[Lexicog] endangered entries for endangered languages

[Hayim Sheynin]

Dear Wayne,

Everything depends on the goals of a lexicographer. If one compiles the dictionary like OED or Thesaurus Totius Latinitatis every word, every spelling
and every meaning should be recorded. This is the type of the dictionary which is historical by nature (and usually done by a team). If you compile the English dictionary of American usage, all the briticisms and obsolete words and meanings should be omitted. If you have goal to compose the dictionary for school children, you make a proper selection of lexic. The lexicographer  should see  clearly  his  goal and his audience before he begins to work on his dictionary. Having said  this, it is possible  to point  to many dictionaries  that were used not only for the purpose that was envisioned by the  lexicographer.
So if you see your Cheyenne dictionary as a kind of textbook for Cheyenne speakers and try to record contemporaneous stratum in Cheyenne lexic, you should include only words and meanings recognized by current speakers. However if you like to erect a monument to a dying language you should try
to exhaust all word treasury of Cheyenne and  even  include  strange and obsolete  words, however with indication like obsolete, unusual, rare, obscure,
no longer in use, or used only by such and such group. If you note etymology, and you didn't arrived to clear solution, you should make a note on that too.

This is at least my opinion that I implemented in a number of my lexicographic works for Latin, Hebrew, Aramaic, Ladino. However there is a big difference between your work and mine. All my works are based on printed text, and if they include additional material, these are medieval manuscripts, while as I assume you work directly with the speakers. So you can rely on speakers' reaction.  

Hayim Sheynin

Wayne Leman <wayne_leman at sil.org> wrote:                                  I assume that a number of us subscribed to this list study endangered 
 languages. I do. I'm continuing work with Cheyenne speakers to bring greater 
 accuracy to our dictionary entries. Occasionally we encounter a form which 
 was used sometime in the past but no longer is. Sometimes it is no longer 
 even recognized by any current speakers. Sometimes speakers can pronounce a 
 word but no longer know what it means. This is especially true of some 
 proper names. Sometimes we don't know for sure exactly how to spell parts of 
 a word. It may have been recorded in an informal way by a soldier or a 
 frontiersman.
 
 Unless significant social changes occur, Cheyenne will no longer be a viable 
 language 30 or so years from now. But Cheyennes value having had their 
 language recorded and likely will value it in the future, just as members of 
 tribes in California value having had some of their, now extinct, language 
 recorded in the past.
 
 Might any of you have recommendations for entering lexical forms for which 
 we have little certainty today since they are no longer recognized by any 
 speakers. We could simply create dictionaries of extant forms. We could do 
 that for English, but we would be missing a wealth of archaic forms which 
 were used at one time in English. It seems to me that when we have some kind 
 of records, however inadequate, that some forms were extant at one time, but 
 no longer are, that there is value in including them in a dictionary.
 
 What do you all think?
 
 Wayne
 -----
 Wayne Leman
 Cheyenne dictionary online:
 http://www11.asphost4free.com/cheyennedictionary/default.htm 
 
 
     
                       

 
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