Lexicography as description of signs of times: the case of neologisms in Chinese

In the latest years, Italian market for Chinese language teaching materials has been more and more populated, as new textbooks belonging to a wide range of different categories have been published. In contrast, the market of Chinese to Italian (and mostly Italian to Chinese) dictionaries is still comparatively poor. At present there exist less than a dozen dictionaries, most of which not very updated and in large majority of general scope. The specialized dictionaries are not more than five, regarding economics or political sciences. Therefore it is possible to state that the market of specialized, learners' dictionary for Chinese in Italy is quite wanting. Among the dictionaries that reasonably should be compiled soon for Italian learners of Chinese is a dictionary of Chinese neologisms. Neologisms are very difficult to be found in general Chinese dictionaries, all the more they are completely absent in bilingual dictionaries, but their presence in Chinese texts is relevant and they may constitute a serious harm to the understanding of a text. Moreover a dictionary of neologisms might serve also to non-learners in order to understand certain social phenomena which neologisms designate. In my contribution I will show the latest tentative to fill this lack: a dictionary of the most recent Chinese neologisms which is under compilation at the Confucius Institute of the University of Macerata as part of the core programs supported by Hanban