A multilingual, multicultural and explanatory music education dictionary for South Africa - using Wiegand's metalexicography to establish its purposes, functions and nature

Abstract

Wiegand's metalexicography is used to establish the purposes, functions and nature of a multilingual, multicultural, and explanatory music education dictionary for South Africa. Specific types of dictionaries have specific purposes. Special-field dictionaries should fulfil the purpose of conveying information on knowledge in special fields. They should also solve communication conflicts. The genuine purposes of special-field dictionaries, according to Wiegand, are to convey either linguistic information on terms, or encyclopedic information, or both. The needs of users should be taken into account when determining the functions of a dictionary. When the functions of a dictionary containing music terms from South Africa is considered, social factors in South African music education also have to be taken into account. The planned dictionary will have a linguistic and a communicative function. It will also have a cognitive and scientific function, fulfilling an educational need. With regard to the nature of the planned dictionary, it will have to contain elements of different types of dictionaries, such as explanatory dictionaries, translation dictionaries, and learner's dictionaries. A thematic arrangement will be followed, supplemented by an alphabetical index. Two versions of the dictionary will have to be published, namely, a more scholarly version for specialists, with more types of information, as well as a more popular version for nonspecialists.

Keywords: multicultural dictionary; multilingual dictionary; explanatory dictionary; special-field dictionary; wiegand; purposes of dictionaries; functions of dictionaries; encyclopedic information; linguistic information; dictionary use; protocols; learner's lexicography