MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND SCIENCE OF UKRAINE

IZMAIL STATE UNIVERSITY FOR HUMANITIES

FACULTY OF FOREIGN LANGUAGES

THE CHAIR OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND TRANSLATION

“Terminology as a science”

Report on
Practice of oral and written
translation
The second-year student
Subgroup 20i
Krystyna Korolkova

Izmail-2020
 Contents
1.Introduction………………………………………………………………………....3
2. Background and development………………………………………………….......5
3. Basic Elements of TS………………………………………………………............5
Object - concept – characteristics…………………………………………….........5
Concept relations and systems……………………………………………...……...6
Definition……………………………………………………………………..........6
Terms………………………………………………………………………………7
4. Terminological Concept Analysis…………………………………………....…....7
5. Terminology Work…………………………………………………………….......8
6. Computer-aided Terminology Work, Term Banks, and Terminology
Management……………………………………………………………………………
…..…8
7. Terminology Planning……………………………………………………….….....8
8. Terminology Science and Research………………………………………….........8
9.Bibliography………………………………………………………………………..9

T[erminology] S[cience] (often abbreviated to terminology) is an interdisciplinary

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study of the principles and theoretical bases of concepts, concept systems and the
designations of the concepts in scientific, technical and other professional fields. Its
origin lies in the efforts to solve professional communication problems resulting from
the internationalization of commerce, technology, and science in the 20th century. A
variety of practice-oriented terminological activities consists of: t[erminology] w[ork]
(terminography, terminological lexicography), terminology standardization,
terminological information and documentation, terminology planning and
terminological training. In general language use, the term terminology normally refers
to the set of (technical) terms on a specific topic or in a specific field. Terminology is
also used to refer to TS, the theory of terminology, or terminological research, or to
any of the practical activities applying its findings. The term terminology science is
created according to the model of the German
terms Terminologiewissenschaft and Terminologielehre. It is widely used in
international contexts even though English native speakers frequently reject the
word science, and prefer, e.g., ‘terminology studies.' Wright and Budin (1997) have
introduced the term terminology management to cover “any manipulation of
terminological information,” i. e., practically all of the activities listed above.  
Terminology science is a branch of linguistics studying special vocabulary.
The main objects of terminological studies are special lexical units (or
special lexemes), first of all terms. They are analysed from the point of view of their
origin, formal structure, their meanings and also functional features. Terms are used to
denote concepts, therefore terminology science also concerns itself with the formation
and development of concepts, as well as with the principles of exposing the existing
relations between concepts and classifying concepts; also, with the principles of
defining concepts and appraising the existing definitions. Considering the fact that
characteristics and functioning of term depend heavily on its lexical surrounding
nowadays it is common to view as the main object of terminology science not separate
terms, but rather the whole terminology used in some particular field of knowledge
(also called subject field).
Terminological research started seventy years ago and was especially fruitful at the
last forty years. At that time the main types of special lexical units, such as terms
proper, nomens, terminoids, prototerms, preterms and quasiterms were singled out and
studied.
A nomen, or a nomenclature unit, is a name of a single notion or a certain unit of
mass production, e.g. prefix dis-; Canon 550D; UA-24; etc.
Terminoids, or jargon terms, are special lexical units which are used to name the
phenomena that are absolutely new and whose concepts are not interpreted in a
monosemantic way. E.g., Salmon Day, mouse potato, etc.
Prototerms are special lexemes that appeared and were used in prescientific times.
Preterms are a special group of lexemes which is represented by special lexical units
used as terms to name new scientific notions. They are represented by a vast

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descriptive pattern, e.g. business process reengineering, management by walking
about, etc.[5]
The main principles of terminological work were elaborated, terminologies of the
leading European languages belonging to many subject fields were described and
analysed. It should be mentioned that at the former USSR terminological studies were
conducted on an especially large scale: while in the 1940s only four terminological
dissertations were successfully defended, in the 1950s there were 50 such
dissertations, in the 1960s their number reached 231, in the 1970s – 463 and in the
1980s – 1110.
As the result of development and specialising of terminological studies, some of the
branches of terminology science – such as typological terminology
science, semasiological terminology science, terminological derivatology, comparative
terminology science, terminography, functional terminology science, cognitive
terminology science, historical terminology science and some branch terminology
sciences – have gained the status of independent scientific disciplines.

