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Do dictionary users really look up frequent words? — on the overestimation of the value of corpus-based lexicography


G de Schryver
D Joffe
P Joffe
S Hillewaert

Abstract

An innovative online Swahili–English dictionary project is presented. A careful study of some of the log files attached to this reference work reveals some hitherto unknown as-pects of true dictionary look-up behaviour, which results in the depreciation of the importance of corpora for dictionary making. Three lexicography software modules are advanced to further enhance the success of the online dictionary.

Keywords: lexicography, software, online, dictionary, log file, corpus, frequency, rank, correlation, swahili, english, tshwanelex

Journal Identifiers


eISSN: 2224-0039
print ISSN: 1684-4904