Department of Contemporary Lexicology and Lexicography
Address:
Letenská 123/4
118 00 Praha 1
Email: lexikografie at ujc.cas.cz
Scope of research:
The Department of Contemporary Lexicology and Lexicography (formerly the Department of Lexicography and Terminology) of the Czech Language Institute is charged with research and lexicographical description of the vocabulary of contemporary Czech. There is
a focus on theoretical issues of lexicology and lexicography, neology and lexical dynamics, as well as practical issues around preparation of a monolingual dictionary of Czech. The department administers extensive collections and materials.
Between 1994 and 2004, lexicographical work centered around processing the latest lexical material. This work resulted in the production of two dictionaries - Nová slova v češtině. Slovník neologizmů 1 (New Words in Czech. Dictionary of Neologisms 1; 1998) and Nová slova v češtině. Slovník neologizmů 2 (New Words in Czech. Dictionary of Neologisms 2; 2004) - as well as a collection of studies Neologizmy v dnešní češtině (Neologisms in Contemporary Czech; 2005). This period also saw the publication of the first edition of the Akademický slovník cizích slov (Academic Dictionary of Foreign Words; 1995) and the second, expanded and revised edition, the Nový akademický slovník cizích slov (New Academic Dictionary of Foreign Words 2005; additional, unrevised editions were published in subsequent years). Editions of the Slovník spisovné češtiny pro školu a veřejnost (Dictionary of Literary Language for Schools and the Public) were also published (second, revised and expanded edition 1994; third, revised edition 2003; additional, unrevised editions were published in subsequent years). An electronic version of this dictionary was produced by LEDA (1997, 2004, 2005). LEDA also released an electronic version of the Akademický slovník cizích slov (Academic Dictionary of Foreign Words) as the Velký slovník cizích slov (Great Dictionary of Foreign Words; 1999), and of the Nový akademický slovník cizích slov (New Academic Dictionary of Foreign Words) as the Velký slovník cizích slov (Great Dictionary of Foreign Words; dictionary version 2.0, 2005). A number of other collections and studies have also been published (see all of the Institute’s publications).
During the same period, the department also worked on valency theory and valency dictionary methodology and compilation. The results of this work to date are two dictionaries: Slovesa pro praxi. Valenční slovník nejčastějších českých sloves (Verbs for Practical Use. Valency Dictionary of Most Common Czech Verbs; 1997) and Slovník slovesných, substantivních a adjektivních vazeb a spojení (Valency Dictionary – Verbs, Nouns, Adjectives; 2005).
Between 2005 and 2011, our department focused on comprehensive preparation of a monolingual dictionary of contemporary Czech under the research project Vytvoření databáze lexikální zásoby českého jazyka počátku 21. století.
Since 2012, the department has been compiling a new general monolingual dictionary, the Akademický slovník současné češtiny (Academic Dictionary of Contemporary Czech). Methodological principles in dictionary processing were published as Kapitoly
z koncepce ASSČ (Chapters from the Concept of Academic Dictionary of Contemporary Czech; 2016). The dictionary project was supported by the Ministry of Culture in 2013–2016 through the NAKI applied research programme, under the grant Nová cesta k modernímu jednojazyčnému výkladovému slovníku současné češtiny (A New Way to a Modern Monolingual Dictionary of Contemporary Czech). We use NEWTON Media, a. s.’s media database and corpora of the Ústav Českého národního korpusu (Institute of the Czech National Corpus of the Philosphical Faculty of Charles University) as sources of authentic texts for research.
In 2019, we published a book aimed at the general public - Jak se píší slovníky aneb Lexikografie pro každého – followed in 2024 by another similar type of book - Slova a jejich příběhy #neologismus #archaismus. We also run the Neologický blog as a public reference resource.
Department staff are longstanding participants in a number of interdisciplinary and international projects.
Current projects:
Akademický slovník současné češtiny (Academic Dictionary of Contemporary Czech)
Since early 2012, the Department of Contemporary Lexicology and Lexicography has been working on a new general monolingual dictionary of contemporary Czech. It is a mid-sized dictionary with an expected 60–70,000 entries. The aim is to cover the vocabulary of contemporary Czech, both the common vocabulary used in official and semi-official public communication and in informal (i.e. non-public, unofficial) communication. To a limited extent, the dictionary captures expressions used in business and special interest communication which have spread beyond their original communication domain. Similarly, the dictionary only lists dialectal expressions that have spread beyond their original territory and which are used mainly in spoken communication and/or in literature.
In its scope and methodology, the forthcoming dictionary may be classified as an academic dictionary, i.e. it is a dictionary with
a scholarly, standardised and structured explanation of word meanings, reasonably rich array of examples documenting typical word usage, precise descriptions of basic semantic relations, especially synonyms and antonyms, and sufficient descriptions of the grammatical properties of words. The comprehensive description of words in the forthcoming dictionary also includes stylistic labels, word origin and pronunciation.
A key part of dictionary development is creating and elaborating the conceptual principles of the emerging dictionary.
Neomat – electronic archive of neologisms
Neomat is an important component of the material collections of the Department of Contemporary Lexicology and Lexicography. Since September 2015, the Neomat neologism archive has been fully accessible to both the lay and professional public.
Details available here.
Lexicological and Lexicographic Research of Contemporary Czech
To further lexicographic description of the vocabulary of contemporary Czech, department staff engages in lexicological and lexicographic research which reflects authorial and editorial work on dictionary entries and conceptual work. Issues of neology and lexical dynamics are also taken into account. Results are presented at national and international conferences or through lectures and are also published in monographs or as papers in journals and conference proceedings.
LEXIKO Reference Portal
The LEXIKO website helps users navigate the Institute’s important material collections – the New Czech Lexical Archive, the Neomat neologism archive, selected digitised dictionaries (Příruční slovník jazyka českého – Desk Dictionary of the Czech Language, Slovník spisovného jazyka českého – Dictionary of Standard Czech Language). LEXIKO also includes a unique database of headwords (lists of headwords in selected dictionaries). In addition, the website presents information on general synchronic dictionaries and selected special monolingual dictionaries of the Czech language created by the Czech Language Institute, the beginning of institutionalisation of Czech dictionary-making in the 20th century, and selected results of the Department of Contemporary Lexicology and Lexicography’s current work.
Details available here.
Collections and materials:
Card catalogue of the Novočeský lexikální archiv (Modern Czech lexical archive; MCLA; 1911-1991)
The MCLA card catalogue contains excerpts used in the development of all representative explanatory dictionaries of Czech. The core material layer of the archive, the “first” material, served as a basis for the preparation of the Příruční slovník jazyka českého (Desk Dictionary of the Czech Language; 1935-1957), additional layers were used in the preparation of the Slovník spisovného jazyka českého (Dictionary of Standard Czech Language; 1960-1971, 1989), Slovník spisovné češtiny pro školu a veřejnost (Dictionary of Standard Czech for School and the Public; first edition 1978) and other dictionaries, e.g. the Akademický slovník cizích slov (The Academic Dictionary of Foreign Words; 1995). The linguistic data was collected following sophisticated excerpting rules from 1911 and 1917. The year 1770 was set as the lower limit for excerpting, which made it possible to document Czech literature from the national revival period. Over the years, collections of lexical material were gradually expanded until the end of the 1980s. The MCLA has been digitised and made available to the public. The main section (layers 1–6) with 8.7 million excerpts is linked to the electronic version of the Příruční slovník jazyka českého (Desk Dictionary of the Czech Language; ePSJČ) for unified searching.
Staff members:
doc. PhDr. Jiří Rejzek, Ph.D.
head of the department