Thesauri
A thesaurus is not like a dictionary. It does not provide the definition or pronunciation of a term. What it does provide is a selection of synonyms, and often identifies relationships with other terms within a structured vocabulary.
For example, let’s begin with the word “Dog”. Related vocabulary terms would be “Mammal” (broader), “Chihuahua” (narrower), or “Doghouse” (related, but not in a hierarchical way).
Thesauri may also list antonyms (I’ll use “Cat” as the example of an opposite term, because the barrier must always be in place in my house to keep the peace), non-preferred terms (“Dog” is formally preferred to “Puppy” because the definition of “Puppy” can be unspecific), and scope notes (“Applies to loving, four-legged beasts that tend to drool when hungry or if their owner is wearing a good suit”).
The most well-known thesaurus is probably Roget’s, but thesauri have many more uses than just to expand your everyday vocabulary. Specialized thesauri are developed to manage controlled vocabularies that ensure the consistent usage of language in the creation, management and discovery of specialized information.
Thesauri are used to:
- Aid writers in the composition of text that must consistently use a specialized vocabulary;
- Ensure effective information classification and the application of metadata in a consistent manner; and,
- Improve search engine performance by expanding the search scope to include synonyms to the query term
Black Cat Indexing can help you bring consistency in the creation and classification of your information resources, based on the vocabulary of your specialized environment.