Building consistent dictionary definitions

Abstract

This paper is focused on the syntactic and semantic structures of dictionary definitions (in Czech). The former are explored by means of the partial syntactic parser Dis and their main types are presented together with their frequencies obtained from the sample of thousands dictionary definitions. It is shown that it is important to know valency frames for nouns that serve as genus proximum parts of the dictionary definitions. Then the distinguisher parts of the definitions are examined and the conclusion is made about their semantic structures. It is pointed out that a special semantic metalanguage will be necessary for the description of the semantic structures of the distinguishers. As a base for such language the formalism of transparent intensional logic (TIL) is suggested. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2003.