Comparison between a Dictionary and Roget’s Thesaurus

Content

0. Introduction

1. Concise overview of the historical development of dictionaries

2. General purposes of dictionaries
2.1.) Organization of a dictionary in detail
2.2.) Dictionary information

3. What is a Thesaurus?

4. History of the Roget's Thesaurus

5. Construction and content of Roget's Thesaurus

6. Conclusion

7. Works cited

0.) Introduction

What is the most likely performed action of a person who stumbles over a yet to him unknown or unfamiliar word? It is neither the internet nor the television (which holds plenty of information and is without a doubt the most important source in requiring recent news) but the dictionary he will seek his information in.

In the time of globalization, the influence and significance of communicating with humans of different speaking languages is raising. Language is first of all a means of communication and it is no exaggeration if one is proclaiming that knowing more than the native tongue and being at least bilingual has become a normalcy.

If we want to understand and communicate with people of other nations, we ultimately have to learn their language and vice versa. Dictionaries provide the basic information if it is about learning something of different languages. The importance of the dictionary becomes evident by the fact that over 90 % of households in Britain possess at least one dictionary, therefore making it far more popular than the Bible, which was to be found in about 80 % of households in England in 1983, according to the Bible Society. ¹

The dictionary being referred to in this term paper is one particular type of dictionary, namely the monolingual dictionary for the adult native speaker of English. The aim of this work is to outline the history as well as the structure of a common dictionary. How is it arranged, what content and information does it provide and what purposes does it fulfil? These and other questions will be subjects of concern.

Besides dictionaries, other helpful sources exist in attaining a language's vocabulary, phrases and synonyms. One of these excellent sources is a thesaurus, which will be the subject of the second half in this term paper. Stress is being put on the history as well as the structure and content of a thesaurus.

1.) Concise overview of the historical development of dictionaries

To consult a dictionary is regarded as a normalcy in nowadays modern world. This convenience, however, is but one out of many inventions that we take for granted. Surprisingly, the dictionary as we know it today cannot be dated back further then 350 years from now. ² One of the earliest dictionaries known is a Latin dictionary, written during the reign of the emperor Augustus. (23 September 63 BC — 19 August AD 14) The title reads "De Significatu Verborum" ("on the meaning of words") and it was more than once abridged.

The first monolingual dictionary of the English language was the Table Alphabeticall of 1604 A.D., created by Robert Cawdrey. The first version contained little more than 254³ headwords, compiled in 120 pages. Every headword was provided with a brief definition (rarely exceeding more than a few words, usually synonyms) additionally marking those words of French or Greek origin. While Cawdrey's definitions contained little more than synonyms the succeeding dictionary was regarded as the first one to be at all comprehensive. The dictionary of concern is the Glossographia of 1656 A.D. by Thomas Blount. It was the largest English dictionary when it was published, containing around 11,000 words. His aim, however, was not to offer a complete listing of English words but rather to define and explain unusual terms of literature. The Glossographia is in many regards outstanding: It was the first dictionary citing sources for the words being defined, the first to include etymologies as well as the first dictionary that depicted illustrations. This dictionary is without exaggeration groundbreaking in its kind but it does not come close to what is known as a dictionary today. The transition from the first English dictionaries to our modern ones is being made by the Oxford English Dictionary (OED). The development of what was to become the most comprehensive record of the English language started out as a project in 1860 in London and was not completed until 1928 A.D. The OED was planned as a four-volume, 6,400- page work that would include all English language vocabulary from the Early Middle English period (1150 A.D.) onward. When it was first published in 1928, in had expanded up to 10 volumes, containing more than 400,000 words with some 2.5 million quotations, and was published under the spectacular name A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles. Meanwhile, a second version of the OED was published in 1989, consisting of more than 20 volumes. Currently, work is being done to publish a third edition which is thought off to be a more polished version of the preceding second edition.

Until the release of the third version, impatient people have the possibility to view the new content via the OED Online version. Some hotly discussion is going on about whether the OED3 will ever be printed or whether it will only be available through the medium of a computer. The OED3 to date (May 2005) has covered the alphabet range m — Papua New Guinea.3 Online dictionaries are gradually spreading in the Net. Although these dictionaries constantly expand in content, they only provide additional information to a common dictionary. Therefore, online dictionaries function as an ideal complement but not as a substitution for dictionaries.

2.) General purposes of dictionaries

Before an outline on the structure and classification of a dictionary can be given, the main tasks of a lexicon need to be revealed and explained first. This is due to the fact, that the purpose of a dictionary severely influences its construction and the detailed information being given on each single word.

So what purposes and needs of a reader does a dictionary have to match? There are, of course, multitudes of reasons why someone is consulting a dictionary. It would be hilarious, even with a slightly insane, if one surrenders the attempt to explain the possible reasons for which a user is approaching the stored knowledge of a language. Therefore, the approach cannot take place on the side of the user but only on the side of the dictionary and the information it entails. The main purposes of dictionaries are evident. Here, all the words of a language are stored and arranged on the basis of an alphabetical order. Furthermore, a short definition of the word in question is being given, escorted with remarks on usage and meaning differences that sometimes accompany that particular word. Last but not least, a word's orthography as well as pronunciation (following in parentheses the word in question) is displayed. A typical exertion of a dictionary can depict this foregoing description best.

A representative example is the entry of the word "God".⁴ The entry according to the Webster's New World Dictionary of the American Language holds the following explanation:

God (god), n. [ME & AS. god; akin to G. gott, Goth. guth, etc.;prob. IE. Base* ghawa -, to call out to, to invoke], 1. any of various beings conceived as supernatural, immortal and having special powers over the lives and affairs of people and the course of nature; deity, especially a male deity. 2. an image that is worshipped; idol. 3. a person or thing deified or excessively honored and admired. 4. [G-], (also occas. god), in monotheistic religions, the creator and ruler of the universe, regarded as eternal, infinite, all-powerful, and all-knowing; Supreme Being; Almighty. Often used in exclamations, as, good God! God almighty! my God!

God (god), n. [ME & AS. god; akin to G. gott, Goth. guth, etc.;prob. IE. Base* ghawa -, to call out to, to invoke], 1. any of various beings conceived as supernatural, immortal and having special powers over the lives and affairs of people and the course of nature; deity, especially a male deity. 2. an image that is worshipped; idol. 3. a person or thing deified or excessively honored and admired. 4. [G-], (also occas. god), in monotheistic religions, the creator and ruler of the universe, regarded as eternal, infinite, all-powerful, and all-knowing; Supreme Being; Almighty. Often used in exclamations, as, good God! God almighty! my God!

What becomes evident by examining this excerpt is that there is much more information offered to the reader as was assumed. For example, the abbreviation ME from the dictionary entry above stands for Middle English and the abbreviation AS stand for Anglo-Saxon. This information is part of the Etymology of a dictionary. Etymology is ⁵

"The study of the origin, basic meaning, and development of individual words as well as of their relationship to words in different languages of the same origin. In ancient times the search for the original semantic motivation of a word was essentially the search for the essence and origin of the thing denoted by the word, which was believed to be revealed in the original meaning of the word."

This example illustrates, that the conception of a lexicon is structured in precise detail, which leads us to a closer examination of a dictionary's organization.

[...]

¹ Robert Ilson, Dictionaries, Lexicography and Language Learning (Frankfurt 1985),1.

² www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dictionary.

³ www.Wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxford English Dictionary

⁴ New World Dictionary of the American Language, s.v. "God". 5.

⁵ Routledge Dictionary of Language and Linguistics, s.v. "etymology". 5.