Delfín Carbonell, PhD., THE Lexicographer and Philologist

Delfín Carbonell, PhD

The majority of lexicographers – scholars who compile dictionaries - are at the helm of teams of researchers who do the most laborious work.

The most prolific authors also have teams of writers who do the actual writing.  The famous author signs it off and also signs the manuscript. This is not criticism, but a fact.

However, I know of a lexicographer who singlehandedly compiles his own dictionaries – of slang, of idioms, quotes, bilingual and monolingual-. So far he’s published 13, and October will bring his 14^th title.

He doesn’t write in seclusion, or in his quiet office at a university, far from the daily grind of common mortals. He also has, by the way, a Dictionary of Cliches, and I’m pretty sure I’ll hear about the one I just used.

Delfín Carbonell Basset weaves the writing of his dictionaries into his daily life. He writes at night or in pockets of time throughout the day. He listens to the way people talk and makes mental and paper notes. He works on his laptop, surrounded by the domestic comings and goings of any household. I don´t know how he does it.

He is the creator of the Unialphabet, in which a bilingual dictionary is not divided into two languages, but sorted alphabetically, just as a monolingual dictionary, which makes it much easier to check.

Besides, Delfín Carbonell is THE philologist of the Spanish TV program Magabusiness, where he explains grammar, pronunciation and other complexities of language with his particular sense of humor, which I’m afraid I may have inherited.

I am an admirer of this scholar, whose passion for language is contagious. I also have the privilege of having direct access to him when I need a fast answer concerning my doubts pertaining language usage, either in English or Spanish, because, he also happens to be bilingual.

I am a writer because I grew up watching Professor Carbonell reading and writing, and I´m bilingual because he devoted time and effort to ensuring all his children spoke two languages.  

It is a privilege to have such a father.

His blogs:

On language and culture

Sobre la lengua inglesa (On the English language)

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The Bilingual Advantage

When I say I´m bilingual I don´t mean that I sort of speak two languages or that I have a good command of one but only read the other. I speak, read and write Spanish just as well as English. Not only that, but I´m bicultural and in my childhood I adopted a third culture. I´m American on my mother´s side, a Spaniard thanks to my dad and proficient in the British culture, having attended a British school for over 10 years. The bilingual advantage is huge, especially when it comes to having command of the two most widely spoken languages in the world (Chinese is a whole different story, since it´s spoken mainly in China).

Being successfully bilingual is not something I´ve achieved on my own, of course. I owe it to my dad, who also has this advantage. He owes that to himself, however, since he traveled to the U.S. when he was 16, went to college here and then was a university professor, after obtaining his PhD in Spain. When we moved from the U.S. to Spain my father, who is now a lexicographer (he compiles dictionaries single-handedly, without the help of teams or helpers), he took on the challenge of teaching my sister and me two languages and doing it well. The result is that I´ve made a good living as a language interpreter and that I´m able to translate a text in the same amount of time that it would take me to copy it in the original language. I can read the great American authors in English and the Spanish classics in Spanish.

Being bilingual and bicultural opens your mind, opens doors and even your heart. You are able to conceive of more concepts when you speak more than one language, since there are concepts that only exist in one language. You also “get” other bilingual and bicultural people. It´s a sub-culture that only the like-minded understand and builds instant rapport.

I now know how difficult it is to make your kids bilingual, because up until now I haven´t had the support, the time, energy nor the means to devote myself to teaching my kids Spanish the way they deserve to be taught. But, it´s not too late and I want them to have the same advantage that my dad gave to my brother, sisters and me.

Besides, my father, Delfín Carbonell Basset, has devoted his entire life to teaching English, with his learning system and his master classes. He is a great teacher, a rarity …

In an upcoming post I will speak about his blog On the English Language and his other successes that have nothing to do with my being bilingual.

If you speak more than one language, share that skill with your kids. It is the best gift you can give them!

http://www.lorrainecladish.com/