Discussion

Questions;

• WTiat are the major divisions of contrastive linguistics?

• What are the main ties between contrastive linguistics and lexicography?

• What is the impact of contrastive linguistics on bilingual lexicography?

LADISLAV ZGUSTA

The bilingual dictionary5

1. The purpose of the bilingual dictionary

The basic purpose of a bilingual dictionary is to coordinate with the lexical units of one language those lexical units of another language which are equivalent in their lexical meaning. The first language, to whose lexical units the lexical units of the other language are coordinated is called the source-language; the order of the entries in a bilingual dictionary is given by the source language. The other language whose lexical units are coordinated to the first ones, is called the target language.

2. The anisomorphism of languages

The fundamental difficulty of such a co-ordination of lexical units is caused by the anisomorphism of languages, i.e. by the differences in the organization of designate in the individual languages and by other differences between languages.

What leaps most to the attention of even the average layman are the cases of the so called culture-bound words; if, say, some plants live or some things exist only in the area where the source language is spoken but not all in the area of the target language, there will be no really equivalent lexical units ready in the target language. It would be a mistake to think that this can happen only if the two cultures are vastly different, above all if one of them is "exotic' or old. On the contrary, this situation can occur in any two pairs of languages: there is nothing similar to the American drug-store in Europe and there is no suitable equivalent lexical imit in the European languages, either.

It would be another mistake to think that it is only the difference in the material extralinguistic world, the absence of the denotatum which is of basic importance; on the contrary, it is the designatum which has the fundamental role. The material extralinguistic world may be more or less identical but the same 'things' are conceived as parts of no designatum in one language but not in another. For example, the Ossetic word agawyghd has the meaning 'hearth + cauldron + chain'; there is no unified designatum in English which would cover all the three components, there are only designations of the single segments of the extralinguistic world.

Again, the distance between the two cultures may cause these cases to be more frequent, but they are observable in any language.

But if there is no equivalent lexical unit in the target language, the bilingual dictionary must use other means than the coordination of lexical units mentioned above. The usual thing is that the meaning of the respective lexical unit of the source language is described by an explanation which is not dissimilar to the definition of a monolingual dictionary but is worded in the target language. In this way, we can read in a Latin-English dictionary, e.g., consul, -is, m. 'the highest executive dignitary of the Roman republic'.

Up to now, we have discussed only designative words. As far as non-designative words go, the lexicographer treats them, as in all other cases, according to the model of the designative ones. For instance_}a grammatical operator like Greek an, the function of which is, in the first place, either to mark the apodosis (second clause) of a conditional sentence, or the iterative aspect of the verb, has no lexical equivalent in English, or in any other language I know, for that matter. In such a situation, the bilingual dictionary will not indicate its equivalent but will explain its grammatical function in the words of the target language. Any other non-designative words can be dealt with in the same way.

Very frequently, it is possible to find an equivalent in the target language, but there are differences caused by the different cultural connections. This is the case, for instance, of Greek theos. English god is the best possible and the only possible equivalent, but there is a vast difference between the polytheistic world of the

Greeks' rather ungodly gods and that suggested by and inherent in the English equivalent.

Cultural change within the same society can also modify these cultural connections; the usual slowness of this process adds to the lexicographer's worries: is the extralinguistic factor of good birth and, or considerable wealth still of importance for the lexical meaning of English gentleman, or is it irrelevant or less relevant by now, as in the majority of languages in which the word is borrowed?

Words like Greek arete, Latin virtus have at least an approximative equivalent in English virtue; but many their near-synonyms, explanatory glosses, and if possible also examples will be necessary to show their entire lexical meanings.

These 'culture-bound words' pose very difficult problems for the lexicographer. He should not despair if he finds that it is not possible to give ail the detailed information on them in his dictionary. After all, he cannot insert long encyclopedic articles with detailed discussions of the other culture. But the basic information on linguistically relevant points should be given.

It would, however, be completely wrong to limit the concept of anisomorphism and the discussion of it to the 'culture-bound words' only. On the contrary, anisomorphism must be expected in all lexical units and can be found in most of them. Scerba is right when he stresses that it is an error in principle if one supposes when compiling a bilingual dictionary, that the notional systems of the two languages are identical. Even in those areas where the two cultures overlap and where the material extralinguistic world is identical, the lexical units of the two languages are not different labels appended to identical notions. In the overwhelming majority of cases, the designata are differently organized in the two languages. Then, too, there js variation in the other components of lexical meaning. The result is that only very few equivalent words which have no polysemy in either language really do have precisely the same meaning; in the majority of cases, they are defined scientific terms. Equivalent lexical units with identical multiple meaning in both languages, and with precisely the same lexical meaning are a real rarissimum.

<...> We must remember that there may be some differences in any of the di­mensions mentioned above. English to pour has a good equivalent in German giefien, but the German verb can pertain only to liquids, whereas the English verb covers also the area of application (and has the criteria! features) of German schatten. English pig has a good equivalent in French cochon; but whereas the former is connotatively rather neutral, this is decidedly not the case of the latter. In English, snakes 'cast' their skins whereas in Czech, they 'take them off (Czech sviekali, the verb used about people taking their garments off). The English pronouns this, that have not two but three Latin equivalents, viz. hie, iste, ille; therefore, there is no one-to-one equivalence and the whole area of application is divided differently in the two languages. In short, the anisomorphism can be manifested by any component of the lexical meaning, in any degree and dimension. Nearly ail the problems of equivalence are caused by the anisomorphism of language.

This lexical anisomorphism causes that the task of translating texts from one language into another is not easy; still, it is possible, because the translator is not obliged to produce a word-for-word translation. To take an over-simplified example: a person in a novel is characterized by his impolite speech, in a passage, this is expressed by his use of impolite words referring to, say, eating. If the target language happens to have no full equivalents (i.e. no equivalent words designating eating with the connotation of being impolite), the translator cannot but use those words of the target language which have the same designation (eating), and characterizes the speaker by the choice of some other impolite expressions. In this way, there is no absolute one-to-one correspondence between some single words of the original and those of the translation, but the whole meaning of the original passage is conveyed by its translated counterpart. <... >