International Journal of Lexicography · 2005 · 75 citations · 0 references
Language StudiesLinguisticsPragmaticsSemanticsSyntaxCollocation AnalysisLexical RelationsLexical SemanticsCollocation Frequency AnalysisLexicographic TheorySemantic FeaturesSpecialized DictionariesSyntactic Composition
The article synthesizes recent collocational theory advances into a unified framework for lexicology and lexicographic practice. It critically examines collocation by posing fundamental definitional questions and reviewing frequency‑based, semantic, and pragmatic approaches. The study reveals that long‑distance collocations and semantic‑feature collocations have been largely overlooked, prompting a new collocational spectrum division and a revised definition grounded in usage norm and holisticity, thereby expanding the scope of dictionary entries to encompass both simple and complex units.
This article attempts to synthesise recent advances in collocational theory into a coherent framework for lexicological theory and lexicographic practice. By posing a number of fundamental questions related to the definition of collocation, it critically reviews frequency-based, semantic and pragmatic approaches to collocation. It is found, among other things, that two types of collocation, namely ‘long-distance’ collocation and collocation between semantic features, have suffered almost total neglect. This leads to suggestions for a new division of the collocational spectrum and for a revised definition of ‘collocation’ based on the notions of ‘usage norm’ (Steyer 2000) and ‘holisticity’ (Siepmann 2003). It is argued that this new view of collocation considerably widens the dictionary maker's brief, since future lexicography will have to provide a full account of both structurally simple and structurally complex units, including fixed expressions of regular syntactic-semantic composition (see Part II of this article, to be published in the March issue of this journal).