Pabaltijo tautų terminologijos problemos ir Europos Sąjunga

This is a collection Lietuvių kalbos institutas of articles officially presented by the Lithuanian Language Institute at the 2006 Book Fair. It was compiled on the basis of the presentations of the international terminology seminar “Problems and challenges of terminology in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania in the European Union”, held in 2004. The publication is international — the editorial board and the authors of the articles are Lithuanian and foreign scientists, and more English than Lithuanian — three articles in Lithuanian (with English abstracts) and seven — in English (with Lithuanian abstracts). The publication is intended for “practical terminology workers as well as anyone interested in terminology” (p. 8). The theme of the collection is diverse. It mainly writes about the terminology work of international organizations and various countries (Lithuania, Latvia, Estonia, Hungary and Russia), some theoretical issues are discussed, terminology innovations are presented. Not very convenient is the way of arranging the articles of the collection — alphabetically by authors. The collection begins with an unproblematic review article by A. Auksoriūtė, Terminologijos darbas Lietuvos kalbos institute (p. 11—20). In summary, the scope of terminology work at the Institute of Lithuanian Language has expanded considerably. In the past, the Institute’s terminologists worked more practical work, but in recent times they have developed more scientific theoretical work (p. 17). In the largest overview article of the collection —St. Overview of the history and current state of Keino Lithuanian terminology in English (p. 48-67). All stages of the history of Lithuanian terminology are discussed — from the first written texts of the 16th century (this is like an answer to the opinions that Lithuanian terminology began in the 20th century) to the 20th century. Terminologija | 2006 | 13 213 difficulties in terminology arise due to translation and borrowing of terms (,,Europeanization“ according to English), irresponsible preparation of multilingual dictionaries of terms, translation of texts of humanities, social sciences, laws, technical standards, widespread Lithuanian—- English bilingualism (p. 61-65). The situation of Latvian terminology after accession to the European Union and its prospects are reviewed in the English article by Valentina Skujienė (p. 154—159, with Latvian and Lithuanian abstracts). In Latvia, terminology work is carried out by two institutions – the Terminology Commission of the Latvian Academy of Sciences and the Translation and Terminology Centre (p. 154). Difficulties in terminology work arise due to disagreements among specialists, poor theoretical and practical preparation. In a hurry, terms are borrowed from English, terminology work is complicated by the synonymy of existing dictionaries, and terminology tools — term bases — are not updated. The terminology work in Latvia is facing fundamental changes, and the project for the modernization of terminology work published by the State Language Commission is expected to find a more successful model for terminology work (p. 157). The difficulties of translating terms in Brussels, Luxembourg and Estonia are described in H. Tam’s article (pp. 160-167). The difficulties of terminology work in the Estonian Legal Language Centre are due to insufficient funding (the number of employees has decreased almost nine times in two years), as well as to the different approaches of the Centre itself and the Ministry of Justice (p. 164). The complex terminological situation in Hungary is described in |. In the second article, the creation of terms in Central Europe, taking into account the EU terminology (p. 100-107). In Hungary, the translation of European Union documents and the terminology work are carried out by non-terminological institutions (p. 102), and terminological work is relatively spontaneous and mainly related to translation (p. 105). The author of the article emphasizes the importance of deliberate language policy and the creation of terminological institutions (p. 105). It is true that the comparison of small groups of terms from one source (p. 103-105) in terms of origin and structure does not yet reflect the language policy of various countries. Different terminology work problems in standardization institutions are examined by N. Dudlauskienė and Ch. In the articles of Galinsky. In her article Standardization of Lithuanian Technical Terms (p. 21—34), N. Dudlauskienė reviews the activities of the Lithuanian Standardization Department and identifies the most pressing and current problems of terminology work: “<...> In July 2004, the LST Technical Commission adopted a resolution to adopt European terminology standards as Lithuanian terminology standards by means of a notification of approval. The consequence of this decision is that 44 Lithuanian terminology standards have already been issued without 214 Robertas Stunžinas | Lithuanian terms, thus only foreign language terms are included in the Lithuanian technical terminology” (p. 28). Other difficulties in the activities of the Lithuanian Standardization Department —insufficient funding of LST TK 37 activities, inability to ensure the participation of representatives of this institution in ISO/TC 37 activities (p. 29). It is true that a specific proposal for solving the existing problems is also presented — all terminology management institutions should jointly discuss the prepared State language standardization, use, education and dissemination programme and the annual implementation measures plans related to terminological work drawn up in accordance with this programme (p. 30). About the activities of ISO/TK 37 and its subcommittees, newly formulated tasks and the policy of global semantic harmonization is written in Ch. Galinski's article ISO/TC 37 and semantic harmonization (p. 34). Semantic harmonization must be based on a unified methodology, it must be carried out not