On The Glosses In English-chinese Learner's Dictionaries From The User Perspective

The present study is an attempt to tackle gloss treatment in ECLDs in the light of two theories, Communicative Theory of Lexicography and Relevance Theory. Based on the two theories, the Evaluation Criteria of the glosses in English LDs are proposed through the User Perspective, with which this study analyzes comparatively the gloss treatment in five EMLDs and five ECLDs. As a result, a tentative model of gloss treatment in ECLDs is proposed with the assistance of the Evaluation Criteria.The treatment of the glosses should not be neglected in dictionary compilation, for glosses are a main means to present word meaning which is the main focus of the compiler. To begin with, the study discusses the importance of the glosses. Then the empirical study, in the form of questionnaire, is designed to investigate dictionary users'habit of using English dictionaries and their personal assessment on the gloss treatment in ECLDs. The result reveals that current ECLDs have done the work far away from the users'satisfaction in gloss treatment.Nowadays, dictionary users take an important position in dictionary compilation. Whether the dictionary can meet the user's needs has been a key to the assessment of the quality of a dictionary. The pursuit of user-friendliness makes the compiler reconsider lots of problems existing in the process of compilation. Taking the User Perspective as the starting point and with the assistance of Communicative Theory of Lexicography and Relevance Theory, the present thesis analyzes the prerequisite to"relevance", the formation of"relevance"and the degree of"relevance"in dictionary glosses and finally puts forward the Evaluation Criteria of the glosses in English LDs—"relevance"along with four concrete criteria. Dictionary glosses should be relevant to the user's need for authentic source language (Evaluation Criterion one); to the user's need for sufficient knowledge of the language (Evaluation Criterion two for EMLDs); to the user's need for equivalence of word meaning (Evaluation Criterion two for ECLDs); to the user's linguistic competence (Evaluation Criterion three); and to the user's reference skills (Evaluation Criterion four).Based on the Evaluation Criteria, this study makes a comparative study of gloss treatment in five authoritative EMLDs and five home-made ECLDs in order to expose the merits and demerits of the gloss treatment in them, and finally a tentative model is proposed for the gloss treatment in ECLDs in the light of the Evaluation Criteria in order to make up the deficiencies existing in the glosses and create an efficient way to exhibit glosses in ECLDs. The high-quality gloss treatment will make the glosses in ECLDs more user-friendly and further improve the quality of the dictionaries.