Dialect Dictionary Research Articles

PHRASEOLOGICAL UNITS AS A MEANS OF ATTRACTION OF ENGLISH NEWSPAPER HEADLINES

The article is devoted to the study of the role of phraseological units in English newspaper headlines. The aim of the work is to study and analyze pragmatic functions of phraseological units in the headlines of modern British and American newspaper articles. The notion of phraseological unit is revealed and its features are defined. The subject of the study is 185 phraseological units belonging to three groups, namely: phraseological units with a component related to the field of colour, music and weather. The research material includes 9,200 headlines of English newspapers, dated 2014-2018 and selected from the Questia Online Library. Using the method of continuous sampling, we selected phraseological units from the dictionaries The Oxford Dictionary of Idioms, Dictionary of English Idioms & Phrases and McGraw-Hill’s Essential American Idioms Dictionary. In addition, the frequency of use of phraseological units of the three groups in the headlines of British and American discourses was studied and analyzed. The study found that the most common of the three groups was the group of phraseological units with a component related to the field of colour. The second most common is the group of phraseological units with a component related to the field of music, and the least numerous is the group of phraseological units with a component related to the field of weather. In addition, it was determined what phraseological units are the most common in English newspaper headlines and which ones are the least common.

Dictionaries as Sources of Folklore Data ed. by Jonathan Roper

Reviewed by: Dictionaries as Sources of Folklore Data ed. by Jonathan Roper David S. Azzolina (bio) Dictionaries as Sources of Folklore Data edited by Jonathan Roper. Folklore Fellows Communications, no. 321. Helsinki: Suomalainen Tiedeakatemia, 2020. Pp. 246. €28.00. ISBN: 978-951-41-1157-0. Folklorists are very creative when it comes to finding sources of folklore, and students of dictionaries likewise know that dictionaries can be used in many ways beyond their immediate functions. Jonathan Roper, Associate Professor of English and Comparative Folklore at the University of Tartu, has edited a collection of ten articles that begin a fruitful avenue of research into the use of dictionaries as a reservoir of folklore. After an introduction by Roper, the collection consists of three sections of three articles each: Folklore in the Formation of Dictionaries, Case Studies of Dictionaries, and Folklore in Dictionaries: Methodological Considerations. All the chapters are based on real-life data in the dictionaries themselves, usually also based in fieldwork. Each has something significant to say about the role folklore can play in the compilation of dictionaries and how dictionaries can inform the folklorist. I am going to end this review by focusing on Roper’s introduction. The first section, Folklore in the Formation of Dictionaries, begins with a discussion of how Roman Catholic priest Patrick Dinneen strove to compile a dictionary of “an unsettled language like Irish,” necessitating the use of proverbs and sayings, customs, and beliefs. There are even references to material culture of the Irish in this 1904 work. Timothy R. Tangherlini from the Department of Scandinavian at the University of California, Berkeley, looks at a dictionary of Jutland folk speech published in four volumes between 1886 and 1914. He starts with a history of Danish dictionaries, a subject likely unknown to most English-speaking readers. Henning Feilberg, the compiler of the dictionary, was a chaplain in southern Jutland and though he had little experience as a fieldworker, he used a large variety of folklore sources including a network of collectors. Tangherlini concludes with an overview of the future of Jutlandic dialect dictionaries. Focusing on John Sampson’s 1926 dictionary of Welsh Gypsy (Romani) dialect, Jeremy Harte notes that Sampson was a fieldworker par excellence. He collected folktales, superstitions, and other belief narratives. The problem may be that such collecting may skew an outsider’s worldview of the Gypsies as a backward group. Roper in his Preface notes that the articles [End Page 235] in this section are connected by their attention to the past, almost reclamatory work as well as their afterlife. The second section is most explicitly devoted to case studies, though all the chapters are case studies in some sense. What makes the chapter by Zoja Karanović and Jasmina Dražić on the 1818 Srpski rječnik (The Serbian Dictionary) and its 1852 revision most interesting is how a dictionary can play an important role in a culture. Its compiler, Vuk Karadžić, looms large in the development of Serbian culture more generally, having produced other works on folk songs and ethnology. Naturally, these materials were included in his dictionary as well as superstitions and mythological beliefs and even humor. Compiled in Latin, since Frisian was chiefly a spoken language in the nineteenth century, Joost Hiddes Halbertsma’s 1872 Lexicon Frisicum is the subject of Anne Dykstra’s chapter. What makes this dictionary unique is its focus on superstitions and the lengthy entries expounding them. By looking at a variety of Greek dictionaries of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, Haralampos Passalis notes that they “constitute products of an era, whose main aim was to prove the relation of Modern Greek customs and language with those of antiquity” (pp. 161–62). All of which is to say that the materials were included as a demonstration of antiquity that was encouraged by larger social forces. The entire effort was caught, as Passalis calls it, between the folklorist and the lexicographer. The final section is devoted to methodological considerations. The famous Dictionary of English/Creole of Trinidad and Tobago is the first example. The methodological problem here is one of inclusion, according to Lise Winer, author of not only the chapter but also of the...

