Terminologija ir dabartis

TERMINOLOGY AND THE PRESENT Under the title “Terminology and the Present,” Kaunas University of Technology published a collection of articles1 comprising papers written for the scientific conference “Problems of the Language of Technical Sciences,” held there on June 4, 1997. The book was published before the conference, so participants could become acquainted with the speakers’ ideas not only in the lecture hall but also after returning home. The publication contains 43 articles. Their authors, numbering fifty, work at nine institutions of higher education and research. They include terminologists from the Institutes of the Lithuanian Language and Latvian Language, a sizable group of Lithuanian- and foreign-language teachers from colleges in Kaunas and Šiauliai, and roughly one in five authors is a natural or technical sciences specialist from Kaunas University of Technology, Vilnius University, or the Institute of Mathematics and Informatics. Most of the articles are in one way or another related to the language of technology and terminology; only a few address considerably broader topics, for example, L. Barzdžiukienė’s “Language—a Cultural Expression of the Human Being,” G. Čepaitienė’s “Functions and Signs of Language Etiquette,” and R. Lekavičienė’s “Language and Consciousness on the Basis of Psycholinguistic Research.” Only a few articles also discuss any aspect of terminology theory in some depth (K. Gaivenis and A. Kaulakienė’s “Linguistic and Subject-Matter Assessment of Technical Terminology,” V. Skujinis’s “International Elements of National Terminology,” and V. Skujinis and M. Kiry­tė’s “The Specific Nature of Terminography in Relation to the Stylistics of Specialised Texts”), or examine the terminology of particular sources or the features of its presentation (N. Banevičienė’s “Deficiencies in the Definitions of Technical-Term Standards,” J. Gaivenytė’s “A Comparison of the Structures of Lithuanian and English Four-Word Technical Terms [– comparison of structures],” J. Korsakas’s “Physics Terms from the Perspective of the Lexicon of Metalanguage Texts,” V. Nečiūnas and V. Nečiūnienė’s “Productive Latin and Greek Affixes and Components in Medical Terminology,” etc.). In their articles, V. Rimša and Sk. Valent take a broad historical-linguistic view of certain aspects of specialised vocabulary— 1 Terminologija ir dabartis: Mokslo darbai. Kaunas: Technologija, 1997. 244 p. 80 —V. Rimša (“On Some Technical Terms”) and Sk. Valent as (“Material Technical Terms in Indo-European Poetics”). The largest share of the articles is devoted to issues of terminology practice and instruction. A practical grounding characterises most of the articles written by specialists in the natural and technical sciences. They present well-supported concerns about inconsistencies found in the terminology of certain fields and offer interesting suggestions (V. Dagienė, “Terminological Problems of Educational Software”; St. Ratautas, “Terminological Difficulties with the Word apranga”; St. Zajankauskas, “On the Terms ėminys, pavyzdys, mėginys, tyrinys, bandinys, etc.”; St. Žebrauskas, “Difficulties in the Use of Certain Electrical Engineering Terms”; A. Žilinskas, “Difficulties in Lithuanian Informatics Terminology,” etc.). But most articles examine or explain, in one way or another, various issues concerning the language of science and the teaching of terminology. Here are just a few examples: D. Aleknienė and V. Žulienė, “Developing Correct Stress in Professional Language”; R. Bukauskienė, “Teaching English Terminology in Ecology and Agronomy in Higher Education”; G. Klimovienė, “Teaching Business and Commerce Terms through Active Learning Methods”; E. Mileškevičienė, “Methods of Teaching Specialised Terminology”; Sv. Statkevičienė, “The Specific Features of Teaching Professional Language to Doctoral Students,” etc. Some of these articles make piecemeal corrections to various aspects of language, especially professional language. There are also articles devoted almost entirely to the culture of professional language, for example, R. Bartkevičienė and N. Petniūnienė’s “Difficulties in the Professional Language of Foresters”; V. Cելiešienė, R. Žilinskienė and R. Žukienė’s “Shortcomings in Lecturers’ Written and Spoken Language”; V. Ljolienė’s “Certain Inaccuracies in the Formation and Use of Electrical Engineering Terms”; E. Molytes’s “The Most Common Errors in Medical Terminology,” etc. The article authors often raise pressing questions about the language of science, term formation, usage, and instruction with considerable concern. Their ideas mostly revolve around current terminological practice and the teaching of specialised language. Incidentally, the close linking of terminology itself and its practice with teaching will probably prove