Yesterday’s Words

Book excerpt: Yesterday’s Words: Contemporary, Current and Future Lexicography reflects the main issues of scholarly discussion in the fields of historical lexicography and lexicology including the historiography of lexicography. The state-of-the-art volume offers a wide range of contributions in five chapters. After the editors’ introduction to Yesterday’s Words, the chapter Dictionaries and Dictionary-Makers of Former Ages concentrates on historical lexicography, including both the main lexicographical works in English and German and dictionaries of minority languages such as Frisian, Welsh, Irish and Scots. The Vocabulary of the Past discusses historical lexicological and etymological issues such as the results of early language contact in the West-Germanic area and in Jamaica in more recent times. Researchers involved in ongoing lexicographical projects, such as the first dictionary of Old Dutch, report on their practice and methodological approach in Current and Future Lexicography and Lexicology. Many dictionaries or dictionary research projects discussed in the volume have been or are being carried out in a digital environment. In the final chapter, Technology of Today for Yesterday’s Words, special attention is paid to projects in which computer techniques and the development of new applications have been essential. The volume is an essential text for lexicographers, historiographers and historical linguists.