Графический анализ вокализма первого слога в ненецких словарях из архива А. М. Шёгрена

This article describes the graphic features of the first syllable vowels in Pustozersk and Obdorsk dictionaries from A. M. Sjögren’s archive. The graphic analysis is carried out against the background of the Proto-Samoyed reconstructions by J. Janhunen, Nenets current literary norm, “Nenets-Russian Dictionary” by N. M. Tereschenko, “A Morphological Dictionary of Tundra Nenets Language” by T. Salminen, and “Dialectal Dictionary of the Nenets Language” by S. I. Burkova et al. The dialectal features of the dictionaries are compared to the modern ones. The area of the Pustozersk region is referred to as the territory where the central (Bolshezemelskiy) dialect is spoken. In one word the graphic representation of the 18th century Pustozersk dictionary coincides with the form of the modern Eastern dialect word. At the same time, in another word, the Western variant is attested. The territory where the Obdorsk dictionary was recorded is the territory where the speakers of the Eastern dialects of the Nenets language reside. In the Obdorsk dictionary, a variant that coincides with the Eastern variant is recognized. Some outstanding consonant features of the first syllable are also taken into consideration. For example, in the Pustozersk dictionary, the initial /ŋ/ is not represented graphically, as in Proto-Samoyedic reconstructions. The Obdorsk dictionary contains three graphic variants of the modern initial /ŋ/. The results are presented in comparison tables. The word examples are presented accordingly. In many ways, the reflexes presented in the Pustozersk dictionary correspond with modern ones. The reconstructed diphthongoids are graphically represented by the diphthongs in the Pustozersk dictionary, which is not the case for modern dictionaries. In comparison with modern dictionaries, reflexes in the Obdorsk dictionary are more diverse. The diphthongs are also used in the place of reconstructed diphthongoids.