only on a global scale, but also covering different societies, applications (p. 42). Terminology and other language resources play an important role and are not only a component of all types of textual content, but also a tool for indexing and searching (p. 45). Problems of terminology theory are analyzed in articles of Russian and Latvian terminologists. In the article Russian terminology: situation and prospects (p. 68-88), V. Leičikas and S. Šelovas briefly identify the features and problems of Russian terminology theory: the essence of the term, the linguistic structure of the term, the nature of terminological systems, the development of terminology and terminological systems, the term and the text, etc. Speaking about the essence of the term, the authors of the article emphasize that this problem is addressed in the first publications of D. Lotte and K. Drezen. The polemic of terminologists is summarized by the statement that the basis of the term is linguistic, borrowed from ordinary language, and the most important feature of the term is the ability to mark, name a defined concept in the system of concepts (p. 70). In the section Linguistic structure of the term (p. 72-74) it is emphasized that one of the main objectives of linguistic research In Russia — the problem of varying (dimorphic) terms and the limits of terminological variation (p. 73). In the chapter Terminology as a science (p. 79—80) the question is resolved whether terminology should be regarded as a linguistic discipline. The answer to this question is given by the following statements: 1) the science of terminology studies not only terms as certain lexical units, but also terminology systems, which are not essentially linguistic categories; 2) the most frequently solved non-verbal theoretical issues in terminology Terminologija | 2006 | 13 215; 3) terminology working methods are heterogeneous and are outside the scope of linguistic competence. Summarizing that terminology is a complex science of many fields, Kobrin states that “the science of terminology develops methods of fundamental sciences: linguistics, philosophy, cognitive science; formal, dialectical and mathematical logic; classification theory and semiotics (p. 79). At the end of the article there is a list of the most important works of Russian scholars. The article of S. Shelov Terms, terminology and definitions of terms (seven steps to terminology theory) (p. 122—153) summarizes the author’s practical and theoretical research in the form of questions and answers. The problem of definitions in Lithuanian terminology has been examined more extensively by K. Gaivenis (see Gaivenis 2004: 85-117). S. Šelovas, having defined the essence of the term and its terminology (p. 123), presents the concepts of definition (definition) and explanation (exposition) (p. 124). According to the Russian scholar, in the broad sense of the word, the terminological definition is an explanation of the conceptual content of the defining term (p. 127). Speaking about the types of definitions of terms, the terminologist presents his own classification: classification, enumeration, operational, contextual, non-specific, general definitions (p. 133). Raising the question of the necessity of a definition, S. Šelovas emphasizes that some terms are fully justified and do not require definitions (p. 133). The chapter on conceptual structure of terminology (p. 138-148) deals with the problem of classification hierarchy of concepts. The tables (p. 143—148) give examples of the terms of heat treatment and communication thermals. The problem of the use of metaphors in the terminology of information and communication technologies is reviewed in the article of Latvian terminology by D. Reizniece, J. Silis, I. Ilzina and J. Borzov (p. 108—121). By presenting extreme views on metaphors, the authors emphasize two main functions of metaphorical terms — cognitive and aesthetic. The article formulates two rules that define the use of metaphorical terms: 1) where possible, English metaphors and expressive elements must be replaced by Latvian equivalents; 2) the balance of cognitive and aesthetic functions of Latvian terms must be maintained. However, these rules are not exclusive, the general principles of terminology of information and communication technologies must also be observed. The creation and development of the terminological work tool Lithuanian language terminology is presented in S. Meškauskienė’s article (p. 89—99). In 2002, K. Gaivenis mentioned 216 Robertas Stuzinas | that the Lithuanian term bank has been prepared for several years at the Institute of Mathematics and Informatics, “when creating the main database of the term bank, the grammar, semantics and pragmatics of terms are parameterized. The search for terms would be carried out according to the normative term, its synonyms, definitions, equivalents in other languages <...>“ (Gaivenis 2002: 84). The result of this work, which took several years, is “238 thousand terms, taken from 24 dictionaries of terms from different fields (physics, mathematics, botany, chemistry, sociology, geology, etc.)” (p. 90). In summary, it can be said that in the collection of articles Problems of terminology of the Baltic nations and the European Union useful information can be found not only by practical, but also theoretical terminology specialists. The material of the collection is very diverse — terminology problems of different languages and political challenges after accession to the European Union. Essential issues of terminology theory and terminology usage are also discussed briefly, but relatively clearly. LITTERACY Gaivenis K. 2002: Lithuanian terminology: theory and organizational outline. Vilnius. Gaivenis K. 2004: Presentation and interpretation of compound terms in terminology dictionaries. —The History and Present Problems of Terminology, Vilnius, p. 85—117. Received 2006-12-04 Robertas Stunzinas Lietuvių kalbos institutas P. Vileišio g. 5, LT-10308 Vilnius, Lithuania Email: [email protected] Terminology | 2006 | 13 217