字典是怎么编的?

It is widely believed that every word has a correct meaning, that we learn these meanings mainly from teachers and grammarians, and that dictionaries and grammars are the supreme¹ authority in matters of meaning and usage. Few people ask by what authority the writers of dictionaries and grammars say what the say. I once got into a dispute with an English woman over the pronunciation of a word and offered to look it up in the dictionary. The English woman said firmly, "What for? I am English. I was born and brought up in England. The way I speak is English." Such self-assurance about one's own language is fairly common among the English. In the United States, however, anyone who is willing to quarrel with the dictionary is regarded as either eccentric or mad.

Let us see how dictionaries are made and how the editors arrive at definitions. What follows applies only to those dictionary offices where first-hand, original research goes on - not those in which editors simply copy existing dictionaries. The task of writing a dictionary begins with the reading of vast amounts of the literature of the period or subject that the dictionary is to cover. As the editors read, they copy on cards every interesting or rare word, every unusual or peculiar² occurrence of a common word, a large number of common words in their ordinary uses, and also the sentences in which each of these words appears.

That is to say, the context of each word is collected, along with the word itself. For a really big job of dictionary writing, such as the Oxford³ English Dictionary, millions of such cards are collected, and the task of editing occupies decades. As the cards are collected, they are alphabetized and sorted. When the sorting is completed, where will be for each word anywhere from two or three to several hundred quotations⁴, each on its card.

To define a word, then, the dictionary editor places before him the stack of cards illustrating⁵ that word; each of the cards represents an actual use of the word by a writer of some literary or historical importance. He reads the cards carefully, discards some, re-reads the rest, and divides up the stack according to what he thinks are the several senses of the word. Finally, he writes his definitions, following the hard-and-fast rule that each definition must be based on what the quotations in front of him reveal about the meaning of the word. The editor cannot be influenced by what the thinks a given word ought to mean. He must work according to the cards, or not at all.

The writing of a dictionary, therefore, is not a task of setting up authoritative⁶ statements about the "true meanings" of words, but a task of recording⁷, to the best of one's ability, what various words have meant to authors in the distant or immediate⁸ past. If, for example, we had been writing a dictionary in 1890, or even as late as 1919, we could have said that the word "broadcase" means "to scatter⁹" (seed, for example), but we could not have states that from 1921 on, the most common meaning of the word should become "to send out programs by radio or television." In choosing our words when we speak or write, we can be guided by the historical record provided us by the dictionary, but we cannot be bound by it, because new situations, new experiences, new inventions, new feelings, are always forcing us to give new uses to old words. Looking under a "hood," we should ordinarily have found, five hundred years ago, a monk¹⁰; today, we find a car engine.

 

1 supreme   

adj.极度的，最重要的；至高的，最高的

参考例句：

• It was the supreme moment in his life.那是他一生中最重要的时刻。
• He handed up the indictment to the supreme court.他把起诉书送交最高法院。

2 peculiar   

adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的

参考例句：

• He walks in a peculiar fashion.他走路的样子很奇特。
• He looked at me with a very peculiar expression.他用一种很奇怪的表情看着我。

3 Oxford   

n.牛津（英国城市）

参考例句：

• At present he has become a Professor of Chemistry at Oxford.他现在已是牛津大学的化学教授了。
• This is where the road to Oxford joins the road to London.这是去牛津的路与去伦敦的路的汇合处。

4 quotations   

n.引用( quotation的名词复数 )；[商业]行情（报告）；（货物或股票的）市价；时价

参考例句：

• The insurance company requires three quotations for repairs to the car. 保险公司要修理这辆汽车的三家修理厂的报价单。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• These quotations cannot readily be traced to their sources. 这些引语很难查出出自何处。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

5 illustrating   

给…加插图( illustrate的现在分词 )； 说明； 表明； （用示例、图画等）说明

参考例句：

• He upstaged the other speakers by illustrating his talk with slides. 他演讲中配上幻灯片，比其他演讲人更吸引听众。
• Material illustrating detailed structure of graptolites has been etched from limestone by means of hydrofluoric acid. 表明笔石详细构造的物质是利用氢氟酸从石灰岩中侵蚀出来。

6 authoritative   

adj.有权威的，可相信的；命令式的；官方的

参考例句：

• David speaks in an authoritative tone.大卫以命令的口吻说话。
• Her smile was warm but authoritative.她的笑容很和蔼，同时又透着威严。

7 recording   

n.录音，记录

参考例句：

• How long will the recording of the song take?录下这首歌得花多少时间？
• I want to play you a recording of the rehearsal.我想给你放一下彩排的录像。

8 immediate   

adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的

参考例句：

• His immediate neighbours felt it their duty to call.他的近邻认为他们有责任去拜访。
• We declared ourselves for the immediate convocation of the meeting.我们主张立即召开这个会议。

9 scatter   

vt.撒，驱散，散开；散布/播；vi.分散，消散

参考例句：

• You pile everything up and scatter things around.你把东西乱堆乱放。
• Small villages scatter at the foot of the mountain.村庄零零落落地散布在山脚下。

10 monk   

n.和尚，僧侣，修道士

参考例句：

• The man was a monk from Emei Mountain.那人是峨眉山下来的和尚。
• Buddhist monk sat with folded palms.和尚合掌打坐。