Lexicology Semantics And Lexicography

Including a selection of papers originally presented at the 10th International Conference on English Historical Linguistics, the contributions to this volume aim to show the breadth and depth of late-1990s studies in lexicology, semantics and lexicography.

From the contents: Maurizio GOTTI: The origin of 17th century canting terms. - Anne MCDERMOTT: Early dictionaries of English and historical corpora: in search of hard words. - Paivi KOIVISTO-ALANKO: Prototypes in semantic change: a diachronic perspective on abstract nouns. - Manuela ROMANO POZO: A morphodynamic interpretation of synonymy and polysemy in Old English."

This volume is a compilation of nine articles, translated from German. They deal with those lexicographic texts or text excerpts which have been formulated in order to convey the meaning of a lexical unit to a potential dictionary user who is not familiar with that meaning. The articles not only critically analyze lexicographic practice, in particular the so-called lexicographic definitions and the items giving the synonyms in correlation with the examples, in the light of different semantic approaches. They also present ways towards a common understanding in the context of lexicographically imparting knowledge of meaning, i.e. on the basis of an actional-semantics approach which takes into account results obtained from analyses of everyday dialogs about word meanings. Moreover, they discuss how meaning-conveying texts can serve their purposes in dictionary look-up situations, and they lay out all those aspects which are particularly to be taken into consideration in the formulation of lexicographic texts aimed at conveying meaning, in dictionaries belonging to different types.

This volume comprises essays in lexicography, lexicology and semantics by leading international experts in these fields. The contributions cover Old, Middle and Present-Day English and Scots, and specific subjects include medical vocabulary, colour lexemes, and semantic and pragmatic meaning in terms for politeness, money and humour. In the area of Old English studies there are articles on kinship terminology and colour lexemes, and in Middle English a semantic and syntactic study of the overlapping of the verbs dreden and douten. Many of the essays make use of the Historical Thesaurus of English project at the University of Glasgow, and pay tribute to its Director, Professor Christian Kay; e.g., one article demonstrates how the HTE, a project which is at the interface between historical semantics and lexicography, may present a rich resource for information about the lexicalization of concepts within our culture, such as changing social attitudes in the area of will, consent and coercion. Other resources, such as The Linguistic Atlas of Early Middle English, and the Oxford English Dictionary provide a rich source for information on historical lexicography, semantics and editing. A number of essays concern the Scots language, such as an analysis of evaluative terms in modern Scots speech and writing, the rich potential of rhyme in Scots, and the role of lexicon in th- fronting in Glaswegian.

While lexicology, lexical semantics, and lexicography all share an interest in lexical items, they often tend to be regarded as three separate albeit interrelated fields. Indeed, the extent to which the interrelationship is recognized and taken into account in lexicographic practice is the moot point. The conference which produced the papers offered in this volume was designed to bring their practioners together and thus gives an impetus to closer cooperation among them, It is the editors' conviction that the practical activity of lexicography should learn more from its sister fields. People working in lexicography, lexical semantics, etc. may find some of the insights arrived at in the more practically oriented descriptions pertinent and useful.

Outline of English Lexicology: Lexical Structure, Word Semantics and Word Formation.

Dictionaries are among the most frequently consulted books, yet we know remarkably little about them. Who makes them? Where do they come from? What do they offer? How can we evaluate them? The Dictionary of Lexicography provides answers to all these questions and addresses a wide range of issues: * the traditions of dictionary-making * the different types of dictionaries and other reference works (such as thesaurus, encyclopedia, atlas and telephone directory) * the principles and concerns of lexicographers and other reference professionals * the standards of dictionary criticism and dictionary use. It is both a professional handbook and an easy-to-use reference work. This is the first time that the subject has been covered in such a comprehensive manner in the form of a reference book. All articles are self-contained, cross-referenced and uniformly structured. The whole is an up-to-date and forward-looking survey of lexicography.