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Chapter 2: General Monolingual English Dictionaries

The purpose of this chapter The purpose of this chapter is to

introduce general-purpose monolingual English dictionaries and present their general features which make them useful for both language learners and translators.

Compiling general monolingual dictionaries started centuries ago for the purpose of protecting languages and preserving their purity.

Therefore, the compilers of these dictionaries were keen to include all the required information related to any word included in their manuscripts.

This task is now made a lot easier today by the modern technology used in compiling dictionaries.

The linguistic information: The linguistic information related to any

word spans a wide variety of linguistic aspects including pronunciation, syllabification, usage, and so on.

This wide range of information can only be provided in a monolingual dictionary.

All the different types of linguistic information can be found altogether in a monolingual dictionary.

Once the user is familiar with them in such a dictionary, it will be easy for him to recognize any kind of information in any other specialized dictionary.

The components of monolingual dictionaries:

A dictionary can be described in terms of its macrostructure and microstructure.

I) The macrostructure: The macrostructure is concerned

with the overall organization of the components of a dictionary including lexical entries and their microstructure.

The macrostructure level includes the following components:

1) Front matter: Front matter: provides a guide to the

use of the dictionary and gives a full description of every part of the dictionary: entry word, syllabification, pronunciation, inflected forms, various kinds of labels, cross-references, variants, etymology, synonyms and usage notes.

The guide helps the reader to interpret all the labels and symbols given in entries and provides clues for locating as quickly as possible particular items of information

A sample page is often printed with various parts of the entries bracketed and linked to captions that identify each part and refer to sections of the guide where the items are discussed.

They vary from one dictionary to another.

2) Back matter: Back matter contains various linguistic aids such

as:

Lists of irregular verbs, spelling guides, tables of ordinal and cardinal numbers, tables of weights and measures and punctuation guides.

Others include sections listing biographical and

geographical names, different practical guides to writing, (pronunciation, grammar, style), forms of address, signs and symbols, lists of abbreviations,

foreign words and phrases, and given names.

3) Middle matter: Middle matter is usually devoted to

grammatical information and sometimes consists of only illustrative graphs. Not many dictionaries have a middle matter.

4) Alphabetization: Alphabetization: entries or words are

arranged alphabetically, according to the 1st letter. When words begin with the same letter, they are arranged according to the second letter, and so on. This makes it easy to find a certain word fast and effortlessly. But in some dictionaries, like Roget's thesaurus, words are arranged conceptually.

5) Guide words:

The guide words are two words in bold put at the top of any page; the one on the left is the same first word on the same page, and the one on the right is the same last word on the same page.

Sometimes, the two words are not on the same page but rather on two opposite pages; one is put on the left top of the page on the left and the second guide word is put on the right top of the page on the right.

• In the following sample page you can see how words are arranged alphabetically. You can also see guide words (envious / epithet) and (epitome / ermine) typed in boldface at the top of each page.

Exercises: 1) Arrange the following words

alphabetically:

a) entity enteritis entertaining entrant entice entrance entreat entrap entrée entry entente entertain entangle entail

b) roadie rock road rage road tax road roam roar roadworks road atlas roadworthy road hog robust road map roadkill roadshow road sign road test roadhouse roadblock roadside roadway roadrunner road trip roach

2) What are the guide words for the following words:slow further argue

extent likely roundly

3) Which of the following words appear between the guide words "exterminate/extremely":

extern extremist extend extrinsic extinct externalize extent extricate extrovert extravert extra exterior extreme extort extravagant

II) The microstructure: The microstructure is concerned with

the structure of individual lexical entries, including types of lexical information and the way in which types of lexical information are organized. In any entry, at least three of the following elements appear:

1) Entry: consists of a headword and all the information provided about this word.

2) Sub-entry: is a word or a phrase derived from the main entry and included within the main entry. Some dictionaries treat all derived words as sub-entries under one main entry to save space. Derived forms may be listed as main entries in some dictionaries.

3) Headword: is the word that appears at the beginning of an entry, usually printed in boldface

Exercises: 1) How many entries do the

following headwords have in your dictionary?

fight make up bank base

2) Following are entries taken from two different dictionaries. Compare between them.

