15-PROSEM209-2BA-11
Exploring word meanings: Lexical resources in the digital age
This is an introductory course into the lexicon
of English explored from the viewpoint of lexical semantics, lexicology and
lexicography. The focus of this proseminar is word meaning as conceptualized in
our mind, understood in context, and represented in dictionaries and other
lexical resources available online. We will be discussing different relations
that exist between word senses, such as synonymy, antonymy, polysemy and
homonymy, as well as metaphor and metonymy – the cognitive processes that lead
to polysemy. Our interest will not only be single words but also multi-word expressions,
among them collocations and idioms. The seminar will deal with different types
of dictionaries, both monolingual and bilingual, general-purpose and
specialized ones. Another theme will be language corpora. Students will become
familiar with the notion of a corpus, and will practise using various corpora.
The future of dictionaries will also be considered in view of the application
of generative AI in lexicography (ChatGPT), which is already happening. The
reading assignments selected for the proseminar will comprise chapters from
handbooks as well as papers from academic journals, and they will be supplemented
with video presentations given by prominent linguists.
- Nauczyciel: Sylwia Wojciechowska