Readability of the Dictionary Readability and Some Suggestions From Me.

As a learner student of English, I wish the dictionaries published could can be more readable easier.   After all, the purpose we learners students buy a dictionary is to understand and know the meaning of words they do not know. the language better.

I found the wording in Some dictionaries is simply too have a complicated and hard to understand explanations. be understood. For example, I cite the definition of the word "recourse" by found in Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary:

"the fact of having to, or being able to, use something that can provide help in a difficult situation."

I do not know if this definition is fine for native speakers. However, for a learner like myself, me, I do find it hard to be this definition is difficult to deciphered and understood understand. 1

For the same word, the explanation from Vocabulary.com is much better:

"Recourse is a source of help. If you're failing trigonometry in spite of studying until your brain hurts, you may have no recourse but to hire a tutor.

Recourse comes from the Latin word "recursus", meaning “to run back or retreat.” People seek recourse from such difficulties such as debt, illness and legal woes.  Therefore so you can think of "recourse" as the words "retreating from such "cursus" of life.  curses" squished together. For the record, though, the "cursus" in "recursus" means course, not curse. Actually, no one knows where the word curse comes from. There may be Perhaps there is some connection between cursus and curses, but then again, we never know for sure. there may not be.

DEFINITIONS OF:
recourse
1
n act of turning to for assistance
n something or someone turned to for assistance or security

The definition from Collins COBUILD Advanced Dictionary for the word "recourse" is also much better:
"If you achieve something without recourse to a particular course of action, you succeed without carrying out that action. To have recourse to a particular course of action means to have to do that action in order to achieve something."

Therefore, I strongly suggest that every learner of English should possesses at least two paper dictionaries ,

My suggestion, have to hardcopy dictionaries for different levels, a thesaurus and also an idioms dictionary. I would like to recommend dictionaries published by the Oxford University Press. Although even though the wording is somewhat "formal" and harder for a beginner. , It is much more comprehensive. Dictionaries published by Harper Collins Publishers are good options for beginners, albeit it is not as comprehensive as the said dictionaries.  For thesaurus, it is used when you cannot understand a word easily  well. You can use it to find other synonyms of the word and associate the word with the synonyms to get a better "concept" feel of the word.

The only hardcopy of a dictionary I have is the giant tome of the "Random House Unabridged Dictionary".  It is the remnant from a different age.  Nowadays, I used electronic dictionaries because it is much easier to use and search.  Dictionaries are like teachers from a primary school, a secondary school and college.  The audience is totally different.  Hence so many different publications.  However, in the end, for a definitive answer, all go back to the OED.

1.  Precisely and concise definition.  A dictionary with a title with the word "Advanced" in it does not mean the dictionary is more advanced than other dictionaries.  It means for the person who is using it has an advance grasp of the language.  It is also a marketing ploy to make you think your command of the language is advance and so you buy it.  There are many different kinds of dictionaries for different levels of people.  You don't expect a child to use the OED.  There are dictionaries for college kids, for professors and believe it or not, for lawyers!  On on side note, how many of us can read a legal document well?

level*, my bad.............................................

Oxford University Press in English field is just like Vogue magazine in fashion aspect, they are, somehow, the leader or at least someone whose responsibility is to keep English/ fashion standardization. Beside the use of helping English learners undertand, their dictionary is also made to maintain the most proper meaning of an English word, so u might have some comprehension with these situations. btw, what do u expect in a "Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary" ? It's in advanced lavel, of cuz, lol.