2. Dictionary: notion, functions, classification, components

If we speak about the dictionary as a linguistic term, it is a list of words with their definitions, a list of characters, or a list of words with corresponding words in other languages. Many dictionaries also provide pronunciation information; grammatical information; word derivations, histories, or etymologies; illustrations; usage guidance; and examples in phrases or sentences. Dictionaries are most commonly found in the form of a book, but more and more dictionaries are produced as software runs from electronic PDA or a general purpose computer. Most dictionaries are produced by lexicographers.

Since words and their meanings develop over time, dictionary entries are organized to reflect these changes. Dictionaries may either list meanings in the historical order in which they appeared, or may list meanings in order of popularity and most common use.

Dictionaries also differ in the degree to which they are encyclopedic, providing considerable background information, illustrations, and the like, or linguistic, concentrating on etymology, nuances of meaning, and quotations demonstrating usage.

Any dictionary has been designed to fulfill one or more functions. The dictionary functions chosen by the maker(s) of the dictionary provide the basis for all lexicographic decisions, from the selection of entry words, over the choice of information types, to the choice of place for the information (e.g. in an article or in an appendix). There are two main types of function. The communication-oriented functions comprise text reception (understanding), text production, text revision, and translation. The knowledge-oriented functions deal with situations where the dictionary is used for acquiring specific knowledge about a particular matter, and for acquiring general knowledge about something. The optimal dictionary is one that contains information directly relevant for the needs of the users relating to one or more of these functions. It is important that the information is presented in a way that keeps the lexicographic information costs at a minimum.

All dictionaries are divided into linguistic and encyclopedic.

Encyclopedic dictionaries describe different objects, phenomena and people and give some information about them.

Linguistic dictionaries describe vocabulary units, their semantic structure, their origin and their usage; words are usually given in the alphabetical order.

Linguistic dictionaries are divided into general and specialized dictionaries.

General dictionaries include explanatory (monolingual) and translation (bilingual) dictionaries.

In explanatory (monolingual) dictionaries the entry consists of the spelling, transcription, grammatical forms, meanings, examples, phraseology.

Translation (bilingual) dictionaries give words and their equivalents in the other language.

Specialized dictionaries include dictionaries of synonyms, antonyms, collocations, word frequency, slang, neologisms; etymological, pronouncing, phraseological and other dictionaries.

Specialized dictionaries (also technical dictionaries) focus on linguistic and factual matters relating to specific subject fields. A specialized dictionary may have a relatively broad coverage, e.g. a picture dictionary, in that it covers several subject fields such as science and technology (a multi-field dictionary), or their coverage may be more narrow, in that they cover one particular subject field such as law (a single-field dictionary) or even a specific sub-field such as contract law (a sub-field dictionary). Specialized dictionaries may be maximizing dictionaries, i.e. they attempt to achieve comprehensive coverage of the terms in the subject field concerned, or they may be minimizing dictionaries, i.e. they attempt to cover only a limited number of the specialized vocabulary concerned. Generally, multi-field dictionaries tend to be minimizing, whereas single-field and sub-field dictionaries tend to be maximizing.

Phraseological dictionaries describe idioms, colloquial phrases and proverbs. Some of them have examples from literature.

Etymological dictionaries trace present-day words to the oldest forms of these words and forms of these words in other languages.

Pronouncing dictionaries record only pronunciation.

Dictionaries of neologisms contain newly appearing words.

Anybody learning a foreign language knows the value of a good dictionary.

We all know how useful a bilingual dictionary can be in providing a quick translation for something when we don't know a simple concrete word which translates easily. On the other hand a good well-organized monolingual dictionary can help a lot.

Let's begin by looking at meaning. You know that one word can have a whole range of different meanings, some of them very similar to each other and some completely different. Which definition should you choose? Well, the first way in which a dictionary can help is by listing meanings so that the most common or frequent comes first, and at least common comes last. A good dictionary will also provide example sentences for each of the different meanings; it can solve a lot of problems if you can see how the word is actually used in a sentence.

The example sentence should also help with understanding the way the word combines with other words in a sentence. For example, you can't really use a verb unless you know that it should be followed by a gerund or an infinitive or «that» clause or whatever.

Another important thing is the use of certain preposition after some adjectives which a dictionary will prompt to you. Besides, dictionaries give examples of common compounds and phrases which include the word you've looked up.

