О двух подходах к содержанию словарных дефиниций

ENThe meanings of the words reflect the classification of the world. The definitions of the meanings in definitional dictionaries should reveal such understanding of the world, which was formed by a nation through centuries. However, the practice of lexicography shows that the definitions in the dictionaries are more orientated towards the presentation of knowledge about the world and not towards the reflection of what exists in the average language user’s consciousness. The review of the definitions of the names of plants and animals in the Lithuanian, Russian, English and German language dictionaries showed that more often broader and more comprehensive definitions are given not for native words which are related with a nation’s culture and household affairs, but for exotic or rarer words, which do not play a more significant role in the users’ consciousness. Certainly, different dictionaries have different aims and the education of the society amongst them is not of the least importance. However, the wish to define the meanings of certain words in a scholarly manner is not compatible with the understanding of a language as a specific reflection of the world. In the author’s opinion it is purposeful to differentiate definitional dictionaries into two types: a) academic type, providing the world-view of a language, and b) educational definitional, providing knowledge about the world.