Abstract
Idioms, sayings and proverbs (referred to here as 'phrasemes'), are a central part of the English language. However, it is often difficult for learners of English as an Additional Language (EAL) to choose the correct headword when looking for such expressions in a dictionary. Learners may not recognise a word as belonging to a phraseme, and so may not look under a single, 'important' word. Moreover, their choice of a salient word may not accord with the lexicographer's. Thirdly, they may not recognise phraseme variants, such as carry / take coals to Newcastle . They may therefore often fail to find the phraseme altogether. A study of 84 phrasemes in five online English learner's dictionaries ( Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary , Collins COBUILD Advanced Dictionary , Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English , Macmillan English Dictionary for Advanced Learners and Oxford Advanced Learner's Dictionary ) revealed a lack of uniformity across and often within dictionaries. This paper is based on 14 of these phrasemes, which appear in one or more of these dictionaries and include proper nouns and/ or variable words. To make learner's dictionaries more user friendly (Zgusta 1971), it is argued that they need greater consistency in their choice of phraseme headwords, both within and between dictionaries, and that greater cross-referencing is necessary within a single dictionary. Five strategies are presented to help learners with their dictionary searches.
Highlights
One of the main precepts for any dictionary is that it should be user friendly (Zgusta 1971), implying that someone can search a dictionary and with a successful outcome
The greatest consistency in search results within a dictionary was found in Cambridge Advanced Learner's Dictionary (CALD), whose numerous headwords generally make searching easy without the user needing to know which part of speech the word belongs to, or whether a word is part of a phraseme
Teachers of English as an additional language (EAL) students can promote such strategies in class, but lecturers or teachers in any discipline can post simple instructions on dictionary use, and links to dictionary websites, in their course details on their Learning Management Systems. It can be seen from this study that the choice of headwords varies greatly, both within and between dictionaries, making it difficult for students to conduct consistently successful searches and potentially leading to frustration (Gouws and Prinsloo 2005: 9)
Summary
One of the main precepts for any dictionary is that it should be user friendly (Zgusta 1971), implying that someone can search a dictionary and with a successful outcome. Phrasemes containing proper nouns, such as the man/ woman on the Clapham omnibus, offer unusual, and salient, nouns, but these may not be used as headwords in MELDs. For example, most learners could not be expected to be familiar with the words Clapham or omnibus, yet a search under either of these words in LDOCE would fail to find the phraseme, which lists it only under the first noun, man (but not under woman). The study which follows compares the use of headwords for 14 phrasemes containing proper nouns or variable words in online versions of the Big 5 to see if these dictionaries are truly user friendly in regard to their search facilities for phrasemes, and suggests strategies for learners to improve their search experiences
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