ЛЕКСИКОГРАФИРОВАНИЕ КАК МЕТОД ОПИСАНИЯ ЛЕКСИКИ. К ТЕОРЕТИЧЕСКОМУ НАСЛЕДИЮ О.И. БЛИНОВОЙ

The article develops the idea formulated by Olga Iosifovna Blinova, professor of Tomsk State University, according to which lexicography is one of the methods of studying vocabulary. The material of the study included: (1) theoretical works by Olga Blinova, (2) her lexicographic works, (3) lexicographic experiments of the author of the article and their theoretical understanding, (4) works of other authors on related issues. The main research method used in the article is a comparison of concepts and principles of their implementation in different authors to identify the features of Blinova’s lexicographic theory and practice. The author interprets lexicographizing of a word as a specific approach to the description of its semantics, as a way of its modeling, which consists in its discretization – transformation of continuous semantic space of the language into notional quanta, clots of meaning. In the study, this method is contrasted with other methods of language modeling found in applied language descriptions: in the methods of language teaching, in translation and in compilation of computer programs on a linguistic basis in particular. Much attention is paid to the concept of lexical parameterization, which occurs in the process of lexicographic modeling of the semantic reality of the language. The most important principle of semantics modeling is the parameterization of the meaning of a word and vocabulary in general. The article discusses the features of parameterization in explanatory dictionaries against the background of their opposition to other types of dictionaries: encyclopedic, motivational dictionaries, dictionaries of everyday interpretations of words and frequency dictionaries. To identify these features, the definitions of words in explanatory and encyclopedic dictionaries are analyzed. Such important trends in modern lexicography as overcoming the absolutization of the discreteness of semantics and its simplified definition are analyzed. The article explores the tendency of lexicography to an antropocentric modeling of semantics in dictionaries, a particular manifestation of which is the representation of the content of a word as a conceptual content. In more detail, the article highlights the specifics of the motivational dictionary – one of the main lexicographic works by Blinova, who developed the concept of this type of dictionary and implemented it in practice by creating the Motivational Dialect Dictionary. The final section of the article analyzes Blinova’s idea about the possibility of implementing a project of a complex dictionary, in which the meaning of each word is considered in the mirror of a set of parameters which together give a systematic idea of the functioning, semantics and linguistic connections of the word. The article draws conclusions about the role of Blinova’s theoretical heritage for semasiology, dialectology and lexicography of the Russian language.

ЯЗЫКОВОЙ ОБРАЗ НЕДОБРОЖЕЛАТЕЛЬНОГО ЧЕЛОВЕКА (НА МАТЕРИАЛЕ РУССКИХ ГОВОРОВ): СЕМАНТИКО-МОТИВАЦИОННЫЙ АСПЕКТ

The article aims at constructing the image of a malevolent person based on language data. Lexical and phraseological units, found in Russian dialect dictionaries and in the unpublished catalog of the Toponymic Expedition of the Ural Federal University, are the research materials. While studying the image of an unfriendly person, the author rests upon the method of ethnolinguistic portraiture that includes a semantic and motivational analysis of lexical and phraseological units belonging to the field and use of a wide cultural background. Besides, the work reconstructs and etymologically interprets a number of language facts. The article presents the material on the basis of the thematic principle. First, the author focuses on the interpretation of language facts that explicate ideas on the appearance and behavior of a hostile person. Then characteristics of the interaction of a malevolent person with the society come into the field of view. In conclusion, data that indicate the assessment of an unfriendly person by other members of society are given. As a result of the study, the author proves the existence of the specifics of the manifestation of a malevolent person’s image in traditional culture. A malevolent person is attributed with certain behavioral features. In general, according to the language data, a malevolent person is characterized with dismal or mean appearance (Vologda region ser’yoznyy “tough, malevolent”, Arkhangelsk region volchanoy “malevolent, mean, unfriendly”). A hostile person is attributed with a specific indirect type of looking (Pomor dialect kosukha “a mean, unfriendly woman”), which can witch you. A malevolent person can also express his/her displeasure verbally, by swearing, arguing, insulting others (Middle Ural dialect naperekoserdiyakh “disunitedly” ← Kurgan, Chelyabinsk, Vologda regions perekoserdie(‘e) “objection, bickering, squabble; quarrel”). The most important feature is aggression coming from this person (Perm region vreditel’nitsa “a malevolent, hostile woman”). A malevolent person can harm someone, that is why people are beware of him/her. An indication of a malevolent person’s existence among fellow residents occupies an important place in his/her language portrait. In particular, such a person does not strive to comply with the society rules (Vyatka region nesovetno “disunitedly”), to preserve relations with others (Arkhangelsk region nesusedlivyy “disunited”), and that is why s/he becomes excluded from his/her group (Karelia region nesoyuznyy “unfriendly, disunited”). Other society members evaluate such malevolence manifestation as a violation of the most important rules and therefore disapprove of it (Karelia region nesovestno “disunitedly, arguing”). The article also interprets a number of lexical and phraseological units, which have not been commented in the linguistic literature (kichkovat’, butuzit’sya, nevlagodne, kokora, zaedlivyy, karaka, chyornaya derevnya, kak Aga i Palaga, nesuyutnyy, prikayutnyy, etc.), in a semantic and motivational and etymological way.

