howling mass of irreplaceable historical chatter: the Consolidated Files.

The files, kept in red cabinets that snake around the middle of the room, contain millions of citations: small slips of paper documenting individual word uses, drawn from newspapers, books, radio, packaging and other sources, stretching from the 1980s back well into the 19th century.

These days, lexicographers work from an updated digitized database. But Ms. Stamper opened a drawer and pulled out a favorite “pink,” as editorial notes are called, from the 1950s sternly declaring that the word “cracker” “could not be defined as a ‘biscuit’ nor as a ‘wafer.’”

“This just sums up the job so well,” she said in a sub-sotto-voce whisper.

If dictionaries are a form of information technology, the building is in some ways a catalog of obsolescence. A downstairs gallery includes a 1934 poster advertising the second edition of the Webster’s New International Dictionary, billed as “one of the thickest books ever printed.” (The technology needed to bind it, Ms. Stamper said, no longer exists.)

There are also oddities like an asymmetrically bound Seventh New Collegiate from 1969, designed so it could hold itself up — an innovation that failed to catch on, probably because if you open it too far from the center, it falls over.

The dictionary industry itself has been listing of late, as printed dictionaries have given way to online dictionaries, many of them free. Merriam-Webster, a subsidiary of Encyclopaedia Britannica, itself announced layoffs just as she was finishing her manuscript. (It currently has 70 employees.)

There are only about 50 lexicographers working at dictionary companies in the United States today, Ms. Stamper estimated. But their work, she believes, remains as vital as it was in Noah Webster’s day.

“There’s something to having a bunch of nerds sitting in an office dispassionately reading lots and lots of material and distilling the meaning of a word as it’s been used in lots of places,” she said. “It really is this weird democratic process.”

An article on Thursday about Merriam-Webster, the oldest dictionary publisher in America, described the current edition of the company’s unabridged dictionary incorrectly. It remains in print; it is not an online-only publication. (Future updates to the dictionary, however, will be made only online.)

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Definition of tour noun from the Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary

• a walking/sightseeing/bus tour
• tour of/round/around something a coach tour of northern France
• They embarked on a tour around the country.
• a tour operator (= a person or company that organizes tours)
• a business trip
• a five-minute trip by taxi
• a long and difficult journey across the mountains
• a tour of Bavaria
• the first expedition to the South Pole
• We went on an all-day excursion to the island.
• The children were on a day’s outing from school.
• We had a day out at the beach.
• a(n) foreign/​overseas trip/​journey/​tour/​expedition
• a bus/​coach/​train/​rail trip/​journey/​tour
• to go on a(n) trip/​journey/​tour/​expedition/​excursion/​outing/​day out
• to set out/​off on a(n) trip/​journey/​tour/​expedition/​excursion
• to make a(n) trip/​journey/​tour/​expedition/​excursion
• have/​take (British English) a holiday/ (North American English) a vacation/​a break/​a day off/ (British English) a gap year
• go on/​be on holiday/​vacation/​leave/​honeymoon/​safari/​a trip/​a tour/​a cruise/​a pilgrimage
• go backpacking/​camping/​hitchhiking/​sightseeing
• plan a trip/​a holiday/​a vacation/​your itinerary
• book accommodation/​a hotel room/​a flight/​tickets
• have/​make/​cancel a reservation/ (especially British English) booking
• rent a villa/ (both British English) a holiday home/​a holiday cottage
• (especially British English) hire/ (especially North American English) rent a car/​bicycle/​moped
• stay in a hotel/​a bed and breakfast/​a youth hostel/​a villa/ (both British English) a holiday home/​a caravan
• cost/​charge $100 a/​per night for a single/​double/​twin/​standard/ (British English) en suite room
• check into/​out of a hotel/​a motel/​your room
• pack/​unpack your suitcase/​bags
• call/​order room service
• cancel/​cut short a trip/​holiday/​vacation
• apply for/​get/​renew a/​your passport
• take out/​buy/​get travel insurance
• catch/​miss your plane/​train/​ferry/​connecting flight
• fly (in)/travel in business/​economy class
• make/​have a brief/​two-day/​twelve-hour stopover/ (North American English also) layover in Hong Kong
• experience/​cause/​lead to delays
• check (in)/collect/​get/​lose (your) (especially British English) luggage/ (especially North American English) baggage
• be charged for/​pay excess baggage
• board/​get on/​leave/​get off the aircraft/​plane/​ship/​ferry
• taxi down/​leave/​approach/​hit/​overshoot the runway
• experience/​hit/​encounter severe turbulence
• suffer from/​recover from/​get over your jet lag/​travel sickness
• attract/​draw/​bring tourists/​visitors
• encourage/​promote/​hurt tourism
• promote/​develop ecotourism
• build/​develop/​visit a tourist/​holiday/ (especially British English) seaside/​beach/​ski resort
• work for/​be operated by a major hotel chain
• be served by/​compete with low-cost/ (especially North American English) low-fare/​budget airlines
• book something through/​make a booking through/​use a travel agent
• contact/​check with your travel agent/​tour operator
• book/​be on/​go on a package deal/​holiday/​tour
• buy/​bring back (tacky/​overpriced) souvenirs
• We met a group of Italians on a tour in Peru.
• They made a whistle-stop tour of the five major towns.
• This summer we went on a walking tour around Provence.
• We're going on a tour of Bavaria.
• You can join an organized tour or you can visit independently.
• I'd like to do a tour of Belgium on foot.
• international
• on (a) tour
• tour of duty