Look at your booklet

4. Orthographic information This relates to the written forms or

spellings of words. Variant spellings are given if words are spelled differently in different parts of the English-speaking world (online or on-line; medieval also mediaeval)

Exercises: 1) Which word has a variant

spelling? judge counseling advice tantalize sabre flavor traveling lurch defenceless aging judgment almanac Palaeozoic syphon encyclopedia reconnoitre

2) Decide whether the following are American or British spellings.

dehumanise esthetic marvellous color

5. Morphological information.

This kind of information includes three aspects in monolingual English dictionaries:

Syllabification: is dividing up words into syllables by means of dots (tri.mor.phic)

word inflections: of the word are the different forms of a word according to their use and function in a sentence (sometimes they are shortened to the last syllable of the entry plus the inflectional ending), such as the past, past and present participle forms of a verb; the comparative and superlative forms of an adjective or a an adverb; and the plural form of a noun.

derivational forms: are the different forms derived from one word. This derivational process usually entails a change of the part of speech.

2) What morphological information does your dictionary provide for the following words:

lullaby, silly, signify, significant

3) How many syllables do the following words have?

afloat pedagogy conspicuous

4) Where can you break the following words?

coveralls creditor credentialed credibility creator criminology

5) What do you think is the usefulness of syllabification?

6) Which words have begin with prefixes? Interpret, disbelieve, unbelieve, discourse, incorrect, dismiss, intelligent, misinterpret, impartial, import, important, illegal, illegitimate, illusion, imbalance, irresponsible, incomplete, atypical, coexist, correspond, abnormal, abdomen, decode, decide, malfunction, malice

7) What is the plural form of the following words?

city, rose, boy, thief, half, hero, photo, tooth, goose, deer, trout, alumna, matrix, axis, crisis, automaton, corpus, focus, stigma, beau, cherub, wheat, son-in-law, sugar

8) What is the singular form of the following words?

phenomena, media, alumni, scissors, millennia, syllabi, tongs, stomata, bureau, seraphim, cattle, scarves, sheep, oxen, oats, tweezers

9) What is the simple past form of the following verbs?

Drive eat bite be awake breed bend cost seek cling fit flee forsake hurt knit

10) What is the present participle form of the following verbs?

Lie bridge Sit rise show

11) What is the masculine form of the following?

niece, empress, widow, duck

12) What is the feminine form of the following?

dog, host, rooster, hero

13) H.W 14) Choose the word with the right prefix: a. These people are (disexperienced /

inexperienced / unexperienced).

b. They (disagreed / inagreed / unagreed) on many points.

c. They (unapproved / ilapproved/ disapproved) of the new plan.

d. You have to (uncode / decode / miscode) the coming information.

Phonological information.This kind of information relates to two

aspects: pronunciation and stress pattern, which are given using special symbols. Special phonetic symbols represent the sounds 7 of a word and a pronunciation key is provided at the beginning of the dictionary to illustrate how to pronounce these sounds. Stress is indicated using a /'/ mark on the stressed syllable.

Exercises:

1) Look at the pronunciation key in your dictionary and use it as a guide to pronounce a word your teacher chooses, paying attention to the stress marks.

Architect Sure sigh

2) What are the silent letters in the following words?

sachet, gristle, bomb, cipher, bustle, hasten, thought, write, enough, aisle, plumber , campaign

H.W 3) How are the letters written in

bold pronounced in the following words?

cyst czar cynical cute Sachet much anchovy choose Cohesive cohesion sure

H.W 4) Do the letters written in bold in

the following words sound the same?

sepia, septic , sequel , sequin take , sake, sack, fade salute, acute, mute, muse

6) How is the [o] in the word "spotty" pronounced in British and American English?

8) Which syllable is stressed in the following words?

afloat pedagogy conspicuous

7) Syntactic information Syntactic information indicates the

part of speech of a word (noun, verb, etc) and its type (transitive verb, auxiliary, prefix, suffix) using special labels (n., v, adj, adv, etc).

In fact, both syntactic information and morphological information can be referred to using one general term: grammatical information.

2) What grammatical information does your dictionary provide about the word "continue".

3) How many parts of speech does each one of the following words have?

Content, contest, continue,

4) What is the grammatical pattern in which the verb "spew" is used as an intransitive verb?

5) Choose: a) The police (is / are) investigating the

case. b) The (pollutions are/ pollution is)

worse during summer seasons.

8) Etymological information Etymological information shows the

history or origin of a word. It tells you where a word comes from, which languages contributed to the development of its meaning, and how its meaning and form developed over the years.

