有声英文阅读-各类词书都是怎样编成的

How Dictionaries Are Made
各类词书都是怎样编成的
    
     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.

     人们普遍认为每个单词都有准确的词义，人们还认为我们主要是向教师和语法学家们学习这些词义，人们还谥为一切词典和语法书都是解释词义和词的用法的最高权威。几乎没有人会提出这样的问题：词典和语法的编著者们根据什么权威资料来说出他们所说的那些话。我有一次曾和一位英国妇女争论过一个英语单词的发音。我让她查一查英语词典。这位英国妇女坚定地说："还查词典干什么？我是英国人。我生在英国，长在英国。我讲的话是英语"。在全体英格兰人当中这种对自己语言的十分自信的态度是相当普遍的。可是，在美国，若是有人想同词典争论，那或者会被认为是颠狂或者是疯子。
     让我们来看看各类词书都是怎样编成的，看看编者们是怎样给每个词条下定义的。下面所述的方法是那些汇集第一手的原始研究资料的词典编纂机构所采用的，而不是那些只是简单地抄一抄现有的一些词典的内容的那些编词典的机构所采用的方法。编词典的工作始于博览所编的词书内容所包括的该段时期里该门学科内有关的浩瀚的文献资料。在词书编者们博览群书的过程中，他们把每一个有趣的词汇，罕见的词汇，每一个普通词汇的不普通的特别的用法，大量常见词的种种常见的用法，以及这些词汇所出现的例句都一一作成卡片。
     这也就是说，不但要汇集该词汇，而且还要把每个词所出现的上下文语言环境也汇集起来。对于编写词典这样十分庞大的工程来说，例如编像《牛津英语大词典》之类，要汇集数百万张卡片。因此要完成这样一部巨著需要费时数十年。在汇集卡片的过程中，要把卡片按字母顺序排列加以分类整理。分类整理工作完成之后，整本词典不论在任何位置上的单词都应当有从二三句到数百个例句的引文出现在该单词的卡片上。
     为了确定单词的义项，然后，词典的编者就把能说明该单词用法的那一堆卡片摆在自己的面前；每一张卡片都阐明了某一文学作品或某一重要历史文献的作者对该单词的实际用法。词典编者要仔细认真地研读，再根据词典编者认为单词所含有的几个义项将这一推卡片加以分类。最后词典编者写出每个义项的定义，在下定义时，编者必须遵守这样一条不容改变的铁的规则：那就是每个义项的定义编者必须根据摆在面前那些卡片上的例句所含有的该词的词义来写。词典编者不能接受到自己认为某词应该有某个义项的这一想法的影响。词典的编者必须根据所汇集的卡片来编词典，不然的话，就根本不必去汇集那些卡片了。
     因此，编写一部词典并不是这样一种工作：编者以权威的身份给所有的单词都规定出一些所谓的"真正的词义"；编写词典是一种记录工作，编者要尽自己的最大努力记录下在很久以前或在最近刚出版的著作中，各种不同的的单词所具有的意义。例如，如果我们是在1890年或者迟至1919年或者迟至在1919年编写一本词典，我们本来可以说broadcast这个词的意思是"撒播"（例如：撒播种子），但是从1921年起我们就不能再这样说了。从1921年起这个词最普遍的意义应该是"通过收音机或电视机播出节目"。当我们说话或写作时在精选推敲用词方面，我们要依词典提供给我们历史上的记录为准绳，但也不能受词典上的记录所束缚，因为一些新的情况，新的经历，新的发明，新的感情总是迫使我们给旧的词汇赋予新的用法。我们查一下"hood"这个词，就会发现，在500年前，意思是"修道士"（a monk），今天这一词条下的解释却是汽车引擎或汽车发动机。

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。