The example sentences can give you quite a lot of information about the grammar of the word you're interested in; but it isn't the only way in which a dictionary provides grammatical information. A dictionary will indicate to what word class a word belongs. A well-thought-out dictionary will also have a system of abbreviations or symbols to tell you, for example, whether a noun is countable, whether a verb is transitive or intransitive and so on. You won't be able to use a word correctly in a sentence unless you know the answers to such questions.

English is famous for its unpredictable spellings and a dictionary is obviously going to be very useful here. A dictionary will tell you whether this spelling is British or American. You can even find out whether a verb has an irregular past tense or whether an adjective has an irregular comparative form.

The phonetic alphabet is used in dictionaries to tell you about the pronunciation of a word, and a special indication will help you get the stress in the right place.

List of major English dictionaries:

The Penguin English Dictionary

Merriam-Webster Dictionary

Webster's Third New International Dictionary (descriptive)

Random House Dictionary of the English Language

The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language

Webster's New World Dictionary

Oxford English Dictionary (descriptive)

Concise Oxford Dictionary

New Oxford Dictionary of English

New Oxford American Dictionary

Canadian Oxford Dictionary

ITP Nelson Canadian Dictionary

Webster's New Universal Unabridged Dictionary Samuel Johnson's A Dictionary of the English Language (prescriptive)

Noah Webster's An American Dictionary of the English Language (prescriptive)

The Century Dictionary

Brewer's Dictionary of Phrase and Fable

Macquarie Dictionary, The, a dictionary of Australian English

Chambers Dictionary

Collins COBUILD

Collins English Dictionary

Gage Canadian Dictionary

Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English

Black's Law Dictionary, a law dictionary

3. The characteristics of Macmillan English Dictionary for Advanced Learners

The Macmillan English Dictionary for Advanced Learners was conceived, compiled and edited by the Reference and Electronic Media Division of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc. Managing editor is Michael Mayor. The Dictionary was printed and bound in Malaysia in 2002.

The Dictionary includes words on the basis of their use in the language today. Some words are identified as being trademarks or service marks. Neither the presence nor absence of such identification in this Dictionary is to be regarded as affecting in any way, or expressing a judgement on, the validity or legal status of any trademark, service mark, or other proprietary rights anywhere in the world.

The definitions in the Macmillan English Dictionary have been based on information derived from 200 million words of English which make up the World English Corpus.

The Macmillan English Dictionary for Advanced Learners is a linguistic dictionary because it describes vocabulary units, their semantic structure, their origin and their usage; words are given in the alphabetical order.

It is a general, explanatory (monolingual) dictionary. The entry consists of the spelling, transcription, grammatical forms, meanings, examples, phraseology.

As for the components or the structure of this Dictionary it's the following:

Except of all the components of this Dictionary we can also single out such elements as: Language Awareness( the information about numbers, phrasal verbs, Academic English, metaphor, computer words, pragmatics, spoken discourse, sensitivity, British and American English, Business English and word formation) and different illustrations on various topics: House, Kitchen, Office, Clothes and patterns, Motorway and Types of vehicle, Transport, Car, Trees, plants and flowers, Fruit, Vegetables, Animals, Sports, Gym and Games.

Ending

In this work we succeeded in achievement of all the aims that we had had at the beginning of our investigation: to study the history of lexicography and its modern development, to make out the dictionary its notion, functions, classification and components, to characterize the Macmillan English Dictionary for Advanced Learners as an example of a dictionary of good quality. So we proved the importance of dictionary-making in modern linguistics.

So General lexicography focuses on the design, compilation, use and evaluation of general dictionaries, i.e. dictionaries that provide a description of the language in general use. In other words it is the art and craft of writing dictionaries.

So we can't imagine our studying or work without lexicography because any pupil, student and even experienced teacher whose activity is closely connected with studying or teaching a language constantly needs a good dictionary which can always help at any time.

The material of this report can be used by anybody who is interested in lexicography as a science and wants to know more about dictionary-making itself.

List of used literature

1. David Crystal, The Cambridge Encyclopedia of the English Language (Second Edition) - Cambridge University Press, 2003.

2. Weiner E.S.C., The Oxford Miniguide to English Usage - OUP, 1987.

3. Lyons J., New Horizons in Linguistics - Lnd., 1970.

4. Longman Essential Activator, 1997.

5. Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, 1996.

6. Arnold I.V., English Word - Moscow, 1973.

7. Benson M, Benson E, The BBI Combinatory Dictionary of English Language - Amsterdam, 1986.

8. Borisova L.M., Fomenko O.V., Introduction to English Philology - Kolomna, 2004.

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