The abbreviations are:

1) OE = Old English 2) ME= Middle English 3) L = Latin 4) Ofr- OF = Old French 5) It. = Italian

Exercise: Where do the following words come

from? capo fine infant Risqué risotto

9) Semantic information Semantic information relates to the

following aspects: a) Meaning: one or many senses or

definitions are provided for any word. They are usually numbered and grouped to show their relationships with each other.

b) Synonyms and antonyms. Some dictionaries list the synonyms of a word and may present a brief discussion of the differences between them. Some dictionaries include antonyms also. Synonyms are the words which have similar meanings and antonyms are words which are opposite.

c) Collocations, idioms, and phrasal verbs: Some dictionaries indicate the words which collocate with the headword, or the idioms or phrasal verbs in which the headword appears.

Exercises:

1) How many meanings does your dictionary give for the following words.

Consultation overdue

2) Paraphrase the following sentences using simpler words:

a) You are requested not to import innocuous products.

b) He was able to remain imperturbable even under the most chaotic circumstances.

3) Choose the appropriate words:

a) What the president said is just an (illusion / allusion) to the expected change.

b) Lawyers should remain (uninterested /disinterested) throughout their cases.

c) You will find a (disused / misused) car in the garage. Nobody has used it for years.

d) The government abolished that law (altogether / all together).

e) She has a (course / coarse) hair.

4) Complete with an appropriate preposition:

a) They will advise you to hold ………buying new equipment until the prices go down.

b) They started to argue about something but they suddenly broke ……. when they heard that noise.

5) What do the idioms or phrasal verbs mean in the following sentences?

b) Why do they keep banging on about globalization?

c) They tried to convince him, but to no effect.

6) Give two adjectives that collocate with the word guess.

10) Pragmatic information Pragmatic information relates to how

words are used. This includes register information, style, and usage. Usage labels indicate the appropriate (or, in some cases, inappropriate) use of a particular meaning of a word (e.g., nonstandard, colloquial, informal, slang, dialect, archaic, vulgar, British, and obsolete.)

Exercise:

Exercise: 1) What usage label is given for the

following words? alas ……………, exult …………..., fatty

acid…………., git………….., goodie…………, gaga…….….., gaiety…………….., girdle…………………, lughole………………..

2) What would people say in everyday English: to have guests for dinner OR to have people over for dinner?

11) Helping aids: Helping aids: includes the following: a) Examples: are provided to show

how a word is used. b) Illustrations and Graphics. Some

dictionaries include illustrations (usually photographs or line drawings, sometimes charts) to help clarify the meaning of certain words or to put them in context.

c) Cross-reference: is used to avoid repeating information. If the meaning of a word is similar to a word that has been defined, the reader is asked to refer back to that word:

featheredge: see deckle edge

Translators and monolingual dictionaries Although translators' work involves

dealing with two languages, they sometimes need to consult monolingual dictionaries for various reasons.

The basic need is to check the different senses of a word, especially when this word is used in an unfamiliar context.

To illustrate this, look at the following phrase, which is a book title, and its translation: The Politics of Linguistics, and the translation is

اللغة علم في . السياسة Most Arab translators take it for granted

that politics is used to refer to any government activities, international political relations, or the like.

The translation we have here is a case in point. Yet a diligent translator would have doubts about the meaning of politics considering the context in which it appears.

To resolve this uncertainty, one is advised to refer to a monolingual dictionary. The following senses are listed in the American Heritage Dictionary:

On close examination, the last sense is the one used in the above phrase: "internally conflicting interrelationships among people in a society".

The above translation is an inaccurate one because of its implications: how is politics viewed or defined or dealt with in linguistics.

A translator may also check a monolingual dictionary to see how a word is used in case dictionaries of usage or collocations did not help.

Monolingual dictionaries may help by giving examples, showing the differences between synonyms, or by devoting special sections to collocational and grammatical patterns of the word usage.

There may be a need as well to check the meanings of certain expressions such as idioms or phrasal verbs if specialized dictionaries are not available.

General exercises:

1) What kind of dictionaries are these? Collocation, general monolingual, specialized, general bilingual, bilingual specialized, Arabic monolingual, synonyms, production dictionary?

Stress-pronunciation

Syllabifica-tion

Etymology Exam-ple

Inflected formsDerivative

forms

Cross refer-ence

semantic synonym

4) Following are five entries from five different dictionaries. Compare between them using the following table.

