El diccionario bilingüe

This paper describes the bilingual dictionary in order to identify some elements in the dictionary’s macro- and micro-structure that characterize the mono- or bi-directional use of it. The main objective of the chapter is to consider the elements of the bilingual dictionary which are most unknown to users who are learning a foreign language, elements that have been identified by foreign language learners in workshops on bilingual dictionary use. Therefore, it focuses mainly on (i) how to help users reflect on what kind of words are collected in the bilingual dictionary’s macrostructure; (ii) how to analyze the contents of the prologues and how to check if the microstructure of the articles matches the objectives that authors declare in the prologues; (iii) to whom the metalanguage of the micro-structure speaks; and, last but not least, (iv) how examples of uses in bilingual dictionaries should be given in order to help foreign language learners.