The Bloomsbury Companion To Lexicography

Book excerpt: The Bloomsbury Companion to Lexicography offers the definitive guide to a key area of linguistic study. Each companion is a comprehensive reference resource featuring an overview of key topics, research areas, new directions and a manageable guide to beginning or developing research in the field. Lexicography, as the practice of compiling dictionaries, has a long tradition that has been, for much of the time, largely independent of linguistics. The direct influence of linguistics on lexicography goes back around 50 years, though longer in the case of learners' dictionaries. The present volume aims to reflect on the research that has been and is being done in lexicography and to point the way forward. It also tackles the critique of dictionaries in the electronic medium, the future of historical lexicography in the electronic mode with special reference to the online Oxford English Dictionary, and on e-lexicography in general.