6) What is the difference between the following: missus / missis nucleus / nuclei numeral/ numerical duke / duchess materialist / materialistic ornament / ornamental audible / inaudible author / authoress hero / heroine ox / oxen

8) Examine the following entry then answer the questions that appear next to it.

a) What is the 1st origin of the word wish? b) What is the simple present form of wish? c) What is the simple past? d) What is the past participle? e) What is the compound word that appears in the

entries shown? f) Which is grammatically correct to say: I wish I was a

bird OR I wish I were a bird? h) Give a synonym for the word wish. i) Does this dictionary use cross references? j) Give two derivatives of wish.

9) Examine the following entry, then state if the following statements are true or false.

in·flam·ma·ble \in'flæməbəl\ adj [Middle English, liable to inflammation, from Medieval Latin nflamm bilis, from Latin nflamm re, to inflame; see inflame] 1. Easily ignited and capable of burning rapidly; flammable. See Usage Note at flammable. 2. Quickly or easily aroused to strong emotion; excitable. in·flam'ma·bil'i·ty n. in·flam'ma·ble n. in·flam'ma·bly adv.

a) This entry uses cross reference. b) The entry provides five forms of the word inflammable. c) The prefix in- in this word means not. d) Inflammable has five syllables. e) The a in 2nd and 3rd syllables in inflammable sounds the same.

f) French contributed to the development of inflammable.

g) Inflammable is the opposite of flammable.

h) People can be described using the adjective inflammable.

i) Inflammable can be used as a noun or an adjective.

j) The third syllable is stressed in inflammable.

10) Examine the following entry, then state if the following statements are true or false.

in·fin·i·tive \in'finətiv\ n [C] technical in grammar, the basic form of a verb, used with 'to' in English.

in·fin·i·tude \ in'finətju:d $ -tu:d\ n [singular, U] formal a number or amount without limit: the vast infinitude of space.

a) The plural of infinitude is infinitudes.b) the word infinitive can be found in a religious text.c) infinitude has only one pronunciation.d) infinitive does not have a plural form.

11) Change the form of the following words according to what is shown between square brackets:

entirety [adjective]…………………………. entomology [noun]………………………………

forbid [present participle]………………………. forecast [past participle] ………………………..

late (adj.) [comparative]………………………..late (adv.) [superlative]……………………………….

ethical [comparative]………………………… die [simple present] ……………………………….

12) What is wrong with the translation of the following sentence? Explain.

Don’t worry. He'll keep it under his hat.فسوف تقلق ال قبعته تحت األمر يبقي

13) Examine the entry of the verb guard then provide the following: a synonym, a phrasal verb, an adverb that collocates with it, a preposition that can be used with it.

14) Give a compound word that has the word guard.

15) Look up the word gynaecology . What kinds of information are provided in this entry.

16) What is the meaning of the verb reverse in the following sentence: He reversed his car into a side road? What is the American synonym of this verb?

17) What is the plural of the noun reveille?

18) How many stress patterns does the noun reveille have? What is the difference between them?

19) Does the present participle of the verb revel have alternative spellings? Indicate.

21) Give two nouns that collocate with the noun revenge.

22) Is the verb revalue transitive or intransitive? Is it used in active or passive structures?

23) The synonym of returnable is …………..………… and the antonym is ..……………….…….

24) What is the American form for Rev? 25) If you want to examine all the

synonyms of the verb revere, under which word can you find them?21

26) What usage label is given for the verb revere?

27) Give four derivative forms for the verb revere (a noun, two adjectives, and an adverb).

28) Can the following sentence في بحثه يجري أن أراد be translated as: He wanted to make his المعملresearch in the lab? Why? Suggest another translation if you think that this translation is inappropriate.

29) Which of the following expressions are typical in everyday English:

a) This problem (relates to / has to do with) what happened last week.

b) They (stayed / remained) loyal to him. c) No more milk (remained / was left) in the fridge.

30) What does your dictionary say about these two sentences where the word "since" is used: Which one is correct and who uses them?

a) It is a long time since I saw grandma. b) It has been a long time since I saw

grandma. 32) How frequently is the verb "sit"

used in English? How did you know?

33) What does the idiom "to sit on the fence" mean in the following sentence: He was asked to express his opinion but he preferred to sit on the fence? How did you find that out?

34) What are the silent letters in "sleigh"? 35) What does the adjective "single" mean

in the sentence: This building is for single persons only?