Outer texts in bilingual dictionaries

Abstract

Dictionaries often display a central list bias with little or no attention to the use of outer texts. This article focuses on dictionaries as text compounds and carriers of different text types. Utilising either a partial or a complete frame structure, a variety of outer text types can be used to enhance the data distribution structure of a dictionary and to ensure a better information retrieval by the intended target user. A distinction is made between primary frame structures and secondary frame structures and attention is drawn to the use of complex outer texts and the need of an extended complex outer text with its own table of contents to guide the user to the relevant texts in the complex outer text. It is emphasised that outer texts need to be planned in a meticulous way and that they should participate in the lexicographic functions of the specific dictionary, both knowledge-orientated and communication-orientated functions, to ensure a transtextual functional approach.

Keywords: back matter, central list, communication-orientated functions, complex text, cultural data, extended complex text, extended texts, front matter, frame structure, knowledge-orientated functions, lexicographic functions, outer texts, primary frame, secondary frame