An Tionscadal | The Project
Background
The development of Irish language lexicography is a statutory responsibility of Foras na Gaeilge, and the New English-Irish Dictionary is the first major lexicographical project under Foras’ auspices. Fifty years have passed since the last major English-Irish dictionary was published (English-Irish Dictionary, ed. Tomás de Bhaldraithe, 1959), and there has been an increasing demand for some time for a comprehensive modern dictionary.
NEID is a bilingual dictionary containing c. 40,000 headwords and is designed be published in both print and electronic formats. The project has been divided into three phases. Phase 1 (the planning and technical design of NEID) was completed in 2006 and Phase 2 (the compilation and writing of NEID) commenced in 2008. The dictionary is to be ready by the end of 2012.
The Irish Content in NEID
As regards spelling, grammar and terminology, the Irish content of NEID will be in modern standard form. As for coverage, the major dialects of Irish will be accommodated and in some instances users will have a choice of translations with appropriate labels.
The English Content in NEID
The English content in NEID will primarily consist of contemporary English as spoken in Ireland. However,common words and phrases from other varieties of English will also be included, British English and American English in particular.
Phase 1 (Planning and Technical Design)
This Phase, which was completed in 2006, involved the planning and design of NEID. The contract for this phase was won by Lexicography MasterClass, and the deliverables delivered during this Phase included:
- The New Corpus for Ireland - containing 30 million words of Irish and 25 million words of Irish English (for more information on the Corpus, click here);
- The list of English Headwords for NEID (the 50,000 headwords from which the 40,000 or so in the final dictionary will be chosen);
- The Document Type Definition (DTD) which specifies the structure, elements and characteristics of the NEID database;
- A comprehensive draft of the Style Guide which sets out the policies and rules concerning the writing of the dictionary.
Some of the Phase 1 deliverables can be viewed here.
Phase 2 (compilation)
Phase 2 began in 2008 and involves the compilation and writing of the Dictionary entries. Phase 2 has been divided into three subphases:
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Phase 2a - The English Entry Frameworks
In Phase 2a, an entry framework is to be created for each of the headwords selected in Phase 1. An entry framework is a database entry which records the various meanings and uses of a given word along with relevant grammatical and functional information and examples from the project’s 1.7 billion words LexMCI English corpus. The Entry Frameworks are designed to create a complete profile of each English headword for the translators working in Phase 2b. Examples of the Frameworks can be viewed here. -
Phase 2b - Translation
Compilation of the Irish version(s) of the English Frameworks. -
Phase 2c - Editing
Selection of the material for the final dictionary entries, the compilation of the actual entries and editing of same.
Current Status
Phase 2a
LexMC were awarded the contract to supply the English Entry Frameworks, and the work commenced in February 2008. Batch 1 of the Entry Frameworks was delivered in July 2008 and Batch 2 in January 2008. The frameworks are being delivered in batches on a quarterly basis, and to date 7 batches have been received; the final batch is due for delivery in August 2010. The table below summarises the content of the 7 batches delivered to date:
| Headwords | Senses | Sample Phrases | Words | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Batch 1 | 1,820 | 5,661 | 25,000 | 655,000 |
| Batch 2 | 4,590 | 17,000 | 61,000 | 1,625,000 |
| Batch 3 | 4,980 | 16,900 | 66,000 | 1,931,000 |
| Batch 4 | 4,170 | 16,601 | 70,985 | 1,844,000 |
| Batch 5 | 4,710 | 16,576 | 73,169 | 1,989,000 |
| Batch 6 | 5,005 | 16,514 | 75,401 | 2,021,800 |
| Batch 7 | 4,671 | 17,198 | 70,370 | 2,242,700 |
| TOTAL | 29,946 | 106,450 | 441,925 | 12,308,500 |
Samples of the Entry Frameworks can be viewed here.
Phase 2b - Translation
The translation phase started in 2009. A panel of part-time translators was recruited and received training in the dictionary writing software and in the translation methodology. As of end-April 2010 6,400 senses had been translated (around 6% of the total).
Samples of the translated material can be viewed here.
A further round of recruitment is taking place in May 2010 to recruit more translators. Further information is available here.
Phase 2c
With the translation phase well underway, the dictionary team is now preparing for the editing phase, i.e. compilation of the final entries based on the translated material from Phase 2b. It is planned to start the editing phase in September 2010.
Utilities & Other Activities
The New Corpus for IrelandAdditional texts are being prepared for inclusion in the Corpus. Over the past year the POS-tagger application that processes the Irish texts has been enhanced in collaboration with Trinity College, to add new functions to the Corpus.
Sketchengine
This application enables the user to search and filter material in the Corpus, in a very flexible and powerful way. This application is used with corpora in Chinese, Russian, Farsi and many other languages, as well as Irish and English.
Further information: http://www.sketchengine.co.uk/
DPS
Following an international competition, the DPS application was chosen as the dictionary writing system for the NEID. DPS is a very powerful application which enables lexicographers to create and efficiently manage dictionary entries in a structured database. It is a very flexible tool with many different functions, allowing multiple dictionaries to be produced from the one database. Its use on this project is intended to facilitate the production of other dictionaries in the future, as well as the New English-Irish Dictionary.
Further information: http://www.idm.fr/