Designing An Electronic Dictionary For Chinese-English Translation Learners: A Scenario-Integrated Approach

With the implementation of China's Belt and Road Initiative and the strategy of “Chinese Culture Going Global”,considerable significance has been attached to the cultivation of EFL learners' translation competence in college English teaching in China.In the current reform,translation proficiency scales have been incorporated into China's Standards of English,an assessing system of Chinese English learners' language proficiency.However,translation courses have long faced such problems as scarcity of qualified teachers,ill-conceived course design,and shortage of translation learning materials.Consequently,the learning outcome of translation learners is far from satisfactory.To overcome these problems,one solution is to increase translation learners' access to learning resources.As a vital companion to second language learners,a bilingual learner's dictionary plays an indispensable role in their translation learning.This is particularly true with a translation learner's dictionary,for it is designed to boost learners' translation competence.However,only a few Chinese-English dictionaries available are designed for translation learners.Therefore,most translation learners have to use some general-purpose Chinese-English dictionaries.These dictionaries show some limitations when used for translation learning.For one thing,most Chinese-English dictionaries available are closely modeled on monolingual Chinese dictionaries and focus on interlingual semantic interpretation of lexical units while ignoring the special needs of translation learners.For another,those dictionaries are print dictionaries and as such fail to meet users' expectations of using electronic dictionaries in the information age.These limitations could be ascribed to the status quo of Chinese-English lexicography as well as its related research.In fact,there is a dearth of studies on electronic or digitalized Chinese-English dictionaries,let alone those designed specifically for translation learners.In a nutshell,to cultivate learners' translation competence and innovate bilingual dictionary design,it is necessary and significant to explore the design of an electronic dictionary for Chinese-English translation learners.This study is aimed at exploring the design principles of an electronic dictionary for Chinese-English translation learners.Setting the objective,three specific research questions are formulated as follows:1)What are the major design features of the target dictionary?2)What are the design principles of the target dictionary?3)How can the validity of the design principles be tested?To answer these questions,this study adopts both theoretical and empirical research methods.Theoretical discussion aims to delineate the design features of the target dictionary and construct a design framework with design principles,and empirical method is adopted to test the validity of the design principles.Three major findings are obtained.The first is the design features of the target dictionary.They are determined by three key elements,i.e.the type of the target dictionary,the attributes of the electronic media,and the needs of the target users.This study concludes that the target dictionary is a specialized learner's dictionary and performs both decoding and encoding functions.As an electronic dictionary,it features large storage space,flexible presentation forms,interactivity,and easiness to be integrated with other translation learning tools.Hopefully,it will become a part of a computer-aided language learning application or a toolkit of learning tools.Another major finding of this study is the design framework for the target dictionary.It is mainly inspired by and further based on the Scenario-Based Design.It also borrows ideas from design research in lexicography.The study concludes that the target dictionary must be designed with a scenario-integrated approach.That is,the integration of dictionary use scenario and dictionary design scenario.Specifically,considering the design features,a mock electronic Chinese-English dictionary has to be created first while taking information from some existing Chinese-English dictionaries.By observing and analyzing translation learners' use of this mock dictionary,a model of dictionary use in translation learning is then formulated.It generalizes the features of a translation learning-oriented dictionary in dictionary use scenario,namely,the complexity of dictionary functions in translation process and human-computer interactivity in dictionary use.In the light of the findings from the field observation and analysis,the cognitive and communicative functions of the target dictionary are defined.The explication of these functions helps to establish the design principles of dictionary content and structure.To be specific,the dictionary content design principles should feature learnability,usefulness and systematicity.With respect to dictionary structure design principles,it should be characteristic of flexibility,stratification and interactivity.In this framework,the validity test of the design principles also requires the integration of the design scenario and the dictionary use scenario to keep it accurate and complete.The third finding of this study is the testing method of the design principles' validity.According to the design framework,the production of a dictionary prototype and the formulation of the usability specifications must come from an iterative design,that is,designing-testing-redesigning-retesting.Therefore,validity test includes the observation and analysis of the dictionary use process and product,the external evaluation from users and the internal evaluation from designers.This method renders the test accurate and complete.The implications of this study lie in three aspects.First,it has a positive effect on theoretical lexicography.This study introduces the conception of Scenario-Based Design into dictionary making,and incorporates the ideas of user study,the Function Theory of lexicography and Communicative Approach.With a scenario-integrated approach,a theoretical framework is constructed for designing the target dictionary,which is of significance to(bilingual)lexicography.Second,it helps with dictionary compilation.It puts forward six principles for designing an electronic ChineseEnglish dictionary for Chinese translation learners,which could be applied in the practice of dictionary-making.Furthermore,it demonstrates an operational approach to testing the validity of design and the sample design also has practical implications for future dictionary-making.As regards design method,this study integrates the topdown approach and the bottom-up approach.The combination could take full advantage of their respective strengths while overcoming their shortcomings.This could be considered as an innovation in dictionary design.By employing research methods from various fields,this study is in nature interdisciplinary,which could serve as a reference for future studies concerning dictionary design.