How dictionaries are made

October 10, 2009 | Posted by profanglais

Most modern dictionary publishers use a huge database of sample of language in order to see how a word is being used at this present moment in time. This is very important, because meanings of words can change very rapidly, especially in our modern Internet age.

These databases are know as a ‘corpus’. The samples are taken from many different sources, including newspapers, television, interviews, books, cartoons etc. The lexicographer can then compare the same word used in various contexts in order to write an accurate definition.

There is a corpus of British English available free online at http://www.natcorp.ox.ac.uk/.

Try entering a word a have a look at the examples given. You will have a better understanding of how the word or phrase is used in context.

Another way of seeing language in context is to ‘google’ a word or an expression. For example, I posted Jennifer’s lesson on ‘get used to’ recently. Are you able to use ‘get used to’ confidently now? Perhaps not, as it takes a long time for a language point to pass from theoretical understanding to practical usage. Enter the search term “get used to”, using the speech marks (“guillemets”) into Google and look at the results. Apart from annoying song titles, you should see recent uses of the phrase in articles across the net.
This is page of two of Google’s results – there’s plenty of interesting examples: