Phraseology in historical dictionaries

Conference item

Phraseology poses a challenge e.g. to describing polysemy or positioning within the structure of dictionaries. These kind of problems have not yet been resolved in German lexicography. In this lecture I will talk about a special field of phraseology - the historical phraseology related to practical experiences in the revised edition of the "Deutsches Worterbuch von Jacob Grimm und Wilhelm Grimm".

The first problem with historical phrases is to identify them. From a synchronic point of view, phraseology is defined by frequency and persistency of a syntagma which can be detected by analyzing a large number of texts (e.g. in electronic corpora) written in present-day language. But how can a phrase in middle high German or old high German be identified when your perception is based on only a few sources, sometimes only one? In lexicography one often gets the impression to be dealing with some kind of idiom of an older stage of a language without being able to prove it. The second problem is how to embed these constructions into the microstructure of a dictionary. To illustrate the problem, I will give examples from different German dictionaries with various concepts affecting the handling of phraseology. These examples will demonstrate the pros and cons of the different systems. However, none of these are able to describe idiomatic syntagmas holistically. These aspects will be discussed on the basis of the current state of research from the user's as well as the lexicographer's perspective. Finally, I will point out the solution that has been considered acceptable in the "Deutsches Worterbuch", thereby leading to my central question for the discussion: Would it be an advantage to take such language structures out of dictionaries describing single words, and placing them in an own phraseology dictionary instead?

Authors: Elsner-Petri, S

• Alternative title: Presented at Phraseology session
• Publication status: Not published
• Peer review status: Reviewed (other)
• Language: English
• Keywords: phraseology
• Subjects: Lexicography