The Bilingual Usage Dictionary

Dušan Gabrovšek

doi:10.4312/elope.17.2.47-59

Authors

Dušan Gabrovšek University of Ljubljana

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.4312/elope.17.2.47-59

Keywords:

English usage, dictionary of usage, monolingual vs. bilingual, English/Slovene usage dictionary

Abstract

The paper highlights the dictionary of English usage as a type of specialized language dictionary. Such dictionaries have been created in either the time-honored prescriptivist tradition or the more recent descriptivist one. Virtually all dictionaries of English usage are monolingual, i.e. all-English. While most dictionaries of English usage have been designed for native speakers of English, there are also a few notable works made particularly for non-native speakers of the language. The main part of the paper is devoted to the suggestion and formulation of guidelines for creating a bilingual, specifically English/Slovene encoding-oriented usage dictionary as a useful, reliable, varied, and user-friendly work of reference intended primarily for advanced-level Slovene speakers of English. The dictionary offers some features that are uncommon in today’s dictionaries, especially the use of both languages in many entries, and some entries challenging the user to find the solution to the language problem listed for themselves. The final section presents 20 selected entries from the envisioned usage dictionary.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

References

Aarts, Bas, Sylvia Chalker, and Edmund S.C. Weiner. 2014. The Oxford Dictionary of English Grammar, 2nd ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Algeo, John. 1991. “Sweet Are the Usages of Diversity.” Word 42 (1): 1–17. https://doi.org/10.1080/00437956.1991.11435829.

Allen, Robert E. 2009. “Dictionaries of Usage.” In The Oxford History of English Lexicography, Volume II: Specialized Dictionaries, edited by Anthony P. Cowie, 339–60. Oxford: Clarendon Press.

Beare, Kenneth. 2018a. “Countable and Uncountable Nouns: The Basics.” ThoughtCo.com. https://www.thoughtco.com/countable-and-uncountable-nouns-1210697?utm_campaign=grammartip&utm_medium=email&utm_source=cn_nl&utm_content=16516592&utm_term=.

—. 2018b. “Commonly Confused Word Pairs for ESL Learners.” ThoughtCo.com. https://www.thoughtco.com/commonly-confused-word-pairs-p2-1209091.

Brians, Paul. (2004) 2013. “Common Errors in English.” Washington State University, The Web Site of Professor Paul Brians. https://brians.wsu.edu/common-errors/. [Also a printed book: Brians, Paul. [2004] 2013. Common Errors in English Usage, 3rd ed. Wilsonville, OR: William, James & Co.]

Brown, Keith, and Jim Miller. 2013. The Cambridge Dictionary of Linguistics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Butterfield, Jeremy, ed. 2015. Fowler’s Dictionary of Modern English Usage, 4th ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Collins. 2020a. “Browse all Official Collins Dictionaries.” https://www.collinsdictionary.com/browse/.

—. 2020b. “Browse the English Usage.” https://grammar.collinsdictionary.com/browse/english-usage/.

Fowler, Henry Watson. 1926. Modern English Usage. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

Fox, Chris, and Rosalind Combley, eds. 2014. Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English, 6th ed. Harlow, Essex: Pearson Education. https://www.ldocelonline.com.

Garner, Bryan A. 2016. Garner’s Modern English Usage. Rev. 4th ed. of Garner’s Modern American Usage. New York: Oxford University Press.

Garner, Bryan A., and Robert L. Greene. 2012. “Which Language and Grammar Rules to Flout.” The New York Times, September 27, 2012. https://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2012/09/27/which-language-and-grammar-rules-to-flout.

Garrett, Peter. 2010. Attitudes to Language. Key Concepts in Sociolinguistics. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Gilman, E. Ward, ed. 1989. Webster’s Dictionary of English Usage. A Merriam-Webster®. Springfield, MA: Merriam-Webster.

Gómez González, María de los Ángeles, J. Lachlan Mackenzie, and Elsa M. González Álvarez, eds. 2008. Current Trends in Contrastive Linguistics. Studies in Functional and Structural Linguistics, Vol. 60. Amsterdam: John Benjamins Publishing.

Granger, Sylviane. 2015. “Contrastive Interlanguage Analysis: A Reappraisal.” International Journal of Learner Corpus Research 1 (1): 7–24. https://doi.org/10.1075/ijlcr.1.1.01gra.

Hands, Penny, ed. 2019. Collins COBUILD English Usage, 4th ed. Glasgow: Collins/HarperCollins Publishers.

Hartmann, R.R.K., and Gregory James. 1998. Dictionary of Lexicography. London and New York: Routledge.

James, Carl. 1980. Contrastive Analysis. Rptd. with corrections 1983. Harlow, Essex: Longman Group.

Longman. n.d. “Longman Dictionary of Contemporary English Online.” https://www.ldoceonline.com/.

McIntosh, Colin, ed. 2013. Cambridge Advanced Learner’s Dictionary, 4th ed. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Merriam-Webster. 2020. “Merriam-Webster Learner’s Dictionary.” https://learnersdictionary.com/.

Meyer, Charles F. 1993. “Investigating Disputed Usages.” In Language Variation in North American English: Research and Teaching, edited by A. Wayne Glowka and Donald M. Lance, 302–12. New York: Modern Language Association of America.

Nordquist, Richard. 2020a. “An Introduction to Punctuation.” ThoughtCo. https://www.thoughtco.com/punctuation-definition-1691702.

—. 2020b. “Glossary of Usage: Index of Commonly Confused Words.” ThoughtCo. https://www.thoughtco.com/commonly-confused-words-s2-1692693.

Partridge, Eric H. (1942) 1999. Usage and Abusage: A Guide to Good English, 3rd ed. Edited by Janet Whitcut. London: Penguin Books.

Punctuation Guide, The. 2011–2020. https://www.thepunctuationguide.com/.

Schwarz, C.M., and M.A. Seaton, eds. 1985. Chambers Concise Usage Dictionary. [Edinburgh:] W & R Chambers.

Sinclair, John McH., ed. 1992. Collins COBUILD English Usage for Learners. Glasgow: HarperCollins Publishers.

Stein, Gabriele. 2013. A Usage Dictionary English-German / German-English. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter.

Swan, Michael. (1980) 2016. Practical English Usage, 4th ed. Oxford: Oxford University Press. [4th ed. abandons the A–Z format in favor of a thematic arrangement]

Todd, Loreto. 1997. The Cassell Dictionary of English Usage. London: Cassell.

Trask, Robert Lawrence. 2001. Mind the Gaffe: The Penguin Guide to Common Errors in English. London: Penguin Group/Penguin Books.

Turton, Nigel D., and John Brian Heaton. 1996. Longman Dictionary of Common Errors, 2nd ed. Harlow, Essex: Addison Wesley Longman.