Lexical and Semantic Features of the Designation of Time in the Ukrainian Dialects of the Carpathians

This article examines the peculiarities of the designation of certain time periods in a number of Ukrainian dialects of the Carpathian region; in particular from the perspective of the specifics of dialect segmentation of this semantic sphere and of the principles of nomination. The lexical material of the Carpathian-Ukrainian dialects allows us to distinguish certain semantic models and shifts observed in time designations: the transfer of spatial parameters for the nomination of time and vice versa; the orientation in the names of months to phenological and economic cycles, and not to the division of the astronomical year into segments containing a certain number of days; the perception of the concept of “time” itself displayed by the vocabulary as a favourable or unfavourable time for any activity or life in general; the nomination of morning as the appearance of daylight or a period of time somewhat removed in the past from the moment of speech; and some borrowings are also noted as an integral part of the vocabulary denoting time in its various manifestations. On the basis of the analysis of material from Carpatho-Ukrainian dialect dictionaries, it is concluded that this vocabulary represents a number of semantic models of names of time periods that have parallels in other Slavic and some non-Slavic languages. Taking into account the linguistic and geographical aspect, namely, a fairly wide distribution in the language territory of Slavia, as well as beyond its borders, we can assume the status of these models as semantic archetypes represented collectively in the dialect zone of the Carpathians.

Editorial

Editorial M. Lynne Murphy This second issue of Dictionaries volume 42 includes work by lexicographers and scholars from five continents, in the form of one independent research article, two thematic forums incorporating five articles, three reports on reference works in progress, four book reviews, and the first installment of a new occasional feature, Teaching Dictionaries. Two obituaries honor important contributors to the field and to this journal. We start with Bing Tian’s “Jianhua Huang’s Lexicography and his Grand Dictionnaire Chinois–Français Contemporain (2014).” This article provides a historical and critical overview of a major work of Chinese bilingual lexicography, begun just as China started to re-engage with the West after decades of isolation. Tian’s article offers the English-language reader insights on the lexicographical challenges for Chinese bilingual lexicography while dissecting the contributions of its editor in chief. The two forums that follow present papers from the 23rd biennial meeting of the Dictionary Society of North America, held online on June 4, 2021. Ben Zimmer introduces the forum “How Global Events and Social Change Affect Modern Lexicography.” The forum’s three articles underscore how quickly everyday vocabulary has changed in recent years and examine ways in which lexicographers and publishers have adapted to give users much more up-to-date information than could have been possible in the print age. The theme of adaptation is also key to the two articles of the second forum, “The Future of Dictionaries and Lexicography,” introduced by Sarah Ogilvie. In Reference Works in Progress, three ongoing projects are described in some depth. Geert De Wilde reports on work toward the second [End Page ix] edition of the Anglo-Norman Dictionary, begun in the 1990s and online since 2006. The project is currently in its final push toward completion: adding new features and a fresh T–Z section by 2025. Next, María Betulia Pedraza Pedraza presents the principles and architecture of the Diccionario Panhispánico de la Administración Pública (DiPAP), a resource with a democratizing mission: to help citizens engage with public services and their varying terminologies in Argentina, Colombia, Mexico and Spain. Finally, Manfred Markus updates us on search-filtering features for source information in the current revision of the EDD (English Dialect Dictionary) Online. In recent decades, scholarly organizations in linguistics have created forums for more active discussions of pedagogy. As I took on editor-ship of Dictionaries this year, I imagined that at some point we’d want to develop a series on lexicography in higher education pedagogy. That “some point” was moved earlier when I got to hear Jack Lynch speak at an Oxford English Dictionary forum in Spring. Lynch’s contribution to our new Teaching Dictionaries series considers the kinds of guidance today’s students need in approaching the OED and using it for the study of literature. This feature will run on an occasional basis, and I welcome enquiries and suggestions from readers who know of innovative teaching of or with lexicography. On a sadder note, in this issue we memorialize two influential DSNA members who died in 2021. Jennifer Westerhaus Adams remembers Ron Butters for his contributions to lexicography and trademark law and his personal generosity. William Frawley, former editor of this journal, is paid tribute by Michael Adams. The back issues of Dictionaries serve as another kind of memorial. Frawley’s work behind the scenes and Butters’ articles on gay, X sucks, and trademarks in dictionaries will continue to serve lexicology and lexicography. Finally, we present reviews of two online dictionaries, a dictionary history, and an intriguing edited collection. Jason F. Siegel considers the Dictionnaire des Francophones “a laudable attempt” to represent the lexical variety of French worldwide, while identifying some glitches that need attention. Kyle Adams deems The Right Rhymes, Matt Kohl’s historical dictionary of hip-hop “an invaluable textbook” to complement the music itself. James Lambert enjoyed Pat Manser’s history of the Macquarie Dictionary, More than Words, “a deliberate paean” to the dictionary. Finally, David S. Azzolina is struck by the “interdisciplinary [End Page x] value” of the edited collection Dictionaries as Sources of Folklore Data, in which “each chapter has something significant to say...