Although a relatively “new” field, the truth is that the systematic ordering of

specialized terminologies to communicate expert knowledge has been carried out
for many decades, as evidenced by the early technical dictionaries produced by subject
experts such as Carolus Linnaeus with his Species Plantarum (1753) and Systema
Naturae (1759); Heinrich Paasch with his maritime dictionary of 1885, and Alfred
Schlomann with his 21 illustrated technical dictionaries that took him 35 years to
complete from 1906 to 1940.
Interestingly enough, these and other experts were not translators, they were subject
experts who developed methodologies to do terminology work that became the
foundation of more active research in the field. Thanks to their efforts, people
like Helmut Felber, Ernest K. Dresen, and Eugen Wüster not only developed the
methodology even further but helped bring Terminology to the forefront of the
scientific world. Wüster gave Terminology its own scientific theory, the General
Theory of Terminology, which clearly defined its object of study, concepts (in
contrast with words which are the object of study of Linguistics). His Theory
differentiates Terminology completely from Linguistics on different fronts.
Other theories have built on Wüster’s Theory, such as M. Teresa
Cabré’s Communicative Theory of Terminology, that consolidated it as
an autonomous scientific discipline. Mind you, there are individuals who consider it
just a practice because it owes the theoretical bases to other disciplines, such as
linguistics, but thanks to terminologists such as Wüster and Cabré, the activities
performed to study terms can be communicated, described and justified according to
their theories which are based on accepted principles. Some others argue that it is not
fully autonomous because it relies on other disciplines, but what discipline is entirely
pure? Most of them feed on each other. Economics, a profession of long-standing, is
still considered by some as a pseudoscience. According to Orlando Patterson, “the

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American public is decidedly more mixed toward economics, ranking it well below
established scientific fields such as physics or biology, and even below sociology.”
If you are a translator, you know the initial struggle with the Translation career. The
same question as to whether Translation was a scientific discipline was raised in the
1970s and 1980s and American Scholar, James Holmes, in his paper “The name and
nature of translation studies” claimed that a prerequisite to call it so was the existence
of communication channels such as conferences and scientific publications”. So this is
yet another rationale behind the fact that Terminology is indeed a scientific discipline.
You only need to take a look at TermCoord’s webpage to find all the evidence.
Terminology has gained great reputation thanks to the work of these and other experts
and linguists and it is likely to become a sought-after career among linguists and
nonlinguists in the next few years. For a summary on terminology theories, read my
post “Terminology Theory in Easy-to-Swallow Pills”.

1. Background and development.

Early on, many scholars and other specialists came to realize the importance of using
accurate terminology in their fields, and e.g., Linnaeus (1707-1778) and Lavoisier
(1743-1794) created systematic nomenclatures for their respective fields. By the end
of the 19th century, international rules had been established for botany, medicine,
chemistry, etc. Different kinds of cooperative terminological activities appeared as a
result of the industrial revolution. TS was established by the Austrian engineer Eugen
Wüster (1898-1977), whose doctoral dissertation “Internationale Sprachnormung in
der Technik, besonders in der Elektrotechnik”was published in 1931. He brought
together theories and methods from several disciplines, such as linguistics, logic,
ontology, and information science. Linguistics, especially lexicology and
lexicography, had created a foundation for describing general language vocabulary,
but was not yet sufficient to cope with L[anguage for] S[pecial] P[urposes] or their
vocabularies. The basic axioms of the general theory of terminology are: (i.) TW starts
from a concept (cf. lexicography) and its goal is to delimit the concepts clearly from
each other; (ii.) concepts and terms are seen as separate units; (iii.) emphasis is on a
synchronic view; (iv.) concepts and terms can only be studied in their relation to the
related concepts and terms; and (v.) organization of terminological entries is
systematic or thematic instead of alphabetic. It was also seen as necessary to
manipulate the lexical resources used in special fields consciously.

2. Basic Elements of TS.

The basic elements of TS and TW are objects (of reference), concepts, the
characteristics of concepts, concept relations and systems, terms and other concept
presentations (definitions, LSP phrases, non-verbal representations), and the relations
between concepts and terms (e.g., synonymy, polysemy, mononymy, homonymy,

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equivalence). As an interdisciplinary field, TS encounters certain problems when it
comes to its own terms and concepts, since it has borrowed many them from various
fields and adapted them to its specific needs.

