Prof. Dr Hab. Nicole Nau, Uam 2018
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LEXICOGRAPHY PROF. DR HAB. NICOLE NAU, UAM 2018 FIRST LECTURE, 1 MARCH 2018 o Some basic questions o What is lexicography? o What is a dictionary? o Types of dictionaries – a first attempt o Some topics in dictionary research LEXICOGRAPHY «Lexicography is a growing field, with a practical branch (dictionary making) and a theoretical branch (dictionary research).» (Hartmann 2001) Bergenholtz & Gouws (2012): «There are two types of lexicography: 1. The development of theories about and the conceptualization of dictionaries, specifically with regard to the function, the structure and the contents of dictionaries. This part of lexicography is known as metalexicography or theoretical lexicography. 2. The planning and compilation of concrete dictionaries. This part of lexicography is known as practical lexicography or the lexicographic practice.» QUESTIONS ABOUT LEXICOGRAPHY ➢ What is the relation between practical and theoretical lexicography? ➢ Is theoretical lexicography a theory about making dictionaries? ➢ What is the relation between lexicography and other disciplines? ➢ Who does «metalexicography» and to what end? IS THERE A THEORY OF MAKING DICTIONARIES? «This is not a book about ‘theoretical lexicography’ – for the very good reason that we do not believe that such a thing exist.» (Atkins & Rundell 2008) «Different approaches prevail, ranging from Atkins and Rundell […] to lexicographers who firmly believe in a lexicographic theory, cf. Wiegand (1989), Bergenholtz and Tarp (2003), Gouws (2011), Tarp (2012).» (Bergenholtz & Gouws 2012) IS THERE THEORY IN DICTIONARY MAKING? «Is one to conclude — right away — that lexicography is not an exact science, that there are no theories that govern it? Not at all: About every page of OGPL [= Atkins & Rundell 2008] reconfirms both the highly scientific nature of the lexicographic enterprise and the need for strong theoretical underpinnings. Theories evolve, users become ever more demanding, the types of dictionaries spiral outward. Variation and continual improvement, therefore, are inherent.» (de Schryver 2008) TO WHICH DISCIPLINES IS LEXICOGRAPHY RELATED? HOW? Our library system: 2.4. Semantics 2.4.1 Lexicography with lexicology and phraseology *** «As a linguistic discipline, lexicography has rather paradoxical nature. On the one hand, almost everybody will agree to classify lexicography as a form of applied linguistics, but on the other hand, it is virtually impossible to give an adequate reply to the question what linguistic theory lexicography might be an application of.» «Lexicography, often misconceived as a branch of linguistics, is sui generis, a field whose endeavours are informed by the theories and practices of information science, literature, publishing, philosophy, and historical, comparative, and applied linguistics. Sister disciplines, such as terminology, lexicology, encyclopedia work, bibliography, terminography, indexing, information technology, librarianship, media studies, translation and teaching, as well as the neighbouring disciplines of history, education and anthropology, provide the wider setting within which lexicographers have defined and developed their field.» (Hartmann & James, Dictionary of lexicography) TWO CLASSICS IN LEXICOGRAPHY Samuel Johnson (1709-1784) The plan of an English dictionary (1747) https://andromeda.rutgers.edu/~jlynch/Texts/plan.html Ladislav Zgusta (1924-2007) Manual of Lexicography, (in cooperation with V. Černý, Z. Heřmanová- Novotná, D. Heroldová and others), The Hague 1971. in Poland: Witold Doroszewski (1899-1976) LEXICOGRAPHY AS A GROWING FIELD Organizations EURALEX European Association for Lexicography https://euralex.org/ ASIALEX, AFRILEX, AUSTRALEX … GLOBALEX Journals, Conferences … (see links at euralex.org) MA programs (for example, https://www.emlex.phil.fau.eu/), summer schools (https://lexicom.courses/), research centers (http://cc.au.dk/en/research/research- centres/centreforlexicography/centreprofile/) … WHAT IS A DICTIONARY? WHAT IS A (PROTO)TYPICAL DICTIONARY? Johnson 1755 Di’ctionary. n.s. [dictionarium, Latin.] A book containing the words of any language in alphabetical order, with explanations of their meaning; Today: • not only books • not always in alphabetical order • not only and not always explaining meaning • not only words (and usually not «the words») DEFINITION OF «DICTIONARY» ON DICTIONARY.COM «a book, optical disc, mobile device, or online lexical resource (such as Dictionary.com) containing a selection of the words of a language, giving information about their meanings, pronunciations, etymologies, inflected forms, derived forms, etc., expressed in either the same or another language;» http://www.dictionary.com/browse/dictionary