Money in Economic Activity and Language of the Old Believers of the South America

The article investigates how lexemes within the lexical field “Money” are used in the Russian dialects of Old Believers spoken in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil and Uruguay. The study addresses the use of recently borrowed names for monetary units as well as of the original Russian nouns. The dialectal material is compared with the data from the Dictionary of Contemporary Russian Colloquial Language and from a variety of dialectal dictionaries. Special attention is given to the names for Russian monetary units rublʹ and kopejka. The word kopejka has retained some of the original Russian figurative meanings and developed a new one. The fact that kopejka has not fallen into disuse in the figurative meaning is not surprising given that original Russian idioms are very well preserved in the dialects in question, including those with kopejka (the latter are analysed in the article). The study has demonstrated significant similarity between the Old Believers’ dialects in South America and Russian varieties spoken in Russia with respect to the semantic field “Money”. At the same time, the analysis has revealed several properties which are unique to the Old Believers’ dialects. These include deviations in lexical meaning, in collocational and stylistic properties, and in usage.

Антонимические и синонимические парадигмы в диалектной фразеологии

The article aims to determine paradigmatic activity of dialectal phraseological units presented by the “Dictionary of the Russian Dialects of Bashkiria” edited by Z. P. Zdobnova. Scientific novelty of the work lies in describing the identified dialectal set expressions, which develop paradigmatic relations. Attention is payed primarily to such semantic paradigms of units as synonymic and antonymic ones, which are characterised by complexity and expressiveness due to indefiniteness of phraseological meaning itself. As a result, an analysis of dialectal phraseological synonyms and antonyms from the standpoint of semantics, component composition, structural organisation was conducted. The paradigms considered in the course of the study can be included into a comprehensive dictionary of the Russian dialects and help to replenish dictionaries of synonyms and antonyms. Looking forward, it may be possible to identify and analyse paradigmatic relations of dialectal phraseological units using material from other dictionaries of the Russian dialects.

