Browsing by Author "Mavoungou, P. A."

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    L.J. van der Veen et S. Bodinga-bwa-Bodinga. Gedandedi sa Geviya/ Dictionnaire Geviya-Francais
    (Bureau of the WAT, 2004) Mavoungou, P. A.
    La parution aux Éditions Peeters de l'ouvrage de référence lexicographique intitulé Gedandedi sa Geviya/Dictionnaire Geviya–Français (en abrégé DGF dans les reste de l'article) a été accueilli avec joie et fierté aussi bien par les locuteurs geviya1 en particulier que par les Gabonais en général. Ce dictionnaire, résultat d'une longue et fructueuse collaboration scientifique entre Lolke van der Veen et Sébastien Bodinga-bwa-Bodinga, marque le début d'une nouvelle ère dans la rédaction des dictionnaires au Gabon. En effet, la majorité des ouvrages de référence lexicographique disponibles dans les langues gabonaises sont des dictionnaires bilingues rédigés par les missionnaires catholiques et protestants ou par les administrateurs coloniaux dans la période allant de 1800 à 1960, date de l'accession du Gabon à la souveraineté internationale (Nyangone Assam et Mavoungou 2000, Mavoungou 2001).
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    Lexicography in Gabon : a survey
    (Bureau of the WAT, 2000) Assam, B. Nyangone; Mavoungou, P. A.
    This paper traces the historical development of lexicography in Gabon. Gabon, like most African countries, is multilingual. The recent inventories of languages spoken in Gabon are those established by Jacquot (1978) and Kwenzi-Mikala (1998). According to Kwenzi-Mikala (1997), there are 62 speech fonns divided into 10 language groups or language-units in Gabon. These speech forms co-exist with French, the official language. In fact, in article 2 of paragraph 8 of the revised Constitution of 1994 the following can be read: ''The Gabonese Republic adopts French as the official language. Furthermore, she endeavours to protect and promote the national languages." This constitutional arrangement naturally makes French the language used in education, administration and the media, The survey of lexicography in Gabon that is presented here includes the linguistic situation in and the language policy of Gabon, the lexicographic survey itself, as well as the lexicographic needs of the different speech forms (including languages and dialects), Initially, the pioneers of Gabonese lexicography were missionaries or colonial administrators. Very little was done in this field by the Gabonese themselves. Although credit is to be given to these early works, there are a number of shortcomings regarding the linguistic as well as the metalexicographic contents of dictionaries and lexicons produced during this period. In fact, the main weak point of those studies was the lack of tones in the written transcription of oral productions and orthographic problems. Furthermore. in those contributions, the theory of lexicography is largely unknown and lexicographic works are hardly ever based on authentic data corpora of the languages being described
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    Macro-and microstructural issues in Mazuna lexicography
    (Bureau of the WAT, 2001) Mavoungou, P. A.
    All the works in Mazuna lexicography have a common denominator: they are translation dictionaries biased towards French and were compiled by Catholic and Protestant missionaries or colonial administrators. These dictionaries have both strong and weak points. The macrostructure although it does not display features of sophistication, i.e. the use of niching and nesting procedures, tends to survey the full lexicon of the language which make these dictionaries real reservoirs of knowledge. The microstructure contains a lot of useful entries. However, no metalexicographic discussion is provided in the user's guide to make it accessible to the target reader. There are also some shortcomings especially in the areas of suprasegmental phonology (absence of tonal indications) and orthography.
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    The reproduction of cultural aspects in dictionaries in French and the Gabonese languages
    (Bureau of the WAT, 2003) Mavoungou, P. A.; Otsaga, Thierry Afane; Mihindou, Guy-Roger
    The reproduction of culture in dictionaries constitutes one of the fundamental problems of lexicographers today. What is the nature of cultural data in dictionaries? To what extent should cultural aspects be transferred from one language to another? How should this transfer take place? This article attempts to discuss the relevance of the reproduction of Gabonese cultural aspects in dictionaries in French and the Gabonese languages. One of the main problems the compilers of these dictionaries encountered was the transfer and the translation of some cultural aspects. In order to discuss the nature and extent of cultural information in Gabonese dictionaries, this article will restrict itself to the following points: - The translation of different realities - The role of culture in the change of meaning - Dictionaries and cultural activities - Dictionaries and cultural ethics - Dictionaries and language registers - Dictionaries and culture maintenance - Dictionaries and the standardization of culture Prior to a discussion of the above-mentioned points, a brief description of the dictionaries investigated will be given. After a description of the influence of cultural contexts on lexicographers in the choice of macrostructural elements and their treatment, cultural differences between source and target languages in the dictionaries of Gabonese languages are discussed. The article concludes with the observation that the majority of existing lexicographic works tend to survey the full vocabulary of the language. The lexicographic treatment of some words is satisfactory because an account of the underlying worldview of the people is given. For example, in this article, the following themes are considered: dietary practices, sexuality, mythology, traditional pharmacopoeia, the kinship system, hospitality, and respect for traditional authority and elders. However, to be used in the most efficient way, these lexicographic publications need to be revised.
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    Synopsis articles in the planning of a trilingual dictionary : Yilumbu-French-English
    (Bureau of the WAT, 2002) Mavoungou, P. A.
    A distinction is often drawn between single articles and synopsis articles. A single article is the so-called default article. It does not deviate from the traditional microstructural approach of the dictionary because it presents the minimum data for each lemma sign treated, while a synopsis article gives additional data for each treated lemma. The classical conception of the synopsis article originates with Bergenholtz, Tarp and Wiegand (1999). In their view, synopsis articles which were devised for language for special purposes (LSP) dictionaries have to make provision for the treatment of lemma signs functioning as superordinate terms (general lemmata or topics) as well as their hyponyms. The aim of this article is to present a new lexicographic approach to the study of synopsis articles against the background of a planned trilingual dictionary. It will be shown that synopsis articles have a more general use than its restricted application in LSP dictionaries. In fact, the focus will not be on the treatment of technical or scientific vocabulary but rather on cultural terms. This article also raises among other things, questions about the purpose of the planned dictionary, its target users, different types of microstructures as well as different data categories to be included in synopsis articles.