Researching the Use of Dictionary by Students of English Literature Department at Jenderal Soedirman University

Abstract

Dictionaries are recommnded as a useful tool when learning EFL because it gives information of the language about many aspects like, phonology, morphology, syntax, and semantics. Nevertheless, EFL practionaires rarely pay attention to the dictionary used by the students. The article focuses on the investigation about types of dictionaries used, the frequency of dictionary use, and the lexical information examined. Respondents were students of English Literature Department, Jenderal Soedirman University. Data were taken from questionnaires. The result showed that students did not have any special instruction on how to make full use of the dictionaries. The respondents favored bilingual dictionaries over monolingual dictionaries. Respondents saw that pronunciation, usage, and examples were considered as a secondary importance.