LINGUIST List 21.3045 Thu Jul 22 2010 Review: Discipline of Linguistics, Lexicography: Yong and Peng (2008) Editor for this issue: Eric Raimy <raimylinguistlist.org> This LINGUIST List issue is a review of a book published by one of our supporting publishers, commissioned by our book review editorial staff. We welcome discussion of this book review on the list, and particularly invite the author(s) or editor(s) of this book to join in. If you are interested in reviewing a book for LINGUIST, look for the most recent posting with the subject "Reviews: AVAILABLE FOR REVIEW", and follow the instructions at the top of the message. You can also contact the book review staff directly. Directory         1.    Ksenia Antonyan, Chinese Lexicography Message 1: Chinese Lexicography Date: 21-Jul-2010 From: Ksenia Antonyan <kvantonianyandex.ru> Subject: Chinese Lexicography E-mail this message to a friend Discuss this message Announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/19/19-2547.html AUTHORS: Yong, Heming and Peng, Jing TITLE: Chinese Lexicography SUBTITLE: A History from 1046 BC to AD 1911 PUBLISHER: Oxford University Press YEAR: 2008 Ksenia V. Antonyan, Institute of Linguistics, Russian Academy of Sciences SUMMARY This book is devoted to Chinese lexicography and is intended for a vast scope of readers working in the field of Chinese linguistics, Chinese philology and Chinese culture in general. It will also appeal to those studying general linguistics, history of linguistics, ancient philological traditions and history of culture. The scope of the book is very broad. It covers a time period from the Zhou Dynasty, 1046 B.C. - 256 B.C. to the end of the Qing Dynasty (1911). Chronologically, it is divided into four major periods: the Pioneering and Emergence Period: 1046 BC - AD 220 (Western Zhou Dynasty to Eastern Han Dynasty); the Exploration and Cultivation Period: 220-1368 (Three Kingdoms to Yuan Dynasty); the Reform and Shaping Period: 1368-1911 (Ming Dynasty to Qing Dynasty); and the Depression and Booming Period: 1911- present (the twentieth century). The book is divided into five parts. Part I (consisting of chapter 1) is an introduction and tells the reader about the status quo in the field of research, approaches and methodology used by the authors, and practical implications of the research. The research is carried out within the theoretical frame of contemporary linguistics. A communicative approach is introduced to establish a theoretical model for the study of the history of lexicography: integrating the compiler, the dictionary, and the user into a trinity so that the dictionaries and their development can be examined from a threefold perspective - the dictionary, its compilation, and its use. The authors call it the 'trinitarian' approach (p. 9). Part I is followed by four main parts. Part II (chapters 2-9) deals with the genesis and emergence of lexicographical culture and works in Ancient China and embraces the period from the Zhou Dynasty, 1046 BC - 256 BC to the Han Dynasty, 206 BC - AD 220. Chapters 2 and 3 give an overview of the emergence of lexicographical culture in China, the progress of exegetic practice and the advent of lexicographical works in China. Chinese lexicography can be traced back to the earliest textbooks compiled for children to learn characters (around 800 BC). In the Han Dynasty dictionary making manifested an apparent evolutionary process - from simple character lists to character lists with interpretative notes, and then to wordbooks and dictionaries. Another source of lexicographical culture in China was the exegetic practice. From the late Western Han Dynasty to the early Eastern Han Dynasty, textual research on characters in the pre-Qin Dynasty classics prevailed as part of explanatory studies of Confucius' works. The practice of exegesis established itself as a formal branch of learning. In the Western Han Dynasty, the achievements of exegesis were embodied in the first Chinese ancient dictionary - ''Erya'' (''The Ready Guide''). Chapters 4-8 are devoted to ancient dictionaries that form the core of Chinese lexicographical tradition: ''Historian Zhou's Primer'' (''Shi Zhou Pian''), ''The Ready Guide'' (''Erya''), ''The Dictionary of Dialectal Words'' (''Fangyan''), ''An Explanatory Dictionary of Chinese Characters'' (''Shuowen jiezi''), and ''The Dictionary of Chinese Characters and Terms'' (''Shi ming''), respectively. Not only did these dictionaries form the basis for future development of Chinese lexicography; they have not become obsolete and are still in use themselves. The authors state that without ''Shuowen jiezi'', it would be impossible to read and interpret ancient Chinese texts: it is a precious collection of ancient classic texts, scriptures and exegetic studies (p. 95). As M. Winter puts it in his monograph on ''Shuowen jiezi'', ''vielleicht ist es ein Charakteristikum