This book introduces the reader to the changing notions of the lexicon and dictionary-making, using a convergence of perspectives from computational linguistics, corpus linguistics, and computational lexicography/lexicology. The main issues include: the relation between lexicon and corpus; corpus-based lexical modelling of language; the computational storage of the lexicon. From this, the book constructs and applies a framework for lexicon-building to a case study. It also stresses the importance of the Internet and World Wide Web for dictionary research and study.
Professional and academic lexicographers present and discuss innovations, ideas, and developments in all aspects of electronic lexicography including dictionary-writing systems and the integration of corpora for every kind of dictionary in every format.
An investigation into the way people use language in speech and writing, this volume introduces the corpus-based approach, which is based on analysis of large databases of real language examples stored on computer.
A linguistic corpus is a collection of texts which have been selected and brought together so that language can be studied on the computer. Today, corpus linguistics offers some of the most powerful new procedures for the analysis of language, and the impact of this dynamic and expanding sub-discipline is making itself felt in many areas of language study. In this volume, a selection of leading experts in various key areas of corpus construction offer advice in a readable and largely non-technical style to help the reader to ensure that their corpus is well designed and fit for the intended purpose. This guide is aimed at those who are at some stage of building a linguistic corpus. Little or no knowledge of corpus linguistics or computational procedures is assumed, although it is hoped that more advanced users will find the guidelines here useful. It is also aimed at those who are not building a corpus, but who need to know something about the issues involved in the design of corpora in order to choose between available resources and to help draw conclusions from their studies.
The first book of its kind, Learner English on Computer is intended to provide linguists, students of linguistics and modern languages, and ELT professionals with a highly accessible and comprehensive introduction to the new and rapidly-expanding field of corpus-based research into learner language. Edited by the founder and co-ordinator of the International Corpus of Learner English (ICLE), the book contains articles on all aspects of corpus compilation, design and analysis. The book is divided into three main sections; in Part I, the first chapter provides the reader with an overview of the field, explaining links with corpus and applied linguistics, second language acquisition and ELT. The second chapter reviews the software tools which are currently available for analysing learner language and contains useful examples of how they can be used. Part 2 contains eight case studies in which computer learner corpora are analysed for various lexical, discourse and grammatical features. The articles contain a wide range of methodologies with broad general application. The chapters in Part 3 look at how Computer Learner Corpus (CLC) based studies can help improve pedagogical tools: EFL grammars, dictionaries, writing textbooks and electronic tools. Implications for classroom methodology are also discussed. The comprehensive scope of this volume should be invaluable to applied linguists and corpus linguists as well as to would-be learner corpus builders and analysts who wish to discover more about a new, exciting and fast-growing field of research.
Contrastive studies have experienced a dramatic revival in the last decades. By combining the methodological advantages of computer corpus linguistics and the possibility of contrasting texts in two or more languages, the structure and use of languages can be explored with greater accuracy, detail and empirical strength than before. The approach has also proved to have fruitful practical applications in a number of areas such as language teaching, lexicography, translation studies and computer-aided translation. This volume contains twelve studies comparing linguistic phenomena in English and seven other languages. The topics range from comparisons of specific lexical categories and word combinations to syntactic constructions and discourse phenomena such as cohesion and thematic structure. The studies highlight similarities and differences in the use, semantics and functions of the compared items, as well as the emergence of new meanings and language change. The emphasis varies from purely linguistic studies to those focusing on practical applications.
This book in the Edinburgh Textbooks in Empirical Linguistics series is a comprehensive introduction to the statistics currently used in corpus linguistics. Statistical techniques and corpus applications - whether oriented towards linguistics or language engineering - often go hand in glove, and corpus linguists have used an increasingly wide variety of statistics, drawing on techniques developed in a great many fields. This is the first one-volume introduction to the subject.
Corpus Linguistics has quickly established itself as the leading undergraduate course book in the subject. This second edition takes full account of the latest developments in the rapidly changing field, making this the most up-to-date and comprehensive textbook available. It gives a step-by-step introduction to what a corpus is, how corpora are constructed, and what can be done with them. Each chapter ends with a section of study questions that contain practical corpus-based exercises.* Designed for student use, with all technical terms explained in the text and referenced further in a Glossary* Examples are taken from existing corpora; detailed case study chapter included* Contains end-of-chapter summaries, study questions and suggestions for further reading* Updated reviews of new studies, areas that have recently come to prominence and new directions in corpus encoding and annotation standards* Detailed coverage of multilingual corpus construction and use* An in-depth historical review of computer-based corpora from the 1940s to the present day* Helpful appendices include answers to the study questions, up-to-date information on where corpora can be found, and the latest software for corpus research."e;[An] important addition to the fast growing literature in corpus linguistics... should be read by anyone interested in utilization of large-scale corpora in linguistic research."e; Studies in the Linguistic Sciences, on the first edition
Specialised linguistic research needs can no longer be met by available software. This book enables the researcher to write programs for text and corpus processing, using the popular and easy to learn Java language.
