John Stephen Farmer (7 March 1854 – 18 January 1916) also known as J. S. Farmer was a British
lexicographer
Lexicography is the study of lexicons, and is divided into two separate academic disciplines. It is the art of compiling dictionaries.
* Practical lexicography is the art or craft of compiling, writing and editing dictionaries.
* Theoreti ...
, spiritualist and writer. He was most well known for his seven volume
dictionary
A dictionary is a listing of lexemes from the lexicon of one or more specific languages, often arranged alphabetically (or by radical and stroke for ideographic languages), which may include information on definitions, usage, etymologies ...
of
slang
Slang is vocabulary (words, phrases, and linguistic usages) of an informal register, common in spoken conversation but avoided in formal writing. It also sometimes refers to the language generally exclusive to the members of particular in-gro ...
.
Career
Farmer was born in
Bedford
Bedford is a market town in Bedfordshire, England. At the 2011 Census, the population of the Bedford built-up area (including Biddenham and Kempston) was 106,940, making it the second-largest settlement in Bedfordshire, behind Luton, whilst ...
. His lifetime work was ''Slang and its Analogues'' published in seven volumes (1890–1904) with
William Ernest Henley
William Ernest Henley (23 August 184911 July 1903) was an English poet, writer, critic and editor. Though he wrote several books of poetry, Henley is remembered most often for his 1875 poem "Invictus". A fixture in London literary circles, the o ...
.
Farmer took interest in
psychical research
Parapsychology is the study of alleged psychic phenomena (extrasensory perception, telepathy, precognition, clairvoyance, psychokinesis (also called telekinesis), and psychometry) and other paranormal claims, for example, those related to near- ...
and spiritualism. He was the first editor for the
spiritualist
Spiritualism is the metaphysical school of thought opposing physicalism and also is the category of all spiritual beliefs/views (in monism and dualism) from ancient to modern. In the long nineteenth century
The ''long nineteenth century'' i ...
journal ''Light''. From 1878, he also edited the ''Psychological Review'', a spiritualist periodical. Farmer was a member of the
London Spiritualist Alliance
The College of Psychic Studies (founded in 1884 as the London Spiritualist Alliance) is a non-profit organisation based in South Kensington, London. It is dedicated to the study of psychic and spiritualist phenomena.
History British National Assoc ...
.
Farmer defended the medium
William Eglinton
William Eglinton (1857–1933), also known as William Eglington was a British spiritualist medium who was exposed as a fraud.Hereward Carrington. (1907). ''The Physical Phenomena of Spiritualism''. Herbert B. Turner & Co. pp. 84–90 Massimo Po ...
from accusations of fraud and in 1886 wrote a biography about Eglinton.
[Christine Ferguson. (2012). ''Determined Spirits: Eugenics, Heredity and Racial Regeneration in Anglo-American Spiritualist Writing, 1848–1930''. Edinburgh University Press. p. 75. ]
Publications
*''Spiritualism as a New Basis of Belief'' (1880)
*''A New Basis of Belief in Immortality'' (1882)
*''How to Investigate Spiritualism'' (1883)
''Twixt Two Worlds: A Narrative of the Life and Work of William Eglinton''(1886)
''Americanisms, Old and New. A Dictionary of Words, Phrases, and Colloquialisms peculiar to the United States, British America, the West Indies, &c., &c., Their Derivation, Meaning, and Application, together with numerous Anecdotal, Historical, Explanatory, and Folk-lore Notes''(1889)
''Slang and its Analogues Past and Present: A Dictionary, Historical and Comparative, of the Heterodox Speech of All Classes of Society for more than Three Hundred Years With Synonyms in English, French, German, Italian, Etc''(Seven volumes, 1890–1904) [with
William Ernest Henley
William Ernest Henley (23 August 184911 July 1903) was an English poet, writer, critic and editor. Though he wrote several books of poetry, Henley is remembered most often for his 1875 poem "Invictus". A fixture in London literary circles, the o ...
]
References
Further reading
*Eric Dingwall. (1981). ''Light and the Farmer Mystery''. Journal of the Society for Psychical Research 51: 22-25.
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Farmer, John Stephen
1854 births
1916 deaths
English lexicographers
English spiritualists
Parapsychologists
People from Bedford