Not all mistakes are really mistakes

Faced with the texts that have been filling the newspaper columns for the last few days, which concern the CANU Dictionary of the Montenegrin Folk and Literary Language, I feel the desire and obligation to, as one of the editors of the lexical material, say a few words with which I would, publicly and without the intention of arguing with individuals and institutions behind the mentioned texts, expressed his position on the problematic segments of the Dictionary, but also to mention a few facts that were not reported in the media before.

Namely, already at the very beginning of work on this project, it was clear to all of us who were involved in that work that the chase that began at the very mention of creating a dictionary of the Montenegrin language (through already common phrases about the non-existence of our language and claims that CANU does not can write anything related to that language) took off as soon as the first volume came out and, well, we weren't wrong. I would not go into the reasons for these attacks. It is clear to anyone even remotely familiar with the situation in Montenegro that they can be diverse - from a negative attitude towards CAN, through the denial of the Montenegrin language and the differences between those for whom the Montenegrin language is more important in the syntagm, this is Montenegrin and those for whom this language is more important, and finally with personal frustrations. Already in the first few days after the promotion of the first volume, we could read in the media from the region that "among the blue covers" there were adjectives (in the aforementioned text, these are all words) such as hospital, fadjola, soldier, long-suffering long-waiter and the like. although the first volume covered only the determinants of the first three letters of the alphabet. Only from such untruths, at the very beginning of the "life" of this dictionary, the intention of the opponents of this project and language is clear to anyone who looks at things objectively. Have defenders of the Montenegrin language come forward to protect that language from such attacks? They didn't. It wasn't long before the attacks arrived from Montenegro, first in general and without many arguments, as can only be done when reacting in texts written before a detailed reading of the Dictionary, and then citing a few examples, some of which I may deal with on another occasion. In addition, people who openly admitted that they had not even picked up Rječnik talked about Rječnik with condemnation.

The biggest problem was caused by the definition of the term Albanianization, so I will talk about it first. It is important to emphasize three things here. First, the author's team made it clear that there was no intention to offend Albanians or members of any other nationality, which, of course, also applies to religions, races, beliefs and the like, expressing regret if someone interpreted that determinant in that way... Such a choice of words in the definition of the word Albanianization is, as in other similar examples, the result of recklessness, perhaps inexperience, but by no means an evil intention. The fact that no one even thought, reading the definitions over and over again, that the Albanian people were negatively marked by this, otherwise it would surely have been corrected immediately, speaks of how bad our intentions were.

Second, there are currently six editors working on the processing of the Dictionary, who receive different parts of the corpus, so it is normal that there are small differences in explanations, when one editor receives the designation Albanianization, another Anglicization, and the third Africanization, even after the standardization process.

Thirdly, the contested word in that definition (it is the word imposition) is a ambiguous word, and one of its meanings within the context that is applicable to said definition is the following: to make someone accept something as logical with one's authority, influence, significance, naturally. This is the definition (which also somehow escaped the attackers of this project) from the most extensive and detailed multi-volume dictionary in our area, the Dictionary of the Serbo-Croatian Literary and Vernacular Language published (and still publishing the remaining volumes) by SANA. I mention this dictionary in order to point out another important thing: these days we could read how CANU works on its dictionary too quickly and with inexperienced people, unlike the dictionaries published by the Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts, Matica srpska, Matica hrvatska, etc., where they worked the most prominent linguists and in much greater numbers, with the help of experienced lexicographers and under the watchful eye of editors who were truly the greatest experts in linguistics of their time.

These days, however, we could not read that even those dictionaries, written for years (or tens of years, and they are still being worked on) and with such a team of authors, still have several pages of corrections to the first or previous edition, and these corrections vary from accent changes , gender or source through changing definitions or grammatical information about the determinant, to deleting or adding entire determinants and examples. It is a normal thing, therefore, that in this job, as in any job, mistakes are made, even when the work is done more slowly and when more experienced and expert people are involved in the work. It is true that at the beginning not all of us had lexicographic experience (it is certainly not true that no one had, as could be heard in the criticism of the Dictionary), but now we have at least one year and one volume behind us, so if it is not good, we will improve , and if there are mistakes - they will be corrected. When it happens to the greatest, they can say goodbye to us too. Therefore, we also made mistakes. Let me emphasize right away: I admit that there were. I believe that there will be more in the future, not because we want it that way, there simply will be, as there are always in every dictionary, because creating a dictionary is a very difficult and complex job, which is constantly being worked on. That is why you can print a leaflet with corrections already with this edition, corrections already in the second edition, etc.

I also have to say that everything that is cited as a mistake these days was not a mistake. Something is a matter of linguistic interpretation and five linguists could have five opinions, something is clearly not a mistake and there can be no question about it, something has been misinterpreted. Something is not a mistake, but it can be done better, and it will be done better in the continuation of the work. Something, finally, is a mistake. As someone who is involved in this project and someone who sincerely loves his language (which I publicly supported, for the information of those who attack us for working against it, years before I enrolled in the Montenegrin language and South Slavic literature studies in Nikšić, years before that language became the official and standardized language even before Montenegro was an independent state, for which I have, no need for evil, and written evidence), I am grateful to everyone who, benevolently or not, pointed out those possible mistakes, because the end result of which will be only one - a better and improved dictionary of the Montenegrin language. I welcome and look forward to any contribution to the improvement of the quality of the Dictionary and the Montenegrin language. Even in the course of work, we took into account suggestions that benefited the Dictionary, so, for example, we expanded the sources with dictionaries and works of writers who, I admit, were unfairly neglected, and we are trying to continue this practice of constant improvement.

Finally, I must also mention this: there are about twenty determinants running through the mentioned critical texts, of which, as I have already said, not all of them are even partially controversial (because some have more than one meaning), but even if we were to assume that all of them were, it would again mean that about a hundred more are missing to cover only one percent of the total content of the Dictionary. About six hundred more definitions and again 95 percent of the dictionary would be good. To paraphrase the words of Vuk Karadžić from the preface of the Serbian Language Dictionary: Our efforts will be sufficiently rewarded and all our wishes will be fulfilled if we bring at least the smallest benefit to the Montenegrin language with this beginning. Of course, I could write about this in more detail, and longer, and more expertly, but that was not my intention, nor are dailies the place for it. I just wanted to emphasize the reasons why I am still on this project and why I still stand behind it, but also to show the public that not everything is as it seems from the posts we read these days.

Starting any project is the hardest part of the job, but it's also the most important part. There will be, I sincerely hope, more dictionaries of the Montenegrin language, there are more institutions that have shown readiness and desire to start a similar project, and I am impatiently waiting for their results and their contribution to the Montenegrin language. Here, we have started.

The author is a processor of lexical material, Institute for Language and Literature "Petar II Petrović Njegoš", CANU