Retskrivningsordbog mellem to stole

Abstract

In November 2012, the fourth edition of the official Danish orthographic dictionary, Retskrivningsordbogen, was published by the Danish Language Board which, according to national law, is authorised to establish the official Danish orthography and publish its decisions in the form of a dictionary, now available in both a printed and an electronic version. In order to be high quality, a work of this sort requires knowledge of language policy and linguistics, on the one hand, and lexicography, on the other hand. The article analyses the Retskrivningsordbogen exclusively from the point of view of lexicographic theory and practice, based upon a similar analysis of the previous edition (cf. Tarp 2002). It registers a number of improvements but also some stagnation and new problems in other aspects. The general conclusion is that the Danish Language Board could benefit from lexicographic knowhow as well as the new information technologies, especially with a view to developing the electronic version which should no longer be conceived as a copy of its printed counterpart but as a user-friendly extension with more lemmata and additional data.