Use of examples in the bilingual dictionary: an empirical study

By the space alone that is dedicated to examples in dictionary entries, it can be assumed that examples are a fairly important part of most of them, particularly in bilingual dictionaries, which, on average, contain more examples than do monolingual dictionaries. Or, at least, it can be assumed that the editors and lexicographers compiling the dictionaries consider examples to be useful. However, up to this point, dictionary examples have primarily been studied from a theoretical perspective. This thesis, therefore, tests several of the theoretical issues that have been raised regarding dictionary examples using data gathered from a French-English cloze translation test administered to 90 Anglophone and Francophone translation students. A user-centered focus is maintained throughout the research, concentrating on whether or not bilingual dictionary examples are useful to translation students with regard to choosing translation equivalents. The research first examines general questions regarding bilingual dictionary use and translation success using the bilingual dictionary. From this point, it examines the use of examples in the bilingual dictionary and whether or not examples in particular can contribute to translation success. Finally, it examines several specific theoretical issues regarding examples from a user perspective: necessity, number, source, length and presentation/placement of examples in the bilingual dictionary entry.