The Linguist's Shoebox

Integrated data management and analysis for the field linguist

Updates to Making Dictionaries

The field guide Making Dictionaries, by David F. Coward and Charles E. Grimes, is a companion to the Multi-Dictionary Formatter (MDF). A practical academic manual on lexicography, it includes principles for determining multiple senses, choosing good example sentences, and mapping a culture's networks of meaning. A computer software manual, it includes about 200 real-language examples illustrating how to organize multilingual data (especially for those who build a lexicon primarily by interlinearizing a corpus of natural texts).

The 1995 edition of the Making Dictionaries book is out of print. The 2000 edition is available only in Portable Document Format (PDF). It is included on the Shoebox CD-ROM. Only minor corrections to the 1995 text were made—no new material was introduced. Here are links to information that supersedes or extends selected parts of the book:

• Appendix A: MDF data field markers in alphabetical order
• Appendix B: MDF data field markers in exported order
  • Headword and structure of the lexical entry
  • Definitions
  • Identity of the headword
  • Example sentences
  • Range of meaning and usage
  • Lexical functions
  • Additional lexicocultural network of the headword
  • Origins of the headword
  • Grammatical paradigms
  • Tables (tab format)
  • Categories (etic and emic)
  • External references
  • Notes
  • Miscellaneous
• Appendix D: Lexical functions in alphabetical order
• Appendix F: MDF changes
  • Data field markers
  • Export processes
  • Language encodings
• Appendix G: MDF files
• Index of updates to Making Dictionaries