How to use a dictonary

7/28/2019 How to use a dictonary

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How to use the Dictionar

FINDING A WORD OR PHRASE

Words that have more than one part of speech

Words that have the same spelling, but havedifferent parts of speech, are listed separately andgiven different numbers.

Words that have more than one spellingIf a word is spelled differently in British andAmerican English, the definition and examples areshown at the British spelling, and there is a cross-

reference from the American spelling.If a word has more than one spelling, the differentspellings are shown together at the beginning of theentry.

Derived wordsDerived words are shown at the end of the entry.These are words that can easily be understoodif you know the meaning of the main word.any of them end in -ly or -ness.

Compound wordsCompound words are treated like ordinary wordsand listed in alphabetical order as if there wereno space or hyphen in them.

Position of idioms and phrasesIdioms and phrases are shown at the first importantword of the phrase or idiom. For example the jury is(still) out on sth is shown atjur. Idioms and phrasesare listed with the other senses of the word infrequency order.

Phrasal verbsPhrasal verbs are listed in alphabetical order afterthe main verb.

If the phrasal verb has an object, this is shown as sb(=somebody) or sth (=something). The symbolmeans that the object can come before or after theparticle.


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LEARNING MORE ABOUT A WORD

PronunciationPronunciation is shown using the InternationalPhonetic Alphabet (IPA).

If the British and American pronunciations aredifferent, the British pronunciation is shown first andthe American pronunciation has a dollar sign ($) infront of it.

For compound words, the primary stress () and thesecondary stress () are shown.

See inside front cover for a list of IPA symbols.

FrequencThe meanings of each word are listed in order offrequency. The most common meaning is shownfirst.

The 3000 most common words in English theLongman Communication 3000 are printed in red

letters. This shows you which are the most importantwords to know. S1 S2 S2 means that the word isone of the 1000/2000/3000 most common wordsin spoken English. W1 W2 W3 means that the word isone of the 1000/2000/3000 most common wordsin written English.

See the end of the book for further information and afull list of the Longman Communication 3000.

There are also graphs that give you extra informationabout spoken and written frequency.

Academic wordsThe label AC indicates that a word is included intheAcademic Word List. These are important wordsto know if you are studying in an English-speakingenvironment, or if you are writing academicassignments.

For further information about the Academic WordList, go to: http://language.massey.ac.nz/staff/awl

RegisterLabels before the definition show you if a word isused in informal, formal, spoken, literary, legal, ortechnical English.

Register notes give additional information about theformality of a word or phrase, helping you to choosethe most appropriate word for a particular context.

See page i for a list of the labels used.

See page A1 for further information about formality inspoken and written English.

American and British EnglishThis dictionary has full coverage of both Americanand British English. If a word is only used inAmerican English, it is markedAmE. If a word is onlyused in British English, it is marked BrE.

If there is another word with the same meaning inBritish or American English, it is shown after thedefinition.

Frequencies of the verb let in spoken and written English.

400200 800600 1000 per million

SPOKEN

WRITTEN


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FINDING OUT ABOUT MEANING

The Longman Defining VocabularDefinitions explain the meaning of the word in clearsimple language, using the 2000-word LongmanDefining Vocabulary.

See the end of the book for further information aboutthe Longman Defining Vocabulary, including a completelist of all 2000 words.

If a word used in a definition is not part of theLongman Defining Vocabulary, it is shown in SM S.

SignpostsIf a word has a lot of different meanings, signpostshelp to guide you quickly to the meaning you want.

ExamplesThere are thousands of useful examples, based oninformation from the Longman Corpus Network andthe Longman Web Corpus, which will help you toproduce natural English.

The Longman Corpus Network is a database of390 million words of written and spoken Britishand American English from books, newspapers,conversations, advertisements, and many othersources.

In addition to the Corpus, we also use the Internetto discover new words and new meanings ofexisting words.

FINDING OUT ABOUT GRAMMAR

Part of speech and grammar informationThe part of speech is shown first, followed byinformation about whether a word is countable,uncountable, transitive, intransitive etc.

See pages i and ii for lists of parts of speech andgrammar codes.

InflectionsInformation about irregular forms of verbs, nouns,and adjectives is shown at the beginning of the entry.

Grammar patternsCommon grammar patterns are shown in bold beforethe examples so that you can see clearly how theword operates in a sentence.

Common prepositions are also shown in bold beforethe examples.

Grammar NotesGrammar Notes provide detailed information aboutareas of grammar.

Common Error NotesCommon Error Notes are introduced by a warningtriangle and provide information about commonmistakes that people make when using a word, basedon research from the Longman Learners Corpus (adatabase of over 10 million words of English writtenby students from around the world).


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BUILDING VOCABULARy

Snonms, antonms, and related wordsynonyms (=words with the same meaning),antonyms (=words with the opposite meaning), andrelated words are shown after the definition.

CollocationCollocations are words that are often used with aparticular word. Collocations are shown in bold.

If a word has a lot of collocations, they are listed in abox at the end of the entry.

Thesaurus NotesThesaurus Notes explain the differences betweenwords which are similar in meaning and give

examples that show how they are used differently.

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How to use a dictonary