The Usage Rules Of Meta-linguistic Vocabulary In The Definition Of Adjectives In Modern Chinese Dictithonary (5^th Edition)

This paper takes the definition of adjectives in the Modern ChineseDictionary (5th edition)(MCD) as the object, choosing the modern Chinesedictionary as the source of corpus. This paper makes a detailed study ofadjectives’ usages of meta-linguistic vocabulary from the meaning point of view.The purpose of this study is summed up the usage rules of meta-linguisticvocabulary in the definition of adjectives in the MCD, revealing the basicprinciples of the usage rules in dictionaries’ meta-linguistic vocabulary.This paper mainly divided into five parts.The first part is introduction, outlining the former researches of themeta-linguistic vocabulary and explaining the purpose and meaning of this paperas well as clarifying the content and methods of this paper briefly.The next part is the criteria of classifying synsets. Synset means a group ofwith synonymous relationship. At this part, we describe the synsets’ criteriabriefly after referring to the <tong yi ci ci lin>(<dictionary of synonyms>) andWordnet and combining with the practice of lexicology and lexicography. We setthe criteria is having the same semantic items. As long as two adjectives havethe same or similar semantic items, it can be classified as a synset. Followingthis criteria, we get337synsets composed by4313semantic items of the typicaladjectives.The third part is the body of this paper. In this chapter, we give a detailed description and generalization to the usage of meta-linguistic vocabularyespecially the core vocabulary in the definition of adjectives. Through thesurvey of analyzing of meta-linguistic vocabulary in the337synsets and thensummed up the basic rules of the meta-linguistic vocabulary in the MCD. That isthe systematic principle, avoid circulation principles and economic principles. Itis shown as follows as this: Unless there are other factors involved, MCD tendsto use the same core meta-linguistic vocabulary frequently in the same synset;avoid appearing explained words in the definition; use less words to explain theadjectives as far as possible.The fourth chapter centers on the alternative principles of themeta-linguistic vocabulary. It is the principle of easy to paraphrase, easy tounderstand, and natural principle and so on. For these reasons, systematicprinciple and economic principle can be violated in the choice of meta-linguisticvocabulary.At last, the conclusion sums up the content and results of this article.