Drafting the Entry Editor
Specifications for the microstructure of the Lotsawa Workbench (i.e., internal structure of any of entries)
A. Entry identity
- 1. Lemma
The lemma is given in standard wylie representation. A transliteration into unicode Tibetan fonts will be automatically generated.
- 2. Homonyms/Homophones
Homonyms and homophones are separate entries distinguished by numbers. Homonyms have the same spelling and the same pronunciation but have different meanings. Homophones have the same pronunciation but have different meanings and may have different spellings. This category is useful in case disambiguation is important. This information can be particularly useful for the interpretation of misspelled words.
- 3. Sense number
This field documents each reading of a polysemous item. These readings are numbered from 1 (mother entry) to n.
B. Expression
The expression of a lemma can be a phonological or graphemic representation.
- 4. Phonological representation
The phonological representation is given in IPA. This is field is useful to provide valuable information when the phonological representation is not derivable by rule from the orthographic representation.
- 5. Sound
This field is meant to provide a link to a sound file.
- 6. Phonological variants
This field accounts for idiosyncratic phonological variation and possible allophones.
- 7. Orthographic variants
The standard graphemic representation serves as lemma. This field is used to document alternative spellings resulting from earlier or unstandardized usage.
C. Language variety
- 8. Dialect
This field is used to record forms that do not belong to standard Tibetan as found in the corpus of Buddhist literature or Central Tibetan literature. By default, the value of this field is ‘standard’.
- 9. Sociolect
This field can be used to indicate that the lemma is used by specific groups (e.g., age group), Buddhist traditions, or professions.
- 10. Style
This field documents style, register, connotations and any kind of pragmatic information. Relevant values include ‘honorific’, ‘formal’, ‘vulgar’.
- 11. Stage – Time period
This field is mainly used for archaic language.
D. Structure
- 12. Tibetan syntactic category
This field contains information about the Tibetan syntactic category under which the lemma is classified.
- 13. Syntactic and morphological category
This field refers to subcategorys of a part of speech, e.g. noun, proper noun, transitive verb, etc. The taxonomy of these categories comprise standard syntactic categories.
N.B. A lemma which belongs to diverse syntactic categories is considered polysemous. Each category then constitutes a record.
The morphological categories to be specified here include noun class, gender, possessive class, verbal voice, inflection class. An inflected word (usually a verb) may fall into diverse morphological categories at once, e.g. voice x, conjugation class y. Some may be syntactically relevant lexical classes such as the gender of a noun, others may be purely morphological classes such as inflection classes.
- 14. Morphological structure
This field contains the constituents of the lemma. In the case of a nominal compound, they represent various stems. In the case of a derivative (e.g., verbal forms), they represent a stem and a derived form. Since the items listed here can be identical to certain lemmas of the database, it is encouraged to use hyperlinks.
- 15. Word formation
This field documents the word-formation process at the origin of the lemma stem, e.g. reduplication, bahuvrīhi, causative, denominal, intensive, etc.
- 16. Derivatives
In this field, lemmas that have the current lemma in their field 14 are automatically referenced.
- 17. Construction
This field contains information about the syntactic and semantic construction frame. For example, different syntactic constructions for verbs with regard to their complement can be documented here. This field is used to provide specify the information contained in field 14.
- 18. Phraseology
This field lists relevant collocations in which the lemma is found. These include fixed expressions, such as technical terms, common phrases, idioms, and proverbs. If these phrases have lemma status, a link will be automatically generated.
E. Meaning
- 19. Meaning definition
This field contains the lexicographer's definition of the lemma.
N.B. In the case of polysemous lexemes, each sense of the lemma has only one definition. Each sense must therefore be documented through the procedure described here.
- 20. Semantic classes
Each lexical item – at least those with a lexical meaning – belongs to one or more semantic classes. For instance, bear is an animal, anger is an emotion, bsang mchod is a ritual, etc. Even a simple word with a single sense may belong to several semantic classes.
- 21. Semantic relations
This field informa user about mutual lexical relations to other lemmas which have the current lemma in the corresponding field.
Common relations include:
- synonymy,
- hyponymy/hyperonymy,
- cohyponymy: antonymy, converse relation, minimal contrast,
- part-whole relation.
- 22. Encyclopedic information
This field contains information on the concept communicated by the lemma, for example, in relation to a doctrinal, ritual, or cultural background.
- 23. Picture
This field includes visual information about the lemma.
F. Genetic-historical information
- 24. Origin and cognates
This field is used to document loans from other languages as well as morphologically or semantically related words from genetically related languages.
- 25. Etymology
This field contains information on the etymology of the lemma.
- 26. Examples
An dictionary example aims at illustrating a specific sense or construction. Ideally, each word sense should be illustrated with a relevant example, particularly in the case of non-generic lemmas, such as technical terms, idiomatic usage, etc.
A dictionary example therefore has two main functions:
- It produces referenced evidence for the dictionary entry with regard to the semantic definition, the grammatical categorization, the stylistic marking, etc.
- It facilitates the understanding of the described lemma in the user’s texts.
As a consequence, a dictionary example should be typical:
- It illustrates exactly the described sense or construction of a lemma,
- It represents a common collocation,
- It is as simple and short as possible without any unnecessary grammatical/semantic/stylistic complications.
H. Equivalents in other languages
- 27. Sanskrit
Enter the Sanskrit term with unicode diacritic marks. Separate multiple entries with semicolons.
- 28. Chinese
Enter the Chinese term (unicode). Separate multiple entries with semicolons.
- 29. Mongolian
Enter the Mongolian term. Separate multiple entries with semicolons.
H. Methodology
- 30. Bibliographical references
Information on the lemma may be included in published sources, primary and secondary. In some specific cases (e.g., technical terms, specialized terminology, etc.), it can be useful to list bibliographical references to further document a specific sense of the lemma. References should be linked to the Bibliography page.
- 31. Comment
This field contains any additional information about the lemma.
- 32. Problems
This field is used to list questions that need to be addressed in future lexicographic work. The information provided by answers and subsequent investigations can be integrated into the knowledge base or noted in the Comment field.
- 33. Date
This is the date of last modification (i.e., timestamp).
Reference: Lexicography: Microstructure - Christian Lehmann (University of Erfurt)