Questions about grammar and vocabulary?

Find the answers with Practical English Usage online, your indispensable guide to problems in English.

• We were given a guided tour (= by somebody who knows about the place) of the palace.
• a virtual tour (= shown on a computer) of the Taj Mahal
• a tour of inspection (= an official visit of a factory, classroom, etc. made by somebody whose job is to check that everything is working as expected)
• a tour guide
• tour of/round/around something Our host gave us a quick tour of the house.
• Come on, I'll give you the grand tour of the backyard.
• I made a lightning tour of the office to say goodbye.
• She takes tourists on ghost tours of Edinburgh.
• The next tour will begin at four o'clock.
• Garden tours are offered throughout the summer.
• After a whirlwind tour of the temples, it was time to find a hotel.
• tour of inspection
• The band is currently on a nine-day tour of France.
• on tour The band is on tour in France.
• a concert tour
• a world/European/UK tour
• The prince will visit Boston on the last leg (= part) of his American tour.
• a book/lecture/speaking tour
• Are you doing a tour for this new book?
• The group will shortly go on a ten-city European tour .
• We are going back to Prague as part of a small tour.
• The president embarked on a whirlwind tour of the provinces.
• Simon and Garfunkel's 2003 reunion tour
• The band is just back from a sell-out Asian tour.
• The group will shortly go on a ten-city European tour.
• a promotional tour for her new book
• the couple's first official overseas tour
• Dolly Parton's tour bus
• He wasn't selected for England's tour party to Australia.
• Phone for details of the band's tour dates.
• The team's tour manager called a press conference.
• on the tour He's been on the European tour for several years.
• The stand-off between the competing tours needs to be resolved.
• She's one of the most popular tour players.
• He served tours all over the world during his 35-year career.

Other results

• the Tour of Britain
• package tour
• tour of duties

Nearby words

Merriam-Webster tour reveals how words get into - and out of - the dictionary

• Published: Aug. 18, 2012, 8:35 p.m.
• Lori Stabile | Special to The Republican

"Tattletale gray” is out. “Octaval” hasn’t made the cut. But, “hot key” is in, and so is “F-bomb.”

Visitors to the headquarters of Merriam-Webster on Federal Street here got an inside peek into the world of words and dictionary making as part of a walking tour series, co-sponsored by the Armoury-Quadrangle Civic Association and Springfield Museums. "I enjoyed finding out about the company. It's the best kept secret in Springfield," said participant Linda C. Barnet, of Westfield. Approximately 70 people heard the history of the venerable company, which settled in its current location in 1940 after having a presence in the city since 1831, and learned just how words get into – and out of – the dictionary. John M. Morse, today's president of Merriam-Webster, said he was gratified to see such a large crowd attend the event. He revealed that "tattletale gray," a light shade of gray, was featured in the 1963 7th edition of the Merriam-Webster Collegiate Dictionary, and managed to last through the 8th and 9th editions as well. But, by the time the 10th edition came out in 1993, the phrase was no longer being used, so it was taken out to make room for new words. "Tattletale gray" had been part of an advertising campaign for a laundry detergent, Morse shared, joking with his visitors that those who knew what the phrase meant were showing their age. "Octaval," meanwhile, cited in the now-defunct Gourmet magazine at least twice, in 1966 and 1978, never caught on enough to merit dictionary inclusion, according to Merriam-Webster associate editor Emily A. Brewster. But, it is still being monitored, she revealed. "It's not doing well," Brewster said. "What does it mean," inquired one of the visitors. "You tell me," said Brewster. "A word needs to have enough evidence in use to determine what it means. It seems to me it means nuanced flavor." Editors spend an hour each day reading and searching for new words or unusual uses of words, and making notations of where they were seen, how they were used. Now done electronically, these citations were made on slips of paper before 1980. Editors scour academic journals, magazines and newspapers; they even draw from conversations overheard and the radio to monitor language.

