Overcoming issues in frequency-based extraction and lexicographic lnclusion of Korean neologisms

Abstract

This paper discusses issues regarding frequency as a criterion for Korean neologism extraction from the perspective of corpus linguistics and lexicography. Most studies agree that frequency plays a central role in the inclusion of neologisms in the dictionary; however, frequency entails a number of complex factors such as the time span of a word’s use as well as the variety of registers. The use of web data to extract neologisms – instead of a balanced corpus – has brought about a new range of issues that call for new ways to address them. Section 2 reviews previous research trends related to neologism frequency from the point of view of linguistics and neologism studies. Section 3 examines and discusses issues in the detection of phrasal and semantic neologisms, and in the use of Web corpora. Section 4 suggests the use of triangulation in order to cope with such shortcomings, combining use-based methodology and used-based approach.