The significance of computational morphological for Zulu lexicography

Abstract

With regard to the significance of computational morphological analysis for Zulu, and more specifically for Zulu lexicography, the aims of this article are the following: Firstly, we discuss computational morphological analysis as an enabling technology in the field of natural language processing (NLP) with specific reference to lexicography. Secondly, we explain how a computational morphological analyser for Zulu is built by using the Xerox finite-state tools. Thirdly, we demonstrate the application of such an analyser by means of examples from Zulu. Finally, we argue that in Zulu lexicography, a computational morphological analyser is an indispensable tool for facilitating some of the basic outputs of electronic corpora.