"Hot key," a computer term, reflects changing technology. A "hot key" is a key or combination of keys on a computer keyboard programmed to perform a specific function when pressed. That entered the collegiate dictionary relatively recently, into the 11th edition released in 2003. "Usage we watch develop for years and years and years," Brewster explained. "We're looking for anything new, anything unusual, even archaic usage that we are seeing in a modern way." Slang terms, she added, "take a long time to be established." Brewster said the editors want to ensure the words are "not a flash in the pan" and will still be understood in three years. For example, the word "jiggy," popularized by rapper Will Smith in a late 1990s song, means "nice" or "fashionable." It was on the radar in 2001, but hasn't been included yet. "I still think jiggy's waiting," Morse said. F-bomb, "a lighthearted and printable euphemism," was one of the words recently added to the 2012 update of Merriam Webster's Collegiate Dictionary, along with man cave (space used by the man of the house for his hobbies), sexting (sending of sexually explicit messages or images by cell phone), and earworm (a song or melody that keeps repeating in one's mind). A new sense for included. Kory Stamper, an associate editor for Merriam-Webster, told the Associated Press that F-bomb was traced back to 1988, in a Newsday story that had the now-dead Mets catcher Gary Carter talking about how he had given them up. "We saw another huge spike after Dick Cheney dropped an F-bomb in the Senate in 2004, and again in 2010 when Vice President Joe Biden did the same thing in the same place," Stamper told the Associated Press. "It's a word that is very visually evocative. It's not just the F-word. It's F-bomb. You know that it's going to cause a lot of consternation and possible damage." Words are removed from the dictionary when they represent outdated technologies, or obscure references. "Snollygoster," a disagreeable person, was taken out in the 2003 collegiate dictionary, Morse said, adding that while he thinks it's a "delightful word," it wasn't used much past the 1960s. When editors are at work reading and marking, Brewster said the room is quieter than a library. Morse says the study process for his editors is "not unlike the kind of logical analysis when doing SAT tests." Each new collegiate edition has about 10,000 new words and definitions, and 100,000 changes. Morse estimated that at least 1 million editorial decisions are handled by 10 editors. The last edition, the 11th, came out in 2003. While new versions of the collegiate dictionary – the standard college-level desk dictionary – usually come out every 10 years, Morse said he expects the next collegiate edition to take longer, as work is being done on the unabridged version. Still, 100 new words will be added to the collegiate this year. The collegiate has approximately 160,000 words, while the unabridged dictionary has 460,000. "Tattletale gray" may still be found in the unabridged, as well as "snollygoster," as there is more room, he said. Keeping the collegiate to 160,000 words allows it to stay affordable at a retail price of $27.95, he said. Annual sales of the collegiate are proprietary information, but they estimate more than 50 million copies have been sold since its inception. He said it's difficult to think of any other book besides the Bible selling that many copies. Merriam-Webster has come a long way since Noah Webster published his first dictionary in 1806, "A Compendious Dictionary of the English Language." George and Charles Merriam took over the Webster rights after he died. The company has seized technology, Morse said, adding it embraced the World Wide Web early and it proved to be a wise move. In 1996, he said Merriam-Webster put the entire contents of the collegiate dictionary on the web at www.m-w.com for free, and he said it was "the best decision ever made." Now, he said, the dominant source of advertising revenue comes from the web. Morse said he's seen two major changes in recent years – the move from print to the web and from the web to mobile devices. The Merriam-Webster iPhone app, which allows users to speak a word, to learn its meaning and spelling, has been popular, Morse said. "People just love that," Morse said. "The history of dictionary making has always made use of an emerging technology." For example, he noted, in 1947, the company unveiled small format paperback books, a major change for the time. Today, Merriam-Webster, which is a subsidiary of Encyclopaedia-Britannica, has very little competition – at least in the print world, according to Morse. Online, he said there's dictionary.com , which licenses an old dictionary from Random-House and there's also thefreedictionary.com . While Morse believes Merriam-Webster is "here to stay," he said the business has been affected by the economy. School sales are down. But, he said he believes the death of the print dictionary will be proclaimed many times before it actually happens. The company employs approximately 70 people. Morse has been with the company since 1980 and in his current position since 1997. He said he fell in love with Merriam-Webster at first sight. A self-described "lover of language," Morse said, "To be in the business of providing language is as good as it gets." "We know that people really want this information. That's one thing the web experience has really made clear. When you sell the print book, you never really know if people are using it," Morse said. "With the web, millions of people a day are coming to the website and looking up words." In fact, Morse is convinced that the young Noah Webster would approve of the company's direction, as he also was interested in creating affordable, innovative products.