О ИМЕНИЦАМА СА СЕКУНДАРНИМ ЗНАЧЕЊЕМ НОСИОЦА КАРАКТЕРНЕ ОСОБИНЕ У РЕЧНИКУ СРПСКИХ ГОВОРА ВОЈВОДИНЕ

The aim of this paper is to analyze the lexemes of the Serbian speeches in Vojvodina whose secondary meanings are used in naming people with specific personality features. The research material was excerpted from the most prominent dialect dictionary in which the lexemes of these speeches are presented. The most important noun groups were distinguished according to the transformation potential of their primary lexical meanings. Given the type of material we analyzed, the lexical meanings were viewed as a set of semantic components. Also, a description of metaphorical and metonymical transfers were given on the examples of the analyzed lexemes.

The sociological context of research into language of villagers

The article is an attempt at presenting the context of the linguistic situation in rural areas. New findings offered by sociology, geography of the country and other disciplines dealing with rural areas indicate clearly that contemporary dialectology requires methodological re-orientation. As a consequence, there is a growing need of referring to a language spoken by inhabitants of rural areas rather than a traditional dialect. There is also growing awareness of the value of local culture and an imperative to cultivate it, accompanied by an urgent need of compiling own dictionaries of dialects.

Predictors of correct interpretation of English and Bulgarian idioms by Russian speakers

During intercultural communication, it is crucial to interpret correctly and to use appropriately foreign idioms which are culturally marked and reflect linguistic and cultural identity of a speech community. Interlocutors should be aware of the cultural and historical precedents that gave rise to the primary image underlying idiomatic expressions and thus created their unique phraseological worldview. The aim of the research is to find out what is a better predictor of correct idiom interpretation - degree of proficiency in a foreign language or degree of genealogical kinship between the native and foreign languages. The topicality of the research is justified by the need for a deeper understanding of linguistic and cultural identity of native and foreign-language speakers, with a view to facilitate and enhance cross-cultural communication. The working hypothesis is that due to the close genealogical kinship between Russian and Bulgarian and the users advanced level of English, the number of correctly interpreted idioms may vary within a statistically significant medium range. The total sample comprises 5000 idioms (2500 English and 2500 Bulgarian ones). The subsample used in the experiment comprises 60 idioms (30 English and 30 Bulgarian ones) selected from The Oxford Dictionary of Idioms and Nov fraseologichen rechnik na bylgarskiya jezik (Нов фразеологичен речник на българския език) by means of stratified systematic sampling. The main methods used in the research include (1) comparative linguistic and cultural analyses, (2) scientific experimentation, (3) systematic and stratified sampling, and (4) a paired t-test. The experimental research and the paired t-test have proved our hypothesis and demonstrated that Russian participants correctly decode more Bulgarian than English idioms, with intergroup variation being statistically significant. Research findings have implications for cultural linguistics. Since translation loans (calques), isomorphic idioms, and idioms dating back to a common source are interpreted more quickly and more accurately than idioms which contain unique or culturally-loaded elements, such as old-fashioned words or proper names, access to cultural precedents that served as prototypes of set expressions contributes to a more seamless code-switching and enables communicants to penetrate deeper the mentality of a specific linguacultural community and thus become aware of the variability of cultural cognition and conceptualisation.

Miejsce gwary opoczyńskiej w lokalnej prasie (na przykładzie kieleckich „Przemian”)

The local press is hardly ever used for dialectological studies. Press texts from the Kielce monthly “Przemiany”; 1970–1989 can be a valuable source of language material for both the study of the language system of the Opoczno dialect and the dialect lexicon. They are represented by 26 chats from the Opoczno area and Opoczno proverbs. For the purpose of this article, I have extracted dialect vocabulary – 61 words from chats – and compared them with dictionary materials from other sources of Polish dialect lexicography: a collection of K. Dejna’s folk vocabulary, Słownik gwar małopolskich (Glossary of Little Poland dialects), Słownik gwary opoczyńskiej (Glossary of Opoczno dialects), the alphabetical index of words from the dictionary Słownik polskich gwar (Dictionary of Polish dialects). The research results show differences in the resources of this lexicon in the sources listed. They confirm the usefullness of press materials for lexicographic research.

