LEXICOGRAPHY

1. Historical development of lexicography

2. The main types of modern dictionaries

3. Some of the main problems in lexicography

1. Historical development of lexicography

Lecicography is an important branch of applied linguistics which makes a study of compiling dictionaries. It has a common object of study with lexicology as both describe the vocabulary of a language. The essential difference between the two lies in the degree of systematization and completeness each of them is able to achieve. It aims at systematization revealing characteristic features of words. It cannot, however, claim any completeness as regards the units themselves, because the number of these units being very great, systematization and completeness couldn’t be achieved simultaneously. The province of lecicography, on the other hand, is the semantic, formal, and functional descripltion of all individual words. Lexicologists sort and present their material in a sequence depending upon their views concerning the vocabulary, whereas lecicographers have to arrange it most often according to a purely external characteristic, namely alphabetically. It goes without saying that these branches of linguistics couldn’t develop successfully without each other.Their relationship being essentially that of theory and practice dealing with the same objects of reality.

A need for a dictionary and glossary has been felt in the cultural growth of many civilized peoples at a fairly aerly period. The history of dictionary-making for the English language goes as far back as the Old English period where its first traces are found in the form of glosses of religious books with interlinear translation from Latin. Regular bilingual English-Latin dictionaries were already in existence in the 15^th century. The first unilingual English dictionary, explaining words by English equivalents, appeared in 1904. It was meant to explain difficult words occurring in books. Its title was “A Table Alphabeticall, containing and teaching the true writing and understanding of hard usuall English words borrowed from the Hebrew, Greeke, Latine or French”. The little volume of 120 pages explaining about 3000 words was compiled by Robert Cawdrey, a schoolmaster.

The first attempt at a dictionary including all the words of the language was made by Nathaniel Bailey who in 1721 published the first edition of his “Universal Etymological English Dictionary”. He was the first to include pronunciation and etymology.

The explanatory dictionary of the English language was published by Dr Samuel Jonson in 1755. The most important innovation of it was the introduction of illustrations of the meanings of the words “by examples from the best writers”. As to pronunciation, it wasn’t marked. Attention to it was turned later. The first pronouncing dictionary was published in 1780 by Thomas Sheridan.

The Golden Age of English lexicography began in the last quater of the 19^th century when the English Philological Society started work on compiling now known as the Oxford English Dictionary, originally named as “New English Dictionary on Historical Principles”. It is traced the development of English words from their form in Old English, the development of each meaning and its historical relation to other meanings of the same word. For words and meanings which have become obsolete the date of the latest occurrence is given. The first part of the Dictionary appeared in 1884 and the last in 1928. Another big dictionary was Joseph Wright’s English Dialect Dictionary.

2. The main types of modern dictionaries

The term dictionary is used to denote a book listing words of a language with their meanings and often with data regarding pronunciation, usage and/or origin. We can distinguish general and special ones. General dictionaries represent the vocabulary as a whole with a degree of completeness depending upon the scope and bulk of the book in question. Some general dictionaries may have very specific aims and are considered general due to their coverage. They include, for instance, frequency, rhyming, thesaurus dictionaries. General dictionaries may be further subdivided into:

a) pronouncing (phonetical) dictionaries – concentrate their attention upon the pronunciation of words. The best-known is “An English Pronouncing Dictionary” by Jones;

b) etymological dictionaries – state the origin of words (the source of borrowing, the origin of borrowing, all the subsequent changes in meaning and usage. Skeat’s Etymological Dictionary is believed to be one of the most widely used;

c) unilingual or explanatory dictionaries – give definitions of word meaning in the same language. They are further subdivided with regard to time. Diachronic dictionaries, of which the Oxford English Dictionary and Webster’s Dictionary of the English language are usually considered to be the most available and popular editions. They reflect the development of the English vocabulary by recording the history of form and meaning for every word registered. Some synchronic dictionaries are at the same time historical when they represent the state of vocabulary at some past stage of its development;

d) bilingual or translation dictionaries – represent the most ordinary, widespread type. They contain words and expressions of the native language and their foreign equivalents, or vice-versa;

e) multilingual or polyglot dictionaries – serve chiefly the purpose of comparing synonyms and terminology in various languages. They are not numerous, e.g. Carl Darling Buck’s Dictionary of Selected Synonyms in the Principal Indo-European Languages.

Special dictionaries may be further subdivided:

a) according to the sphere of human activity in which they are used (technical, medical, linguistic, economical dictionaties). Unilingual books of this type giving definitions of terms are called glossaries.

b) according to the specific language units, i.e. with phraseology, abbreviations, neologisms, borrowings, surnames, toponyms, proverbs and sayings, etc.

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