der kontinuierlichen chinesischen Zivilisation, dass eine beinahe 1900 Jahre altes Woerterbuch noch immer nicht zum alten Eisen gehoert'' (Winter 1998: 11). The micro- and macrostructure of ancient dictionaries became the template for future dictionaries. The semantic classification and the definition modes worked out in ''Erya'' formed the basis for ''Shuowen jiezi'', ''Fangyan'', ''Shi ming'' and many other dictionaries. Moreover, the lexical fund represented in ''Xiandai hanyu cidian'' (the normative ''Dictionary of Modern Chinese'') has much in common with that of ''Erya'' (Guryan 2009b: 142-143). It is a notable peculiarity of the book under review that the authors translate the titles of the dictionaries. It is unusual for sinological studies; usually the titles are only transliterated, not translated, cf. Norman 1988. This is, in my opinion, a useful and progressive innovation: it makes the book much more user-friendly and facilitates the access to the material to non-sinologists. Of course, the translation of the title may be a serious problem; in difficult cases, and in cases when the English equivalent is far from literal translation the authors give the detailed philological analysis of the title in question. Thus, the English equivalent suggested by the authors for ''Erya'' - ''The Ready Guide'' - is motivated by the function of this dictionary rather than by the literal meaning of its title. In this case the authors carefully analyze the possible interpretations of the original title (according to a note to ''The book of the Han Dynasty'', 'er' means 'close, approximate' and 'ya' means 'zheng' 'justice, standard') and motivate their choice (pp. 59-60). Original titles and their English equivalents are given in two appendices: a ''List of book titles from English to Chinese'' and a ''List of book titles from Chinese to English''. This makes the use of the book very convenient. One of the merits of the book is that it provides information not only on the dictionary itself, but also the information on the historical background and motivation to its compilation, its academic value and cultural influence. This puts the information on the dictionary in a broad socio-cultural context and makes the book much more informative, interesting and valuable. The layout of chapters 4-8 in Part II is as follows: The historical background to the dictionary's birth. The background and motivation for the dictionary's compilation. The format and style or the dictionary. The cultural and academic implications of the dictionary. In the light of the studies of contemporary lexicographers, the authors summarize the functions of a dictionary into three categories: descriptive, didactic, and ideological (p. 138). They show that, apart from the first two, the dictionaries of the Han dynasty also played an ideological role in helping 'to interpret the classic works, to advocate Confucian ideas, to maintain the sovereign, and to consolidate the foundation of the government' (p. 138). In the Tang Dynasty, ''Erya'' (''The Ready Guide'') was elevated and ranked among the scriptures. The values embedded in it, for instance, filial piety and brotherliness, have influenced the thinking and behaviour of the Chinese in later generations. Chapter 9 gives a survey of theoretical inquiries into lexicographical issues in ancient China. Part III (chapters 10-14), entitled ''The Exploration and Cultivation of Lexicography in China'', embraces the period from the Wei Dynasty, 220-265, to the Yuan Dynasty, 1206-1368. The authors call this period a period of exploration and construction for Chinese lexicography for the following reason. Prior to the Western Han Dynasty, the prototype of lexicographical culture had already taken its form - major types of dictionaries had appeared and the general styles and formats of dictionary compilation had begun to take shape and established. The authors show that this period is noteworthy for the following four highlights. First, the invention of 'fanqie' solved the problem of phonetic notation in dictionary making and enabled lexicographers to formulate and standardize dictionary formats and styles; second, on the basis of dictionaries of the Han Dynasty, dictionary families began to take shape and continued to flourish, notably ''An Explanatory Dictionary of Chinese Characters'' and its derivatives, and ''The Ready Guide'' and its derivatives; third, new dictionary types had come into being and were added to these dictionaries; and new retrieval systems were created, that is, referring to dictionary information by means of phonetic sequence (p. 165). Part III tells about the development of Chinese character dictionaries, word dictionaries, classified dictionaries ('leishu'), and rhyme dictionaries. Part IV (chapters 15-19), entitled ''The Reform and Shaping of Lexicography in China'', embraces the period from the