Abstract: EcoLexicon? is a terminological knowledge base (TKB) on the environment where different types of information converge in a multimodal interface: semantic networks, definitions, contexts and images. It seeks to meet both cognitive and communicative needs of different users, such as translators, technical writers or even environmental experts. According to Meyer et al. 1992, TKBs should reflect conceptual structures in a similar way to how concepts relate in the human mind. From a neurological perspective, Barsalou 2009: 1283 states that a concept produces a wide variety of situated conceptualizations in specific contexts, which clearly determines the type and number of concepts to be related to. The organization of semantic information in the brain should thus underlie any theoretical assumption concerning the retrieval and acquisition of specialized knowledge concepts as well as the design of specialized knowledge resources Faber, 2010. Furthermore, since categorization itself is a dynamic context-dependent process, the representation and acquisition of specialized knowledge should certainly focus on contextual variation. Context includes external factors (situational and cultural) as well as internal cognitive factors, all of which can influence one another House, 2006: 342. This view goes hand in hand with the perception of language as a kind of action, where the meaning of linguistic forms is understood as a function of their use Reimerink et al., 2010. In this paper we briefly describe each module of our resource and explain how EcoLexicon? has been contextualized according to conceptual and terminological information. The conceptual contextualization of different entries in EcoLexicon? has been performed according to role-based domains and contextual domains, whereas terminological contextualization is based on contextual domains and use situations. In this way, context is two-fold, since we account for the referential context of concepts in the real world and users’ own communicative and cognitive context.

Keywords: context, dynamism, reconceptualization, environmental knowledge, TKB.

ACM Classification Keywords: H.5.2 User interfaces – Natural language

Link:

CONTEXT-BASED MODELLING OF SPECIALIZED KNOWLEDGE1

Pilar León Araúz, Arianne Reimerink, Alejandro G. Aragón

http://www.foibg.com/ijitk/ijitk-vol04/ijitk04-2-p03.pdf