2.1 Object - concept - characteristics

In TS concepts are often defined as units of thought formed by abstraction or as units

of knowledge. Concepts consist of characteristics,  based on properties observed in a
(material or immaterial) object or in its relation to other objects. An analysis of the
characteristics of a concept is needed for delimiting a concept from its superordinate
concept and its coordinate concepts as well as from its own subordinate concepts.
Characteristics can be divided into intrinsic and extrinsic ones. The intrinsic
characteristics are based on the properties of an object in itself, e.g., material,
consistency (of a substance, chemical), structure, quality, form, color, size, quantity,
form of existence, etc. The extrinsic characteristics are based on properties that can be
observed when an object is seen in its relation to other objects, e.g., sequence, age,
duration, frequency, location, reason, cause, purpose, aim.
2.2 Concept relations and systems

TS emphasizes that concepts are not discrete elements, but related (concept relations)
to others; together they form networks of concepts (concept systems). In TW, an
analysis of concept systems is used to provide an overview of a special field, to
delimit concepts, to define them, to form new terms and to evaluate existing and
competing terms, as well as to structure systematic glossaries and other systematic
representations. Graphic representations (e.g., tree diagrams, bracket diagrams) are
often used to visualize the concept system(s). Concept relations and systems can be
classified into logical and ontological. Sometimes logical concept systems are called
taxonomies or typologies. The ontological concept relations and systems are based on
the relationships observed on the object level, e.g., whole-–part and part–-part,
object–-location, simultaneous or consecutive events, cause-–effect, effect-–effect,
object–-material, object–-origin, activity-–agent, sender–-object –receiver –channel,
object-–representation, etc.

2.3 Definition
In TS and TW it is generally acknowledged that it is not enough to collect lists of
terms and their equivalents in different languages; rather, definitions are needed. An
ideal definition describes the contents of a concept (intension) and distinguishes it
clearly from neighboring concepts (see 2.1). A definition also provides a link between
the concept and its designation(s). Unambiguous definitions are seen to be a
prerequisite for high-quality terminology. For practical TW there exist rules for

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definition writing. Definitions are also an object of basic terminology research, e.g.,
different types of definitions, definitions of concepts referring to actions and events,
and non-verbal definitions.
2.4 Terms
Terms can be defined as linguistic designations of specialized concepts. They are more
precise than non-terms and belong to systems of terms that correspond to concept
systems. Traditionally, terms are associated with nouns, even though adjectives, verbs,
and adverbs may also be terms. Term formation mainly follows the same rules as does
general language vocabulary. Characteristic to the terminologies are, however, high
numbers of borrowings, compounds, and abbreviations. According to handbooks, an
ideal term is: (i.) logical and self-explanatory, (ii.) harmonized with other terms within
the same system, (iii.) complies with the syntactic and morphological rules of the
language; (iv.) capable of producing derivations and compounds; (v.) as short as
possible without affecting its clarity; (vi.) clearly different from other terms, and
preferably has no synonyms or homonyms, nor is polysemous, nor has any
orthographic or morphological variations; and (vii.) accepted by users. In practice,
however, these requirements cannot always be met. Research interests have extended
to LSP phraseology (e.g., to browse the WWW), non-verbal signs of concepts and
acceptance of neologisms.

3. Terminological Concept Analysis

Terminological concept analysis consists of: a) extracting the concepts and terms and
preliminarily ordering them; b) analyzing the characteristics of the concepts; c)
analyzing the relationships between the concepts and establishing a concept system
representation; and d) connecting the terms to the concepts, and vice versa, including
detecting synonymy, polysemy and homonymy. Concept analysis can be applied to
just one concept and its terms and equivalents in another language (ad hoc analysis),
or for projects designed to cover a larger area of mono- or multilingual terminology.
Terminological concept analysis is not used only for compiling terminological
vocabularies and data bases, but it can be applied to any description of the terms and
concepts of a field.

4. Terminology Work
T[erminology] w[ork] “is concerned with the systematic collection, description,
processing and presentation of concepts and their designations” (ISO/FDIS 1087-
1:2000) and thus covers the whole process of producing terminological products
containing the mono-, bi- or multilingual terminology of a special field. Its purpose
can be descriptive or prescriptive. The process of TW consists of organizing the work,
delimiting and sub-dividing the field, collecting source material, terminological
concept analysis, definition-writing and preparating for publication (terminography).
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Terminology work is carried out in subject fields, usually by groups of experts. There
are national (e.g. terminology centers), international (e.g. Infoterm, Termnet) and
regional organizations, associations, etc., involved in TW on its different levels. Their
functions vary much, e.g., creating new terminology, compiling terminological
vocabularies and term banks, coordinating and consulting for terminological projects,
disseminating terminological information, training subject field specialists in
terminology work, etc. Many companies also pursue their own TW to improve their
internal and external communication. One special form of TW is terminology
standardization intended to unify or harmonize concepts and concept systems and to
achieve agreement on unambiguous concept designations in a given field, either in a
single language or in several languages. In 1952, a committee was founded in ISO (the
International Organization for Standardization) to coordinate the international
standardization of technical terminology and to define principles for this work.

