LEXICOGRAPHY AS A TOOL AND THE

RESULT OF LEXICOLOGICAL STUDIES

 PROBLEMS FOR DISCUSSION
 
1.History of Lexicography:
a) the history of British Lexicography;
b) the history of American Lexicography.
2.The main problems in lexicography.
3.Types of dictionaries.
 
Lexicography
• Lexicon has two different meanings:
1. All the vocabulary of a language
2. The dictionary

The English suffix -graphy means either "writing" or a

"field of study“

• Lexicography is used in two different senses:

* Practical lexicography is the art or craft of writing
dictionaries.
* Theoretical lexicography is the theory or scholarly
discipline of analyzing and describing dictionaries.
Historical development of English lex
icography
 
• 1755 – the first big explanatory dictionary by
Dr Samuel Johnson "A Dictionary of the
English Language”
• words were illustrated by examples from
English literature
• pronunciation was not included
• helped to preserve the English spelling in its
conservative form
 The Golden Age of English lexicography
The Oxford English Dictionary (OED)
began in the last quarter of the 19th century when the English Philological Society started work
on compiling
New English Dictionary on Historical Principles (NED). It is still referred to as either OED or
NED.
The objective of this is to trace the development of English words from their form in Old
English
 The English of G.Chaucer, of the "Bible" and of W. Shakespeare is given as
much attention as that of the most modern authors.
 The dictionary includes spellings, pronunciations and detailed etymologies.
 The completion of the work required more than 75 years.
 The result is a kind of encyclopaedia of language used not only for reference
purposes but also as a basis for lexicological research.
 The First part of the Dictionary appeared in 1884 and the last in 1928.
 Later it was issued in twelve volumes and in order to hold new words a three
volume Supplement was issued in 1933.
 These volumes were revised in the seventies. Nearly all the material of the
original Supplement was retained and a large body of the most recent accessions
to the English language added.
• A still shorter form is The Pocket Oxford Dictionary.
The latest edition of OED was undertaken in 1905.
• The new enlarged version was issued in 22 volumes
1994.
• Two Russian borrowings glasnost and perestroika were
included in it. This publication was followed by a two
volume Supplement to hold new words.
• With this target in view W.W. Skeat, famous for his
"Etymological English Dictionary" founded the
English Dialect Society in 1873.
• Dialects are of great importance for the historical
study of the language. In the 19th century they were
very pronounced though now they are almost
disappearing.
• The Society existed till 1896 and issued 80
publications.
 The main problems in lexicography.
1)the selection of lexical units for inclusion;
2)the arrangement of the selected lexical
units;
3) the setting of the entry;
4)the selection and arrangement of word-
meanings;
5)the definition of meanings;
6) the illustrative material.
(1)The selection of lexical units for inclusion.
It is necessary to decide:
a) what types of lexical units will be chosen for
the inclusion;
b) the number of these items;
c) what to select and what to leave out in the
dictionary;
d) which form of the language, spoken or written
or both, the dictionary is to reflect;
e) whether the dictionary should contain obsolete
units, technical terms, dialectisms,
colloquialisms, and some others.
The Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English
(second edition. 1987), dictionary
• contains around 56,000 words and phrases,
• including scientific and technical language,
• business and computer terms,
• literary words, and informal and idiomatic
usage.
• It covers both the major varieties, American
and British English, in particular.
(2) The arrangement of the selected lexical units.
There are two modes of presentation of entries,
the alphabetical order and the cluster-type
(3) The setting of the entry .
• entry usually presents the following data:
• accepted spelling and pronunciation;
• grammatical characteristics including the indication of the part of
speech of each entry word, whether nouns are countable or
uncountable,
• the transitivity/intransitivity of verbs and irregular grammatical
forms;
• definitions of meaning; modern currency;
• illustrative examples;
• derivatives;
• phraseology;
• etymology;
• sometimes synonyms and antonyms.
Compare the setting of the entries in the Macmillan English Dictionary for Advanced
Learners (1) and the Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English (2):
(1) excel / iksel / verb [intransitive]
to do something extremely well:
We aim to give every student the opportunity to excel.
excel in/at: Robbie had always excelled at sport.
excel yourself
1to do something much better than you usually do
2HUMOROUS used when someone has in fact done even worse than they usually do
(2) Excel verb
past tense and past participleexcelled,present participle excelling
1 [intransitive, not in progressive] to do something very well, or much better than most people
excel at/in
Rick has always excelled at foreign languages.
2 excel yourself British Englishto do something better than you usually do:
Graham has excelled himself with the new exhibition.
(4) The selection and arrangement of word-meanings.
a) in the historical order, i.e. in the
sequence of their historical
development;

b) in the empirical or actual order,

i.e. in conformity with their
frequency of use, i.e. with the
most common meaning first;

c) in the logical order, i.e.

according to their logical
connection
 (5) The definition of meanings.

a) by means of linguistic definitions that are only

concerned with words as speech material

b) by means of encyclopedic definitions that

are concerned with things for which the
words are names;

c) by means of synonymous words

and expressions;

d) by means of cross-
references.
(6) The illustrative material.
 Types of dictionaries
Encyclopedic dictionary Linguistic dictionary

Unilingual or Multilingual
The Encyclopedia Bilingual or
explanatory or comparative
Americana Translation
The Encyclopedia
Britannica

Diacronic Synchronic Special

General
dictionary dictionary dictionary
dictionary

Frequency Rhyming Technical Ph. U Synonyms

dictionary dictionary dictionary dictionary dictionary

Machine translation dictionary

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