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{%type%} Definitions

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Short "hint"

A journey or route all the way around a particular place or area.

Usage examples (37)

• If Shakespeare had to go on an author tour to promote Romeo and Juliet, he never would have written Macbeth.
• They took an extended tour of Europe
• SHUBERT: He's here on what he calls a tour for peace, not as a negotiator.
• This tour is all about ratcheting up enthusiasm for traditionally Democratic groups.

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Synonyms (9)

Antonyms (0), rhymes with, conjugation.

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7 Ways to be a Traveler and Not a Tourist

Are you a Tourist or a Traveler? Well, let’s see here, what is the difference between the two words? The Merriam-Webster dictionary seems to think that they are nearly one and the same. The trusted book defines a tourist as “one that makes a tour for pleasure or culture” and a traveler as “one that goes on a trip or journey.” There really isn’t much of a distinction between the two.

However, in the pompous travel community, a big, intimidating line has been drawn between these two similar terms. Being called a tourist is more condescending than being called a traveler. The tourist has been distinguished as a sort of amateur traveler, and a traveler has been distinguished as more of an experienced tourist. It sounds strange, but let’s see if we can clear things up a bit.

You need to be a child before you can be an adult, likewise, you need to be a tourist before you can be a traveler. An all-grown-up traveler knows what it’s like to be a tourist and actively avoids most (if not all) “tourist activities.” Tourist activities are things like planning a short week-long trip out weeks in advance and hitting all the popular sights, it’s staying in a nice hotel, eating at fancy restaurants, taking photos of yourself so it looks like you’re holding up the Leaning Tower of Pisa…just to show your friends back home.

The traveler avoids these over-crowded activities and seeks the road less travelled as to appreciate the real culture of the destination. Trust me, you want to be a traveler if you want respect from both the locals and other travelers alike. Here’s how you do it:

Be Spontaneous A traveler has no schedule set in stone. Only broad ideas of the trip are in mind with little or no attachment to them.

Don’t eat at a McDonalds Everybody get homesick, but you didn’t just travel halfway across the world to eat food you can get at home.

Don’t rush to big attractions A traveler can still see the huge, popular attractions in a country, but don’t make seeing them a priority.

If it’s free or cheap, do it The locals probably don’t spend “tourist prices” for their activities and you shouldn’t either.

Don’t fly Taking buses, trains, and bicycle hires are a way better way to experince a region.

Make friends with a local Learn some of the local language and head to a restaurant or bar. You might be amazed at the special private tour you may walk into!

Stay in a hostel or inexpensive guesthouse If you spend the money for a 5 star hotel, you’l probably want to spend more time in it than outside enjoying your travel experice.

All in all, the most important difference between a traveler and a tourist is time. A tourist is only on a vacation with little time. Resulting in a rushed, consumer oriented, crowded, sight-seeing, and photo heavy vacation. A traveler has more time; time to get lost and not miss a flight, time to understand a region through all the senses, time to learn the language, and time to be carefree and unburdend by a trip planner.

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Definition of grand tour

Examples of grand tour in a sentence.

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'grand tour.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

Word History

1678, in the meaning defined at sense 1

Dictionary Entries Near grand tour

grand total

grand touring car

Cite this Entry

“Grand tour.” Merriam-Webster.com Dictionary , Merriam-Webster, https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/grand%20tour. Accessed 29 Jun. 2024.

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Thesaurus: All synonyms and antonyms for grand tour

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