What it is:
The lexicographer compiles, edits, and fact-checks dictionaries. This includes dictionaries for native speakers, people learning English, or even technical dictionaries for specific careers such law. There are also bilingual lexicographers that translate words instead of defining them. Research is only part of the job as editing, proofreading and justifying entries with viable entries through research.
Average salary:
Depending on the job title, an assistant editor can make $28,485-$33,232, while an editor can make $31,650-$47475 annually. For senior positions, a senior editor can make $36,397- $55,387 and project managers can make up to $71,212.
A very particular set of skills: A degree in disciplines like English, linguistics, modern languages, politics/history, and other humanities will help increase your chances of employment. Gaining a career without a degree is very unlikely. An excellent understanding of the English language is required and this includes the foreign language if a bilingual lexicographer. Excellent proofreading and editing skills will also dramatically improve the chances of a career. The ability to explain complex words simply with precision and concise flair is also a necessity. An eye for detail and a strong motivation to stay accurate as possible is needed. It is important to mention that based on the publishing house, different regulations come with different employers so relearning may be required if switching from one to the other. Since there are only around a dozen employers in the grouped in the Northeast, there are not many opportunities for new employees. “The number of full-time working English-language lexicographers in the United States, including freelancers, is probably well below 200; adding those working on scholarly and academic dictionaries might double that number, but not much more.” (Eric McKean 1) on a career in lexicography.
Places that give M.A./M.S.:
University of Birmingham and the University of Brighton in Europe
*There are no degrees for lexicography currently in the United States, but there are classes taught for the discipline.
Daily activities for an English language lexicographer:
Proofreading, adding new definitions while following specific protocols, writing advertising copy about specific titles for catalogues, identifying new words for new editions, researching databases comparing pieces of language for meanings and their sources, and figuring out which words are used primarily compared to ones not used as often.
Daily activities for the bilingual lexicographer:
Translating words to fit into dictionaries, resolving problematic translations with native-speaking colleagues, writing grammatical and cultural supplements in some editions of translation editions.
For project managers:
Scheduling projects for upcoming editions, discussing the framework and ideas with other colleagues, managing financial resources for a project’s budget as well as time and activities with staff, and working with a marketing staff to produce a marketing strategy for publication.
Job description: http://www.prospects.ac.uk/lexicographer_job_description.htm
In-depth breakdown of entry requirements:
http://www.prospects.ac.uk/lexicographer_entry_requirements.htm
Some known lexicographers include:
Wendalyn Nichols and Enid Pearsons of Random House
Orin Hargraves who previously worked freelance for Oxford
Debbie Sawczak who worked for Canadian Gage dictionaries
Joanne Despres: senior editor of Merriam-Webster
*Pulled from the Dictionary Society of North America
Poem describing the daily life of a lexicographer:
Day Job: Lexicographer
Can you skip backwards? Can a photograph
Of flowers in a vase be a still life?
Was Ms R. Bailey Ms U. Fanthorpe’s wife?
Are wasting time and killing time the same?
If “Ann” is Carol Duffy’s middle name
Was “Luther” Martin King’s? Tough work? Not half!
And yet it must be done – and done so fast
There’s hardly left a moment to remember
To make sure June’s been treated like December.
The product’s never perfect but it may
Help language-learners’ progress on their way
To being language-lovers till at last
They ask me this and make me brood upon it:
Is what my explanation is a sonnet?
Robert Ilson
The lexicographer compiles, edits, and fact-checks dictionaries. This includes dictionaries for native speakers, people learning English, or even technical dictionaries for specific careers such law. There are also bilingual lexicographers that translate words instead of defining them. Research is only part of the job as editing, proofreading and justifying entries with viable entries through research.
Average salary:
Depending on the job title, an assistant editor can make $28,485-$33,232, while an editor can make $31,650-$47475 annually. For senior positions, a senior editor can make $36,397- $55,387 and project managers can make up to $71,212.
A very particular set of skills: A degree in disciplines like English, linguistics, modern languages, politics/history, and other humanities will help increase your chances of employment. Gaining a career without a degree is very unlikely. An excellent understanding of the English language is required and this includes the foreign language if a bilingual lexicographer. Excellent proofreading and editing skills will also dramatically improve the chances of a career. The ability to explain complex words simply with precision and concise flair is also a necessity. An eye for detail and a strong motivation to stay accurate as possible is needed. It is important to mention that based on the publishing house, different regulations come with different employers so relearning may be required if switching from one to the other. Since there are only around a dozen employers in the grouped in the Northeast, there are not many opportunities for new employees. “The number of full-time working English-language lexicographers in the United States, including freelancers, is probably well below 200; adding those working on scholarly and academic dictionaries might double that number, but not much more.” (Eric McKean 1) on a career in lexicography.
Places that give M.A./M.S.:
University of Birmingham and the University of Brighton in Europe
*There are no degrees for lexicography currently in the United States, but there are classes taught for the discipline.
Daily activities for an English language lexicographer:
Proofreading, adding new definitions while following specific protocols, writing advertising copy about specific titles for catalogues, identifying new words for new editions, researching databases comparing pieces of language for meanings and their sources, and figuring out which words are used primarily compared to ones not used as often.
Daily activities for the bilingual lexicographer:
Translating words to fit into dictionaries, resolving problematic translations with native-speaking colleagues, writing grammatical and cultural supplements in some editions of translation editions.
For project managers:
Scheduling projects for upcoming editions, discussing the framework and ideas with other colleagues, managing financial resources for a project’s budget as well as time and activities with staff, and working with a marketing staff to produce a marketing strategy for publication.
Job description: http://www.prospects.ac.uk/lexicographer_job_description.htm
In-depth breakdown of entry requirements:
http://www.prospects.ac.uk/lexicographer_entry_requirements.htm
Some known lexicographers include:
Wendalyn Nichols and Enid Pearsons of Random House
Orin Hargraves who previously worked freelance for Oxford
Debbie Sawczak who worked for Canadian Gage dictionaries
Joanne Despres: senior editor of Merriam-Webster
*Pulled from the Dictionary Society of North America
Poem describing the daily life of a lexicographer:
Day Job: Lexicographer
Can you skip backwards? Can a photograph
Of flowers in a vase be a still life?
Was Ms R. Bailey Ms U. Fanthorpe’s wife?
Are wasting time and killing time the same?
If “Ann” is Carol Duffy’s middle name
Was “Luther” Martin King’s? Tough work? Not half!
And yet it must be done – and done so fast
There’s hardly left a moment to remember
To make sure June’s been treated like December.
The product’s never perfect but it may
Help language-learners’ progress on their way
To being language-lovers till at last
They ask me this and make me brood upon it:
Is what my explanation is a sonnet?
Robert Ilson
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