Dictionaries

Abstract

The present article starts by discussing the usefulness to word-formation research of general dictionaries and some types of specialist dictionary, before turning to dictionary types designed to give a lexicographic description of a language's word-formation system. Depending on the main lemma type (morpheme, derivative, word family or word nest), a distinction may be made between several types of morpheme dictionary, word family dictionaries and word-formation dictionaries, which in turn may differ in their macrostructures and microstructures. The article concludes by exploring the weight given to information on word-formation in the macrostructures and microstructures of a variety of dictionaries. Information on word-formation is found to be relevant to wordformation research not only as a tool or as a result of research, but also as a means of supporting receptive and productive language activities and of contributing to linguistic standardization and codification.