Verbs with the Meaning ‘Change Facial Expression to Denoting Negative Emotions’ in Dictionary of Dialect Speaker

The material for the article was the author’s dictionary of a resident of the Ust-Tsilemsky district of the Komi Republic. The author of the article dwells on the characteristics of the verbs grouped on the basis of a common meaning ‘to change a neutral facial expression to denoting negative emotions’. The novelty of the research is seen in the fact that the considered group of dialectal verbs has not previously attracted the attention of researchers. The author notes that the form of the headword of the verbs in the author’s dictionary is conditioned both by the structure of a person’s memory and by their very lexical meaning, which contains a qualitative shade of perfect meaning. It is emphasized that the verbs are either not recorded in “professional” dialectal dictionaries, or their other meanings are noted in them. The author proceeds from the fact that dictionaries compiled by non- professional lexicographers are valuable in determining the lexical composition of a dialect and clarifying the meanings of dialectisms. It is concluded that the verbs of this group are differently active in the memory of the dialect speaker: the word istravitsya is recorded in the vocabulary variants several times and turns out to be used for a large number of situations, other lexemes turn out to be less frequent and more specific in their relevance to the described circumstances. It has been proven that verbs have a transparent inner form, including specially described motivational features of words that are thematically related to the means of one code — culinary and gastronomic.

Little Fire, Zygmunt! You are a Guest and I am a Guest… Conceptualization of Fire as a Living Creature in the Polish Folk Culture. An Ethnolinguistic Analysis

The analysis is focused on the reconstruction of an image of fire as a living creature, preserved in the Polish folk culture. This image is corroborated by linguistic data, e.g. names, epithets, established connections, riddles, proverbs, formulas of greeting and bidding farewell to a home fire and of obviating fire, as well as by “paralinguistic data” that is beliefs and practices. Conceptualization of natural phenomena (such as fire) in the categories of a living “being” has a general cultural character, corresponds to a vision of the world as an integrated organism whose components are endowed with life and consciousness, and can be a manifestation of the mythical perception of the world. The analysed material has been acquired from dictionaries of dialects, works of folklore collectors and archive resources (i.e. the Ethnolinguistic Archive of Maria Curie-Skłodowska University and the File of the Dictionary of Polish Dialects of the Polish Academy of Sciences).

Spoken word corpus and dictionary definition for an African language

The preservation of languages is critical to maintaining and strengthening the cultures and identities of communities, and this is especially true for under-resourced languages with a predominantly oral culture. Most African languages have a relatively short literary past, and as such the task of dictionary making cannot rely on textual corpora as has been the standard practice in lexicography. This paper emphasizes the significance of the spoken word and the oral tradition as repositories of vocabulary, and argues that spoken word corpora greatly outweigh the value of printed texts for lexicography. We describe a methodology for creating a digital dialectal dictionary for the Igbo language from such a spoken word corpus. We also highlight the language technology tools and resources that have been created to support the transcription of thousands of hours of Igbo speech and the subsequent compilation of these transcriptions into an XML-encoded textual corpus of Igbo dialects. The methodology described in this paper can serve as a blueprint that can be adopted for other under-resourced languages that have predominantly oral cultures.

Extending phpMorhy with dialect words

This paper describes the work done to create a tool for adding new (dialect) words into the dictionary of phpMorphy. PhpMorphy is a tool written in PHP which helps to annotate a word with grammatical information. It was chosen because it needs not to be trained and it can be integrated into PHP based text corpora search system relatively simply. The search is planned to be done over inverse index of words. The search requests are supposed to contain desired grammatical description of words (eg, “find all feminine adjectives”, etc.). For that reason inverse index should contain grammatical information. The process of adding new words into phpMorphy dictionary technically is not hard however it is time consuming and tedious. To facilitate this work the mentioned tool was developed. Also paper describes the process how the words to add into the phpMorphy dictionary were selected. The words from the given dialect dictionary were run through phpMorphy. If phpMorphy correctly recognizes a word, then it should not be added into the phpMorphy dictionary. Otherwise it should be.