Ming Dynasty, 1368-1644, to the Qing Dynasty, 1616-1911. The dictionaries in the Ming and Qing Dynasties fall into the following four categories: dictionaries patterned after ''The Ready Guide'' (the Erya dictionary family), those patterned after ''The Dictionary of Dialectal Words'' (the Fangyan dictionary family), dictionaries of exegetic explanations, and function word dictionaries. The book provides an introduction to the masterpieces of each category to outline the evolutionary progression of dictionaries in this period. Chapter 15 gives a general survey of the lexicographical culture in the Ming and Qing Dynasties. Chapters 16-19 deal with the formation of Chinese character dictionaries, Chinese word dictionaries, the evolution and reformation of special and encyclopedic dictionaries, and the evolution and formation of rhyme dictionaries. Part V (chapters 20-25) gives the detailed overview of Chinese bilingual lexicography from the Tang Dynasty, 618-907, to the Qing Dynasty, 1616-1911. It tells about the origin and emergence of Chinese bilingual lexicography, the archetype and evolution of Chinese bilingual dictionaries, ethnic minority languages and their bilingual dictionaries (among other, Tangut, Mongolian, Turkish and Tibetan), religious preaching from the West and its influence on bilingual dictionary compilation, Chinese government establishments and Chinese bilingual dictionary compilation, and the characteristics and socio-cultural influence of early Chinese bilingual dictionaries. Chinese bilingual lexicography originated from the preaching of Buddhism; it was introduced into China in the late Western Han dynasty, 206 BC - AD 7 (p. 369). In translating Buddhist sutras, Chinese monks accumulated Buddhist terms and transliterated them with Chinese characters, which were later gathered to become glossaries. The authors show that the earliest extant glossary of this kind preceded the first Western Sanskrit-English dictionary by more than one thousand years (p. 370). Further development of the bilingual lexicography was stimulated by cultural and trade relations of China with its neighbours (including Xinjiang and Central Asia) and countries in other parts of the world. From the Eastern Han Dynasty (25-220), the Han Cultural Rim was beginning to take shape, and Chinese culture was widely found in China's neighbouring countries such as Korea, Japan, and Vietnam. By the sixteenth century, Christianity began to spread in China, which led to the compilation of numerous Chinese-English, Chinese-Latin and other Chinese-Western dictionaries. The book disposes of a detailed and well-organized reference apparatus. It contains three appendices: a ''List of Book Titles from English to Chinese with English Titles Arranged in Alphabetical Order'', a ''List of Book Titles from Chinese to English with Chinese Titles Arranged in Pinyin Order'' (unfortunately there is no pinyin transliteration itself, the titles are given in Chinese characters only) and ''The Chronology of Chinese History''. The book gives an extensive and far-ranging bibliography on the subject, a list of main websites used by the authors, and an index of Chinese names. The bibliography is a precious guide and an indispensable guide for scholars interested in the subject. The book contains 13 colour illustrations representing, among other, prominent persons of Chinese history, such as the First Emperor of Qin Dynasty and Xu Shen, the author of ''Shuo wen jie zi'' (''An Explanatory Dictionary of Chinese Characters''), as well as pages from the major lexicographic works, such as ''Shi ming'' (''The Dictionary of Chinese Characters and Terms'') and ''Guang yun'' (''The Dictionary of Rhymes''). EVALUATION It may seem incredible that a book on Chinese lexicography has not been written by now. Dictionaries belong to the main products of Chinese traditional philology, one of the most ancient autochthonal traditions of the world. Moreover, dictionaries are necessary for anyone who would like to take up a study of any aspect of Chinese culture. But the fact is that ''for various reasons, historical, political, and linguistic, no in-depth, comprehensive, and consistent studies have ever been made of the history of lexicography in China'' (p. 12). Except for a few of succinct reviews not exceeding a dozen of pages, there is no general survey of Chinese lexicography in European languages (Creamer 1991, Xue 2003; the relevant sections in Norman 1988 and Harbsmeier 1998). This also refers to Russian (Yakhontov 1980, 1981; the relevant sections by S.E.Yakhontov, O.I.Zavyalova and A.M.Karapetyants in the encyclopedia ''Spiritual Culture of China'', vol.3, 2008 and vol.5, 2009). In China, the books on the subject are not numerous, too. The main of them to be mentioned are Liu 1992 and Qian 1986. So, the authors' undertaking is a pioneering one. It is the first fundamental monograph