Abstract: This dictionary has 10,600 entries and 20,000 definitions. The words were selected from the study Functional Active Vocabulary of Cuban Schoolchildren, senior high school vocabulary (collected for that purpose), textbooks published by the Ministry of Education, and Cuban newspapers (Granma, Juventud Rebelde and Trabajadores). This is a reference book for students in the second cycle of primary education (fifth and sixth grades) and in secondary education.
Each entry includes:
- part of speech
- definition
- example sentences for every definition, with labels to better understand the part of speech used in the sentence
- phrases, idioms and sayings related to entry words
- plural form of words
- synonyms, antonyms and similar words
- participles of verbs, and diminutives and augmentatives (where necessary)
- syllabification of headwords
- letters that can make spelling tricky are highlighted in contrasting colours in headwords
The dictionary has two appendixes: one of 83 verb conjugation models matching the codes in the entries for verbs, and another on stress and syllabification at the end of lines. The book includes 19 illustrated thematic fields: the cosmos, animals, the hospital, minerals, school, vegetables, etc. This dictionary is a useful tool to enhance students’ language, as well as their cultural, scientific, ethical and patriotic knowledge. The whole dictionary was compiled and edited by the Centre for Applied Linguistics. It was first published in July, 2003. This lexicographic work won the EURALEX-2002 International Award granted by the European Association for Lexicography. It also won an Outstanding Work award at the 14th National Science and Technology Symposium in 2002. Four scientific articles on this dictionary have been published in journals and proceedings of national and international conferences. In 2010, a third edition —which consisted of 50,000 copies and was coedited by the Editorial Oriente and the Centre for Applied Linguistics— was published. In 2011, the third edition will be reprinted in 50,000 copies. The CLA in collaboration with scholars from the Faculty of Computer Science, University of the Basque Country, created a CD and an online version of the dictionary (http://ixa.si.ehu.es/dbe/index.html).
Director: Eloína Miyares Bermúdez
General coordinator: Julio Vitelio Ruiz Hernández
Lexicographic team: Eloína Miyares Bermúdez, Nancy Álamo Suárez, Alex Muñoz Alvarado, Leonel Ruiz Miyares, Celia Pérez Marqués, and Mileidis Quintana Polanco
Computational linguistics: Leonel Ruiz Miyares, and Celia Álvarez Moreno