Presenting Dictio – online sign and spoken language dictionary
| Authors | |
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| Year of publication | 2022 |
| Type | Appeared in Conference without Proceedings |
| MU Faculty or unit | |
| Citation | |
| Description |
Sign language (SL) lexicography – a young field of study within SL linguistics – faces a lot of challenges that have already been answered for the audio-oral languages. This talk presents an online sign and spoken language dictionary Dictio (www.dictio.info) developed at Masaryk University that aims to contribute to the solution of some of these challenges. Dictio was created as an aid for students with special needs but has gradually broadened and transformed into a useful tool for (native) signers of Czech SL, linguists and the general public. Czech SL signers constitute a vital part of our team and can therefore directly witness and influence the lexicographic process. Linguists use Dictio as a source of SL material, as well as a platform for implementing various novel lexicographic methods. The general public, teachers and students of sign languages benefit from a simple learning tool and a study material. The interface is accessible either as a mono- or bilingual dictionary. The SL entries are searchable by several options: (i) a translation into one of the spoken languages; (ii) phonological parameters of the signs (handshape, place of articulation, movement); (iii) hand-composed SignWriting. A SL entry is structured as follows: the headword of each sign contains a front and side video, a SignWriting notation, its grammatical and/or regional variants, its social and regional distribution, the definition (in the given SL), examples of use (e.g. in short sentences), and finally translations to several spoken or sign languages. The platform currently accommodates eleven languages, most of which are signed, and about 158.000 entries. New entries of all present languages, but mainly the Czech SL, are constantly being added via different projects, so the dictionary mirrors the contemporary state of the languages and functions as a dynamic representation of today´s language use. |
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