on the subject, incomparable with its predecessors in scope and volume. It is the first work that opens up the history of Chinese lexicography to non-Chinese scholarly world. The scope of the book is very broad. It covers a time period of more than two millennia and gives information on more than 170 dictionaries: the date of creation, authorship, macro- and microstructure. Some of the dictionaries are discussed briefly, and some in much greater depth, with cited examples supplied with English translation and a detailed commentary. The value of the book is increased by the fact that it puts the information on the dictionaries in a broad socio-cultural context. It explains how the need for the book emerged and whom it was intended for. The authors do not limit themselves to just only linguistic information. The research is carried out within the context of the history of world lexicography and within the theoretical frame of contemporary linguistics. However, some parallels between European and Chinese lexicography drawn by the authors may seem too straightforward. In my opinion, it is rather misleading to begin the chapter devoted to ''Fangyan'' (''The Dictionary of Dialectal Words'') with remarks on the emergence of sociolinguistics in America (p. 76). This also refers to parallels drawn between the first European etymological dictionary published by Thomas Blount in 1656 and ''Shi ming'' (''The Dictionary of Chinese Characters and Terms'') (p. 114). ''Shi ming'' can hardly be categorized as an etymological dictionary in the strict sense of the term. It is true that its semantic interpretations are based on the principle of phonetic interpretation ('shengxun'), that is, on words that sound similarly. But it is not etymology per se that was the aim of ''Shi ming''; its aim was, according to the citation from its Preface given by the authors, 'to discuss and point out the real reference of the names' (p. 118). A few crictical remarks concerning the reference apparatus of the book. Unfortunately there is no subject index (including, among other, Chinese terms such as 'fanqie' - a method for giving phonetic notation to Chinese characters in ancient China, 'xungu' - 'exegesis' and others). It would be better if the name index included all the names mentioned in the book, not only the Chinese ones. The book would be more informative for sinologists if it gave all the original Chinese terms for key concepts, not only their English equivalents: e.g., we find only 'phonetic interpretation' (original Chinese terms 'shengxun' and 'yinxun' are not given in the book). A serious shortcoming of the bibliography is that for publications in Chinese, only the English translation of the title is given (no original Chinese title); and as the titles from the bibliography are not represented in the appendices (which include the titles of the dictionaries and some other works that are the object of description of the book), the original title is nowhere to be found. This makes the book much less useful for sinologists (who might want to find the book in Chinese and read it in Chinese). The authors declared that their aim was to ''adopt a style more appealing to western readers'' (p.7); but why not be a little more friendly to sinologists? When the scope of the book is so broad, it would be impossible to include in the bibliography all the works concerning the subject. Nevertheless, it is a pity that some very important works are missing. E.g., as far as ''Erya'' (''The Ready Guide'') and ''Shuo wen jie zi'' ''An Explanatory Dictionary of Chinese Characters'') are concerned, these are Gu and Wang 1990, Guan 1996, Dou 2004, and Winter 1998, to name just a few. There is one regrettable mistake to be mentioned. The title ''Guo yu'' is erroneously translated as ''The National Language'' (pp. 36, 72, 135, 416, 427). Actually, it has nothing to do with the concept of national language; the title coincides with the term coined centuries later and first applied to Chinese as the national language in 1910 (Norman 1988: 133-134). ''Guo yu'' is the title of the historic Confucianist writing that throws light on the events that occurred in eight ancient Chinese kingdoms during the period of the 10th-5th cent. BC. Orthodox Chinese scholarship attributes the work to Zuo Qiuming and states that it was written with materials left over from the ''Zuo zhuan''. Russian sinologist V.S.Taskin renders the title into English as ''Discourses of Kingdoms'' (Kuo Yü (Discourses of Kingdoms) 1987: 469-470; Imber 1975; The Indiana Companion to Traditional Chinese Literature (1986): 524-525). However, these shortcomings are not decisive and can be easily corrected in the second edition. The book is by far the most systematic and exhaustive study available. It is a must for anyone interested in the subject. Studying and teaching of Chinese lexicography, Chinese traditional