[Lexicog] Theoretical constructs vs. practical reference dictionaries

[Kenneth C. Hill]

Re: Grammatical info in the Hopi Dictionary

I am not prepared to write a paper on this, but here are a few examples:

The "elsewhere" case for predicate pluralization is the suffix -ya. But in
the listing of verbs, we cite the plural suffix whatever it may be.

There is an adjectival class in which the nominative is in -y(o-) and the
accusative is in -kw (or -ko-), plus elaborations. This pattern is easlily
explained in the grammar, but because the items involved are few, we
didn't bother suppressing the grammatical information at the specific
entries.
--- 'Lou Hohulin' <lou_hohulin at sil.org> wrote:
> Thank you, Ken Hill, for reminding us of this distinction.
>
> In your e-mail, you mentioned putting a fair amount of grammatical
> information in the Hopi dictionary.  I'd like to raise some questions
> about the amount of grammatical information that we should put in
> 'practical reference dictionaries'. I am writing a descriptive grammar,
> along with the compilation of a dictionary of a largely undocumented
> language (Tuwali Ifugao - Austronesian, Philippine-type), and am
> attempting to integrate the information between the two products.
> However, decisions regarding what should be put in the dictionary, as
> well as in the grammar, are difficult. Is there a principled way to make
> consistent decisions?
>
> I also noted Rich Rhodes comments about the lexicon and grammar being a
> 'continuum' -- that isn't the way he stated it, but essentially I agree
> with that theoretical position; however, when it comes to the practical
> task of producing helpful dictionaries and grammars, we desperately need
> a theoretically sound basis for deciding 'what goes where'.
>
> I am using the SIL-developed program, LinguaLinks, which allows me to
> interlinearize text, and then, attested examples from the texts can be
> seen in entries. Also, there is an annotation field that allows
> grammatical information, encyclopedic information, etc. In addition,
> there is a thesaurus program which allows ease in classifying words into
> domains. The domains are not always as unique as I need for the
> language; however, it is a tremendously helpful program for clearly
> defining the differences in large numbers of very specific words.
>
> Lou Hohulin
>
>
> On Sat, 7 Feb 2004 12:42:31 -0800 (PST)
>  "Kenneth C. Hill" <kennethchill at yahoo.com> wrote:
> > I detect a common confusion in this interchange, the loss of the
> > distinction between "the lexicon" as a theoretical construct
> (alongside
> > "the grammar, the syntax, the phonology, the onomasticon," etc.) and
> "a
> > dictionary" as a specific reference work. A dictionary is motivated by
> the
> > perceived needs of the prospective users as well as by the author's
> > perhaps idiosyncratic interest in including certain information. In
> the
> > Hopi Dictionary, for example, there is a lot of stuff that properly
> > belongs in the grammar, but it was thought to be useful to remind the
> > potential user of various details of grammatical behavior within the
> body
> > of the dictionary. And the grammar we provided was a bare-bones
> practical
> > sketch. The Hopi Dictionary mixes encyclopedic knowledge in with
> > everything else in a somewhat unprincipled way simply because that
> > information was considered of potential interest to the reader and,
> > anyway, we weren't about to write a separate encyclopedia. Items
> appear in
> > the dictionary that pertain to the theoretical onomasticon but, I
> guess,
> > only where the onomasticon and the encyclopedia overlap: selected
> > placenames and a couple of personal names with historical importance.
> >
> > I urge the distinction between the dictionary-as-theoretical-construct
> and
> > the dictionary-as-practical-reference-work. Most of us, I believe, are
> > concerned overwhelmingly with the latter. I know some others have
> pointed
> > this out, but I hereby put my two cents in.
> >
> > --Ken Hill
> >
> > A few quotations that led up to the statement above:
> >
> > ... what does it mean to be lexicalized?
> >
> > ... what goes in a dictionary and what goes in an encyclopedia?
> >
> >
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> >
> >
> >
> >
> >
>
>



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