Digital lexicography and recent advances in artificial intelligence have created favourable conditions for reconsidering how dictionaries are compiled, consulted and pedagogically exploited. Yet most existing dictionary writing systems remain centred on editorial workflow and publication, without fully implementing the principles of media-converged lexicography or integrating lexicographic and teaching functions within a shared environment. This article presents BILEX (Blended & Intelligent Lexicographic platform; https://bilex.top), a blended media-converged platform developed for a multimodal English-Chinese learner's dictionary. The platform makes three main contributions. First, it provides, to our knowledge, the first operational realisation of media-converged lexicography as a unified shared-database platform integrating compilation, consultation, textbook linkage and administrative feedback, thereby implementing both "convergence" and "interconnection". Second, it proposes and implements an AI-assisted contextual disambiguation solution to data overload: instead of deleting or restructuring lexicographic data, the system identifies the contextually relevant sense and guides the user to it through automatic scrolling and visual highlighting. Third, it dynamically links textbook content to the dictionary database and generates six types of AI-assisted exercises, extending the pedagogical scope of learner's dictionaries beyond consultation. The article discusses the theoretical motivation, system architecture and principal functionalities of BILEX, and argues that the platform offers a model for AI-assisted, rather than AI-replaced, lexicographic practice.
Our article aims to analyse the French terminology of the European Union acquis using lexicographic and terminographic resources. The study is based on the Stabilisation and Association Agreement between the European Communities and Their Member States, of the One Part, and the Republic of Montenegro, of the Other Part, belonging to the EU conventional law. While traditional terminological postulates, oriented towards standardising needs, take polysemy as an assault on terminological precision, modern approaches take into consideration the importance of contextualisation and a descriptive perspective, integrating variation as a natural consequence of the meaning evolution. The consulted dictionaries and termbases demonstrate the interactivity and dynamic nature of terms and attest to the presence of terminological migrations, even within a single document. They also reveal how diverse and specialised the terms of the EU acquis are, and furthermore, they reveal a very modest number of terms belonging strictly to the legal domain. Finally, the fact that some of the analysed term were absent from the consulted lexicographic and terminographic resources highlights the need for their constant updating.
This article presents a theory-based criticism of Aquilina's Maltese-English Dictionary (AMED), the most authoritative bilingual dictionary in Maltese lexicography. Grounded in Function Theory, it evaluates AMED in relation to communicative and cognitive functions, with particular attention to the interaction between structure, access, and lexicographic information costs. Methodologically, the study combines Tarp's (2017) model of dictionary criticism with Nielsen's (2009) framework of significant features and information costs. Drawing on a systematically constructed sample, it analyses AMED's dictionary concept, structural design, and functional performance across text production, reception, proofreading, translation, and cognitive consultation. The findings show that AMED's authority rests primarily on its cognitive strengths, including encyclopaedic scope, morphological coherence, and historical depth. At the same time, elevated search-related and comprehension-related information costs reduce its effectiveness in punctual communicative use. These limitations arise not from a lack of information, but from its structural organisation. More specifically, they reflect an implicit, historically grounded polyfunctional concept that prioritises documentary completeness over functional differentiation. By making these trade-offs explicit, the article contributes to theory-based dictionary criticism and demonstrates how functional analysis can provide explanatory insight into uneven lexicographic performance. It also offers implications for the design of future Maltese-English lexicographic resources better aligned with contemporary user needs.
Employing a multidimensional quantitative framework, this study undertakes a systematic comparison of definition features of mathematical terms from the Modern Chinese Dictionary (7th edition, MCD), a traditional Chinese general-purpose dictionary, and their AI-generated counterparts across four dimensions: lexical differences in definitions, textual similarity, semantic features, and syntactic complexity. The results reveal fundamental divergence between the two sources. (1) MCD definitions exhibit a stronger tendency toward direct definitions, whereas AI-generated ones are more explanatory. (2) In textual similarity analysis, the average similarity between the two types is quantified at 0.28, indicating a low level of similarity. (3) Regarding semantic features, MCD definitions prioritize essential features, with other features supplemented, while AI-generated ones exhibit a greater variety and a more balanced distribution of semantic features. (4) In terms of syntactic complexity, AI outputs manifest higher syntactic complexity. Based on these analyses, the study further discusses the implications for the cognitive load of definitions for users, the knowledge representation and organization in definitions, and reflections on dictionary compilation, thereby providing empirical insights for future comparative studies in traditional lexicography and AIgenerated/assisted lexicography.
This article analyses the capabilities of ChatGPT as an assistive tool for the production of specialised lexicographic definitions in the field of contemporary French architecture. The study focuses on a set of architectural terms displaying different degrees of specialisation and complexity, submitted to ChatGPT in order to assess its ability to generate lexicographic definitions and organise the associated semantic information. The methodology adopted is based on a comparative analysis of the definitions generated by ChatGPT and those provided by reference general and specialised dictionaries. The analysis considers, in particular, the precision of the definitions, the selection and organisation of semantic information, and their adequacy to the specialised domain. This approach makes it possible to examine the role of generative artificial intelligence models in specific lexicographic compilation practices, including the production of draft definitions, the reformulation of information, and the initial organisation of lexical data. The aim is therefore to assess the extent to which ChatGPT can be used as an assistive tool in the design and development of specialised lexicographic resources, while also examining the methodological conditions required for the use of its outputs in this context. More broadly, the study contributes to the ongoing discussion on the integration of generative artificial intelligence technologies into contemporary digital lexicographic practices.