philology and Chinese culture will be raised with it to a new level. It would not be a big exaggeration to say that this work is an introduction into Chinese culture through the gates of lexicography. It will certainly help to remove barriers between Chinese and Western lexicography, initiate new forms of comparative research in the global context, and converge the history of Chinese lexicography into the general flux of the history of world lexicography. We hope that the authors' work will continue and they will prepare the next volume devoted to Chinese lexicography from 1911 to present, for nowadays Chinese lexicography is a vast and actively developing area. REFERENCES Creamer T.B.J. (1991). ''Chinese Lexicography.'' In Woerterbuecher /Dictionaries/Dictionnaires. An International Encyclopedia of Lexicography. 3 vols. Vol. 3. F.J. Hausmann et al. Handbooks of Linguistics and Communication Science. Berlin, New York: Walter de Gruyter. Pp. 2595-2610. Gu Tinglong, Wang Shiwei (1990). Erya daodu (A Guide to Erya). Chengdu: Bashu shushe. Guan Xihua (1996). Erya yanjiu (A Study of Erya). Hefei: Anhui daxue chubanshe. Guryan, Nataliya V. (2009a). ''Problems of Dating and Authorship of Ancient Chinese Dictionary Erya.'' In The Bulletin of Moscow University. Series 13. Vostokovedenie. № 1: 86-97. Moscow: Moscow State University named after M.V.Lomonossov (in Russian; English summary). Guryan, NataliyaV. (2009b). The Structure of the First Chinese Dictionary ''Erya'' and the Chinese Philological Tradition. Ph.D. Dissertation. Moscow: Moscow State University named after M.V.Lomonossov, Institute of Asian and African Studies (in Russian). Dou, Xiuyan (2004). Zhongguo yaxueshi (A History of the Chinese Dictionaries of the Erya Family). Jinan: Qilu shushe. Harbsmeier, Christoph (1998). ''Language and Logic in Traditional China.'' In Needham, Joseph. Science and Civilisation in China. Vol. 7. Part 1: Language and Logic. By Christoph Harbsmeier. Ed. By K.Robinson. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Imber, Alan (1975). Kuo Yü. An Early Chinese Text and its Relationship with the Tso Chuan. Stockholm. Kuo Yü (Discourses of Kingdoms) (1987). Transl. and Comment. by V.S.Taskin. Moscow: Nauka (in Russian; English summary). Liu, Yeqiu (1992). Zhongguo zidian shilüe (A Brief History of Chinese Character Dictionaries). Beijing: Zhonghua shuju. Norman, Jerry (1988). Chinese. Cambridge University Press. Qian, Jianfu (1986). Zhongguo gudai zidian, cidian gailun (An Introduction to Ancient Dictionaries in China). Beijing: The Commercial Press. Spiritual Culture of China. Encyclopaedia (Zhongguo jingshen wenhua dadian). Vol. 3. Literature. Language and Writing (2008). M.L.Titarenko (ed.). Moscow: Russian Academy of Sciences, Vostochnaya Literatura Publishers (in Russian). Spiritual Culture of China. Encyclopaedia (Zhongguo jingshen wenhua dadian). Vol. 5. Science, Technology, Military Science, Public Health Service and Education (2009) M.L.Titarenko (ed.). Moscow: Russian Academy of Sciences, Vostochnaya Literatura Publishers (in Russian). The Indiana Companion to Traditional Chinese Literature (1986). Nienhauser, William H., Jr. (Editor and Compiler). Bloomington: Indiana University Press. Winter, Marc (1998).''…und Cang Jie erfand die Schrift''. Ein Handbuch für den Gebrauch des Shuo Wen Jie Zi Schweizer Asiatische Studien. Monographien / Monographies. Band / Volume 28 Bern; Berlin; Frankfurt a.M.; New York; Paris; Wien: Peter Lang. Xiandai hanyu cidian (Dictionary of Modern Chinese) (1996, 2005). Beijing: Shangwu yinshuguan. Xue, Shiqi (2003). ''Chinese Lexicography Past and Present'' In R.R.K.Hartmann (ed.), Lexicography: Critical Concepts (Reprints of 70 Texts by 75 Authors), 3 vols., Vol. 2. Reference Works Across Time, Space and Language, London, New York: Routledge. Pp. 158-173. Yakhontov, Sergey E. (1980).''History of the Chinese Linguistic Tradition (1st Millennium BC - AD 1st Millennium).'' In A.V.Desnitskaya, S.D.Katznelson (eds). History of Linguistic Traditions. Antiquity, Leningrad: Nauka. Pp. 92-109 (in Russian). Yakhontov, Sergey E. (1981). ''History of the Chinese Linguistic Tradition (XI-XIX cent.)'' In A.V.Desnitskaya, S.D.Katznelson (eds). History of Linguistic Traditions. The Orient in the Middle Ages, Leningrad: Nauka. Pp. 224-246 (in Russian). Ksenia V. Antonyan is senior research fellow at the Department of East and Southeast Asian Languages at the Institute of Linguistics, Russian Academy of Sciences (Moscow). Her field of research is Modern Chinese grammar, verb compounds and the phenomenon of grammaticalization. She published a book 'Morphology of Resultative Constructions in Chinese' (Moscow, 2003; in Russian, English summary). She has taught two courses: 'Theory of Chinese Grammar' and 'History of Chinese Grammar' at Russian State University for Humanities. 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