Innovation in Language Learning
Visual Dictionaries. A Cognitive Study on the Efficiency of Illustrated Words.
Ludovica Cerini, - (Italy)
Abstract
Ludovica Cerini
Università degli Studi di Bari
Italy
The proposal put forward in this paper makes use of the elements of cognitive linguistics to move towards the creation of a new type of specialist glossary addressed to translators.The research question is whether it is possible to use visual thinking with the aim of improving the experience of the translator. In other words whether it is possible to use visual thinking to create an animated glossary that supports the translator during terminology research and to support the understanding of the text.
Through animated images it is possible to develop a fertile ground to create associations of meaning, starting from the primordial stimuli we use in our learning process. The image reflects the substance of the lexical, the movement express the dynamic forces involved in physical processes that move the world, together, these two elements recreate frames and scripts by which the element can be identified, tried, and recalled to memory once learned and used to be decoded through verbal communication.In this way translator, could have at its disposal the materialization of a difficult concept, structured in such a way that it can be learned quickly.
If understand means to some extent remember, the best way is to enable this process is using the images. The idea is to put together the verbal with the visual and animate the visual to simulate metaphorically a difficult concepts belonging to hard sciences, so as to facilitate the discovery of information and understanding at the same time. It is necessary to make sure that visual dictionaries
do not remain in their static form, but enhance the educational experience they offer. It is the visual dictionaries that help when all other resources have already been consulted and are the ones most affected by the non-innovation.
Paradoxically, they have become mere multimedial appendage and they have not found a proper place in the digital tools for the translator: images research pass through search engines; video channels that deal with specialized topics, explaining them, proliferate following a current chaotic and not very tidy, which is not good for those who have to worry about understanding a whole text, translate it and do everything in a short time.