On Some Names of Braga and Moonshine in Northern Russian Dialects

The article represents the description of the group of homemade alcoholic beverages names, which exist in the dialects of Arkhangelsk, Vologda and Kostroma regions. The study is based on lexical materials of the oponymic Expedition of the Ural University, as well as dialect dictionaries, which include the lexemes used on the territory of the Russian North. The peculiarities of vocabulary formation and the influence of social, demographic and economic factors on its formation are revealed. Semantic-motivational and etymological analysis of dialectal lexemes showed that this group of vocabulary, along with the original Northern Russian units, includes borrowings from Volga dialects, semi-professional languages and the words originating from foreign sources (polonism, turkism). The author identified sustained motivational models presented in the considered nominations: the semantics of "homemade intoxicating drink" emerges from the alteration of meanings "low-quality liquid"; "disorder, bustle", "prank, hooligan"; "talk, chatter". The peculiarities of this lexical group were influenced by governmental bans on home brewing: there are a large number of euphemisms and variability of the lexical group. Compared with beer, home brew and moonshine in the Russian North were considered second-rate drinks and were associated with alcohol addiction, while drinking beer rarely caused social condemnation.

Lexical Vernacular in the Speech of Literary Language Users Residing in Perm Region

The article considers the influence of dialectal layer of the languages by means of incorporating vernaculars into the lexical system of the literary language. It is stated that substandard verbs most frequently get the status of colloquial verbs due to their expressive semantic content or to their wider area of usage. The material for the analysis was 24 substandard verbal lexemes recorded in the explanatory and dialectal dictionaries of the Russian language and found in the speech of native speakers of the literary language. Data on the use of these units were obtained from recordings of the speech of residents of Perm and cities of Perm Krai (the total duration of the audio is about 30 hours). The research is based on the description of the semantic and functional-stylistic potential of vernacular vocabulary. The dynamics of stylistic characteristics of a word is described on the basis of the data recorded in lexicographic publications of different years. It is shown that the transition of words from one subsystem of the Russian language to another is a natural and logical process that contributes to the enrichment of the vocabulary of the Russian language. It has been confirmed that vernacular is a transitional space between dialects and literary language.

V.N. Dobrovolsky and Smolensk Regional Dictionary: Possibilities of Use for Dialect Studies

The article deals with Smolensk Regional Dictionary compiled by a famous researcher of Smolensk dialects V.N. Dobrovolsky. This unique set of regional vocabulary of the early XX century is an invaluable source that can be
 used for dialectological research. Released in 1914, Dobrovolsky’s work is now
 a kind of historical basis for a modern «Dictionary of Smolensk Dialects», a reprint
 of which is being prepared at the Russian language department of Smolensk
 State University.
 The article analyzes principles of compiling Dobrovolsky’s Dictionary in
 detail and describes methodology used for collecting dialect material. The great interest to modern dialectologists is caused by the reasons for the changes in the composition of Smolensk dialects for half a century, that is, since the beginning
 of the dialect material collection. The article analyzes samples of the dictionary
 entries and their content in detail. In addition, it highlites advantages and certain
 disadvantages of giving examples illustrating the meanings of dialect
 words. The author considers possibilities of using V.N. Dobrovolsky’s work for
 modern dialectologists’ research.
 The detailed analysis of the various dictionary entries makes it possible to compare the principles of the words presentation in the dialect dictionary of the early XX century and the modern one, which is of great use for lexicographers. Moreover, it can also assist to identify some aspects that should be paid attention today in the examination of Smolensk territories (for example, the existence of diminutive popular forms of personal names).