Kerry Maxwell
Word of the Week/BuzzWord author, and MED Magazine contributor
Kerry Maxwell has a first degree in computational linguistics and an MA in theoretical linguistics from the University of Manchester, specialising in syntactic theory.
For several years she worked as a researcher at Manchester and Essex universities, where in connection with European projects on machine translation, she was involved in computational lexicography, co-ordinating research in computational descriptions of compounds and collocations, and presenting her work in various international academic contexts.
In 1993 she joined Cambridge University Press as a lexicographer/editor and grammar consultant, and worked on a large number of Cambridge learner's dictionaries, including the English Pronouncing Dictionary, the Cambridge International Dictionary of Phrasal Verbs and the Cambridge Learner's Dictionary in print and CD-ROM versions.
In 2001, Kerry moved to York where she currently works as a freelance writer / editor / lexicographer and is involved in a range of dictionary and grammar projects.
Among the publications she has contributed to are Advanced Grammar In Use (2nd Ed.) and the Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary for Cambridge University Press, the Cobuild Elementary English Grammar (2nd Ed.) for Collins, Best Practice - Intermediate for Thomson Heinle, and for Macmillan Education: Macmillan Phrasal Verbs Plus, Macmillan Schools Dictionary, Macmillan Diccionario Pocket and MED CD-ROM (2nd Ed.). As well as being the regular author of the MED website's 'Word of the Week' column, she regularly writes for MED Magazine and co-authors grammar reference material for OneStopEnglish. She is the author of a book on new words in English, Brave New Words, which has recently been published by Pan Macmillan.
Most of her spare time is spent looking after her two sons Tom and Sam, though she enjoys walking, swimming and any opportunity to travel.