HOW DOES A TYPICAL DICTIONARY LOOK LIKE FOR YOU? B. T. S. ATKINS IN 1992 – ONLY 25 YEARS AGO «Much is written nowadays in artificial intelligence circles about electronic dictionaries, but almost the whole of dictionary production still consists of books—and I know no publisher who sees an imminent profitable market for custom-built electronic dictionaries. The electronic dictionaries that exist today all started life as books, with the tiny exception of lexicons built expressly for a computer. To my knowledge, apart from the Japanese EDR Electronic Dictionaries, none of these is even as big as a small pocket dictionary. Books are the focus of professional lexicography, and the dictionaries discussed, reviewed, praised, or criticized are books.» Hartmann & James, Dictionary of lexicography (1998) Dictionary: A type of REFERENCE WORK which explains the meanings of the words and phrases by DEFINITIONS. The prototype of this dictionary is the monolingual alphabetical GENERAL DICTIONARY. Reference work: Any product, such as a published book or a computer software, that allows humans to store and retrieve INFORMATION relatively easily and rapidly. The DICTIONARY is the prototypical ‘reference book’, as it provides structural linguistic and/or encyclopedic information by means of a generally known access system (such as an ALPHABET). REFERENCE SCIENCE (HARTMANN & JAMES1998) „A cover term for the complex of activities concerned with the design, compilation, use and evaluation of all types of REFERENCE WORKS. There is as yet no unified framework for such an interdisciplinary field, but a strong case can be made for broadening the perspectives of LEXICOGRAPHY and TERMINOLOGY, and considering works other than dictionaries (such as ATLASES, CATALOGUES, DIRECTORIES, ENCYCLOPEDIAS and TERMINOLOGICAL DATABASES) together. What unites them is the basic human reference need for INFORMATION, linguistic as well as factual, and the possibilities of INFORMATION TECHNOLOGY, above all the computer, which are likely to produce new MULTIMEDIA reference formats in the future. => INTERNET” HARTMANN (2001) (Reference Science) (Non-lexicographic Reference Works: Directory, Atlas, Other) Dictionary Research Metalexicography Lexicographic Reference Works Dictionary, Thesaurus, Encyclopeadia DICTIONARY VS. ENCYCLOPAEDIA? «A dictionary is a reference book about words. It is a book about language. Its nearest cousin is the encyclopedia, but this is a book about things, people, places and ideas, a book about the ‘real world’, not about language. The distinction between dictionary and encyclopedia is not always easy to draw, and there are often elements of one in the other. But they do not share the same headword list – you would be unlikely to find resemble in an encyclopedia – and they do not provide the same information for the headwords that they do have in common.» (Jackson 2002) WHAT ARE DICTIONARIES MADE FOR? «Dictionaries are reference books. People consult them to find out information about words. We must assume that compilers of dictionaries – lexicographers – include information that they know or expect people will want to look up. What we cannot assume, however, is that lexicographers will exclude information that they might expect users will not want to look up. A dictionary is more than just a reference book; it is also a (partial) record of the vocabulary of a language. Any dictionary contains entries and information that few, if any, users will want to access, either because they know it already, or because it is of no interest to them.» (Jackson 2002) DICTIONARIES AS RECORDS OF A LANGUAGE «Was ist eines wörterbuchs zweck? nach seiner umfassenden allgemeinheit kann ihm nur ein groszes, weites ziel gesteckt sein. Es soll ein heiligthum der sprache gründen, ihren ganzen schatz bewahren, allen zu ihm den eingang offen halten. das niedergelegte gut wächst wie die wabe und wird ein hehres denkmal des volks, dessen vergangenheit und gegenwart in ihm sich verknüpfen.» (Jakob Grimm,Vorwort http://woerterbuchnetz.de/cgi-bin/WBNetz/wbgui_py?sigle=DWB&mainmode=Vorworte&file=vor01_html#abs3) «What is the purpose of a dictionary? According to its comprehensive generality, it can have but a large, wide aim. It shall found a sanctuary of the language, enshrine its whole treasure, keep the entrance open for everyone. The deposited good will grow like a comb and will become a noble monument of the people whose past and present are tied together in it.» CLASS ORGANIZATION Website: http://elldo.amu.edu.pl/?page_id=753 Password for the Texts & Tasks page: Sanakirjat Ideas for projects? Homework: • read Chapter 2 of Atkins & Rundell (2008) • prepare a short presentation of a dictionary, based on the properties given on p. 24-25 of that chapter..