Search

The paper focuses on guiding devices in print monolingual dictionaries for learners of English. It aims to find answers to six research questions. The main aim is to investigate how the location of guiding devices within entries — starting from a new line versus run-on — affects consultation time and sense selection accuracy of dictionary users in entry navigation. In addition, the paper looks at the effect that part of speech (noun versus verb entries) has on consultation time and sense selection accuracy; further, the relationship between entry length and consultation time is investigated, as well as that between consultation time and sense selection accuracy.

We use modern eye-tracking technology to scrutinize the process of sense and equivalent selection in polysemous bilingual entries. Our study subjects, intermediate and advanced Polish learners of English, consulted 26 Polish-to-English dictionary pages prompted with a sentence translation task. Throughout the task, an eye-tracking device unobtrusively recorded their gaze patterns, which are analyzed and discussed. Both successful and unsuccessful searches are examined. Also, we assess the potential of eye-tracking technology in the study of dic­tionary use.

Multi-word lexical units, such as compounds and idioms, are often problematic for lexicographers. Dictionaries are traditionally organized around single orthographic words, and so the question arises of where to place such complex lexical units. The user-friendly answer would be to include them primarily under the word which users are most likely to look up. But how do we know which words are likely to be looked up? The present study addresses this question by examining the roles of part of speech, word frequency, and word position in guiding the decisions of Polish learners of English as to which component word of a multi-word expression to look up in the dictionary. The degree of word frequency is found to be the strongest predictor, with less frequent words having a significantly greater chance of being selected for consultation. Then there is an independent part of speech-related preference for nouns, with adjectives being second, followed by verbs in third place. Words belonging to the remaining syntactic categories (adverbs, prepositions, conjunctions, determiners, and pronouns) are hardly looked up at all. However, word placement within the multi-word expression does not seem to matter much. This study has implications for dictionary makers in considering how to list multi-word-expressions.

ABSTRACT: One finding of user studies is that information on meaning tends to be what dictionary users want most from their dictionaries. This is consistent with the traditional image of the dictionary as a repository of meanings of words, and this is also borne out in definitions of the item DICTIONARY itself as given in dictionaries. While this popular view has not changed much, the growing role of electronic dictionaries can change the lexicographers' approach to meaning representation. Traditionally, paper dictionaries have explained words with words, using either a definition or an equivalent, and occasionally a line-drawn picture. However, a prominent feature of the electronic medium is its multimodality, and this offers potential for the description of meaning. While it is much easier to include pictorial content, electronic dictionaries can also hold media objects which paper cannot carry, such as audio, animation or video. Publishers are drawn by the attraction of these new options, but are they always functionally useful for the dictionary users? In this article, the existing evidence is examined, and informed guesses are offered where evidence is not yet available.OPSOMMING: Multimodale leksikografie: Die voorstelling van betekenis in elektroniese woordeboeke. Een bevinding van gebruikerstudies is dat inligting oor betekenis dit blyk te wees wat woordeboekgebruikers die meeste van hul woordeboeke verlang. Dit is in ooreenstemming met die tradisionele beeld van die woordeboek as 'n bewaarplek van die betekenisse van woorde, en dit word ook bevestig deur die definisies van die item WOORDEBOEK self soos aangebied in woordeboeke. Terwyl hierdie populêre siening nie veel verander het nie, kan die toenemende rol van elektroniese woordeboeke leksikograwe se benadering tot betekenisvoorstelling verander. Tradisioneel het papierwoordeboeke woorde met woorde verduidelik deur óf 'n definisie, óf 'n ekwivalent te gebruik, en soms 'n lyngetekende illustrasie. 'n Opvallende kenmerk van die elektroniese medium is sy multimodaliteit, en dit bied 'n moontlikheid vir die beskrywing van betekenis. Terwyl dit baie makliker is om illustratiewe inhoud in te sluit, kan elektroniese woordeboeke ook mediaobjekte bevat wat papier nie kan oordra nie, soos oudio, animasie en video. Uitgewers word aangetrek deur hierdie nuwe keuses, maar is hulle altyd funksioneel nuttig vir die woordeboekgebruikers? In hierdie artikel word bestaande getuienis ondersoek en ingeligte raaiskote aangebied waar getuienis nog nie beskikbaar is nie.Sleutelwoorde: ELEKTRONIESE WOORDEBOEK, BETEKENIS, ILLUSTRASIE, ANIMASIE, OUDIO, KLANKEFFEKTE, VIDEO, MULTIMODALITEIT, GESPESIALISEERDE LEKSIKOGRAFIE, AANLEERDERSWOORDEBOEK

A Way with Words is a Festschrift volume to honour the 70th birthday of Patrick Hanks. The volume is attractively printed on thick, good quality paper, hardbound in cloth and supplied with a cover sleeve (which, I admit in shame, I have a habit of throwing away, but this one has an adorable portrait of Patrick which can be enjoyed quite independently of the book). The title on the cover is rendered in golden letters, perhaps a hint at the level of contribution the dedicatee has made to the study and description of meaning.