''Nationalencyklopedin'' (; "The National Encyclopedia" in English), abbreviated NE, is a comprehensive contemporary

Swedish-language Swedish ( ) is a North Germanic language spoken predominantly in Sweden and in parts of Finland. It has at least 10 million native speakers, the fourth most spoken Germanic language and the first among any other of its type in the Nordic countr ...

encyclopedia An encyclopedia (American English) or encyclopædia (British English) is a reference work or compendium providing summaries of knowledge either general or special to a particular field or discipline. Encyclopedias are divided into articles ...

, initiated by a favourable loan from the

Government of Sweden The Government of the Kingdom of Sweden ( sv, Konungariket Sveriges regering) is the national cabinet of Sweden, and the country's executive authority. The Government consists of the Prime Ministerappointed and dismissed by the Speaker of the ...

of 17 million

Swedish kronor The krona (; plural: ''kronor''; sign: kr; code: SEK) is the official currency of the Kingdom of Sweden. Both the ISO code "SEK" and currency sign "kr" are in common use; the former precedes or follows the value, the latter usually follows it b ...

in 1980, which was repaid by December 1990. The printed version consists of 20 volumes with 172,000 articles; the

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...

version comprises 260,000 articles (as of June 2005).

History

The project was born in 1980, when a government committee suggested that negotiations be initiated with various

publisher Publishing is the activity of making information, literature, music, software and other content available to the public for sale or for free. Traditionally, the term refers to the creation and distribution of printed works, such as books, newsp ...

s. This stage was finished in August 1985, when in Höganäs became the publisher responsible for the project. The project specifications were for a modern reference work based on a scientific

paradigm In science and philosophy, a paradigm () is a distinct set of concepts or thought patterns, including theories, research methods, postulates, and standards for what constitute legitimate contributions to a field. Etymology ''Paradigm'' comes f ...

incorporating

gender Gender is the range of characteristics pertaining to femininity and masculinity and differentiating between them. Depending on the context, this may include sex-based social structures (i.e. gender roles) and gender identity. Most cultures u ...

and

environment Environment most often refers to: __NOTOC__ * Natural environment, all living and non-living things occurring naturally * Biophysical environment, the physical and biological factors along with their chemical interactions that affect an organism or ...

al issues. Pre-orders for the work were unprecedented; before the first volume was published in December 1989, 54,000 customers had ordered the encyclopedia. The last volume came out in 1996, with three supplemental volumes in 2000. 160,000 copies had been sold as of 2004. Associated with the ''Nationalencyklopedin'' project are also: *''NE:s Ordbok'', a

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 ...

in three volumes (1995–1996) *''NE:s Årsband'', complementary volumes concerning current events and fast changing information distributed annually since 1997 *''NE:s Sverigeatlas'', an atlas of

Sweden Sweden, formally the Kingdom of Sweden,The United Nations Group of Experts on Geographical Names states that the country's formal name is the Kingdom of SwedenUNGEGN World Geographical Names, Sweden./ref> is a Nordic country located on ...

(1998) *''NE:s Världsatlas'', a world atlas (1998) *''NE-spelet'', a quiz game with 8,000 questions (1999) In 1997, the first

digital Digital usually refers to something using discrete digits, often binary digits. Technology and computing Hardware *Digital electronics, electronic circuits which operate using digital signals **Digital camera, which captures and stores digital i ...

form of the encyclopedia was released on six

CD-ROM A CD-ROM (, compact disc read-only memory) is a type of read-only memory consisting of a pre-pressed optical compact disc that contains data. Computers can read—but not write or erase—CD-ROMs. Some CDs, called enhanced CDs, hold both comput ...

s (later on

DVD The DVD (common abbreviation for Digital Video Disc or Digital Versatile Disc) is a digital optical disc data storage format. It was invented and developed in 1995 and first released on November 1, 1996, in Japan. The medium can store any kin ...

as well), and in 2000 as an

subscription The subscription business model is a business model in which a customer must pay a recurring price at regular intervals for access to a product or service. The model was pioneered by publishers of books and periodicals in the 17th century, and ...

service. The online version contains the dictionary as well as an updated version of the original encyclopedia. It has 356,000 entries, 183,000 of which are encyclopedic articles. The service has been completed with several features not available in the printed version, such as a Swedish–English dictionary. After a decision to remove the authors' names from the

byline The byline (or by-line in British English) on a newspaper or magazine article gives the name of the writer of the article. Bylines are commonly placed between the headline and the text of the article, although some magazines (notably ''Reader's D ...

of online articles, ''SVT'' reported the encyclopedia may be forced to remove thousands of articles due to copyright infringement unless the authors' names are added back.

References

{{Reflist

External links

''Nationalencyklopedin''
- Official site (in Swedish)

- Christofer Psilander's comprehensive bibliography on Swedish encyclopedias Swedish encyclopedias National encyclopedias Swedish online encyclopedias 1989 non-fiction books 20th-century encyclopedias 21st-century encyclopedias

History

See also

References

External links