5. Computer-aided Terminology Work, Term Banks, and Terminology

Management.
Since the 1970's, terminologists have seen the usefulness of computers for
terminology work. Terminology database development began with custom made
termbanks developed by terminology centers, governmental agencies, industrial
companies, or universities. Later followed terminology software for individual
terminologists or translators, and terminology databases integrated into companies'
information systems. A terminology database contains structured information on
terminology, e.g., classification, term-related information (recommended terms,
synonyms, abbreviations, full forms, pronunciation, grammatical information, context,
equivalents in different languages, field of usage), concept-related information
(definitions, relations, pictures, figures), information source, etc.
6. Terminology Planning
Terminological methods have been applied in language planning in different countries
and language communities. Especially in countries that have recently gained their
independence, the local languages have often received a new status as a uniting factor.
This has lead to intensified terminology work in order to increase the lexical resources
of the language in order to cope with all the functions of a fully developed language.
Terminology work has been extended to minority languages and to new special fields
without earlier terminology in the local language.
7. Terminology Science and Research
The objects of theoretical terminology research are the basic elements of the theory,
ways of analyzing and presenting terminological knowledge, and methods of practical
terminological activities. Furthermore, special characteristics of terminologies in
individual languages or in given fields are subjected to both synchronic and diachronic
research. New impulses are sought from other disciplines to enhance and develop the

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theoretical foundation and methods. The differences in the approaches to the theory
often reflect the specific terminology-related problems of the country or area. In many
countries, practical TW is in the foreground, while others cover all the activities,
including research into the theoretical foundations of TS. Normative TW comprises
the most visible part of terminological activities, which is also why TS as a whole has
received a normative label and the descriptive use of terminological methods is often
forgotten.
As early as in the 1930s, Wüster was a proponent of A[pplied] L[inguistics] and found
it to be an ideal location for TS. Its starting point is in real language-related
communication problems. Since the 1970's, TS has spread to many universities where
it is often situated directly under AL or translation and interpreting, LSP or foreign
language studies, computational linguistics, or technical communication. Also theory
of science has its interest in TS. TS is often treated also as an independent discipline.
The interdisciplinarity offers the prerequisites for achieving new insights into the
nature of terms and concepts as well as for creating new methods for solving both
theoretical and practical terminology-related problems in LSP communication.

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 Bibliography
1.Cabré, M. Teresa. 1998. Terminology: Theory, methods and applications.
Amsterdam: Benjamins.

2.ISO/FDIS 1087-1:2000. Vocabulary - Part 1 Principles and Methods.

3.Laurén, Christer; Johan Myking; & Heribert Picht. 1998. Terminologie unter der
Lupe. Vom  Grenzgebiet zum Wissenschaftszweig. Vienna: Termnet.
4.Nuopponen, Anita. 1998. Begriffsbeziehungen und Begriffssysteme. In Laurén;
Picht; & Myking,  pp. 164-185.
5.Picht, Heribert & Jennifer Draskau. 1985. Terminology: An Introduction.
University  of Surrey, Department of Linguistic and International Studies.
6.Wright, Sue Ellen & Gerhard Budin, eds. 1997. Handbook of Terminology
Management. Amsterdam: Benjamins.
7.Sager, Juan C. (1990). A Practical Course in Terminology Processing. Amsterdam:
Benjamins.
8.Wüster, Eugen. 1959. Das Worten der Welt, schaubildlich und terminologisch
dargestellt. Sprachforum 60. 3/4: 183-203.
9.Wüster, Eugen. 1979/1985. Einführung in die Allgemeine Terminologielehre und
Terminologische Lexikographie. 2nd. ed. Copenhagen Business School.
10.Patterson, Orlando. Overreliance on the Pseudo-Science of Economics in The New
York Times, February 9, 2015.

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