William Quinby De Funiak (November 16, 1901 – November 2, 1981) was an American writer and law academic who wrote what was probably the first systematic American-British, British-American dictionary: ''American-British, British-American Dictionary With Helpful Hints for Travelers''. It was published in the 1960s. He was born in Alabama and traveled abroad to lecture and study and visited Britain a good deal. He noted the linguistic differences between

American English American English, sometimes called United States English or U.S. English, is the set of varieties of the English language native to the United States. English is the most widely spoken language in the United States and in most circumstances i ...

and

British English British English (BrE, en-GB, or BE) is, according to Lexico, Oxford Dictionaries, "English language, English as used in Great Britain, as distinct from that used elsewhere". More narrowly, it can refer specifically to the English language in ...

and decided to produce a detailed glossary to aid the "two peoples separated by a common language" (as

George Bernard Shaw George Bernard Shaw (26 July 1856 – 2 November 1950), known at his insistence simply as Bernard Shaw, was an Irish playwright, critic, polemicist and political activist. His influence on Western theatre, culture and politics extended from ...

put it). As a regular traveler, De Funiak focused particularly on the needs of the business traveler such as transport, food, lodging and entertainment. The dictionary was last reprinted in 1978 and is still available, though the advice for travelers is now somewhat out of date. He died in

Santa Cruz, California Santa Cruz ( Spanish for "Holy Cross") is the county seat and largest city of Santa Cruz County, in Northern California. As of the 2020 census, the city population was 62,956. Situated on the northern edge of Monterey Bay, Santa Cruz is a po ...

in 1981, at age 79.

Selected works

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References

American legal writers American lexicographers 1901 births 1981 deaths 20th-century American non-fiction writers 20th-century lexicographers {{US-nonfiction-writer-stub