to be the most interesting feature of the collection’s contents, a connection that has rarely been brought together in this way— 81 —until now. “Pure” terminologists, as well as various terminology commissions, generally show virtually no interest in teaching, although it is one of the most important (if not the most important) ways of introducing terms into usage. Thus, broadly speaking, the collection discusses, or at least touches on, many important issues concerning the existence of terms and their present-day state, along with matters related to them. “Terminology and the Present” is an interesting, substantial book, competently produced and published. It will undoubtedly be used and consulted by both terminology planners and language teachers. However, readers consulting it will need to be cautious: throughout the book they will encounter a sizeable number of various inaccuracies, mistakes, erroneous statements and explanations, and unsupported conclusions. For this reason, in order to help the book’s authors and readers, this review is concerned first and foremost with mentioning at least the more significant unacceptable or questionable points, and also drawing attention to certain inaccuracies of thought and expression. One longstanding problem among specialists in some of our scientific, artistic, and other fields is insufficient knowledge of the history of those fields. This gives rise to relatively frequent instances of seriously underestimating their age—many perhaps imagine that before the twentieth century, or even before the first period of national independence in this century, almost nothing existed in Lithuania—not in art, music, science, or technology—even though we are heirs to the culture of the great Grand Duchy of Lithuania and have one of the oldest universities in Eastern Europe. Unfortunately, some authors of “Terminology and the Present” also seem to locate the origins of their fields far too late: the article “Difficulties in the Use of Certain Electrical Engineering Terms” claims that the seventieth anniversary of the University of Lithuania coincides with an equal anniversary of the technical sciences (p. 216), while the author of “Suffixal Medical Terms in P. Avižonis’s ‘Guide to Eye Diseases’” appears to consider P. Avižonis’s book, published in 1940, one of the earliest sources of Lithuanian medical terminology (p. 51). The origins of both Lithuanian terminology and, especially, science and technology should be sought much further back. We also have another rather odd habit: we use the term linguist for people in a very imprecise way. Even linguists themselves often call primary-school teacher A. Vireliūnas (1887–1925) a linguist, apparently, 82 because for several years in the early 1920s he worked on the Terminology Commission alongside J. Jablonskis, K. Būga, and others, compiled a collection of terms adopted by that commission, and wrote a few articles and a booklet. Perhaps it was sometimes for similar reasons that, in the article “Lexical [= Leksiniai] and stylistic features of scholarly texts,” the engineer A. Novodvorskis and the physician A. Šuminas were called linguists (p. 154). Yet, seeing the names of genuine linguists such as K. Gaivenis, E. Jakaitienė, J. Palionis, R. Piotrovskis, A. Reformatskis, G. Vinokuras, and others all around them, one can quite reasonably wonder whether those individuals may have joined that company by mistake. It is easy to gather a good handful of inaccurate explanations of various linguistic matters from the collection’s articles. A few examples from word formation: the word įeitis (p. 16), formed with the suffix -tis, is considered a suffixal derivative, whereas the reverse occurs with užkratas (p. 53), an obvious ending-derived word that is treated as a suffixal derivative of -tas. Having carelessly isolated the suffixes -ula and -da (p. 54) in the words pragula and pažaida, one is left with the unusually truncated roots -gu- and -žeid- of the base words pragulėjo and pažeidė. Such things clearly show that some of those examining terms should study the foundations of morphological analysis more thoroughly. In general, writers would greatly benefit from a better acquaintance with the theory of word formation, grammar, language culture, and language standardization. This might help them avoid devising unfounded rules and enable them to assess more objectively both others’ claims and the linguistic material at hand. For example, when the adjectives in -inis, -ė used in an electrical engineering publication are corrected simply because they are supposedly derived from international words containing the suffix -al- or -yv- (aktyvinė, diferencialinė, etc., p. 128), one might easily conclude that such adjectives cannot be formed in the standard language. But that is simply not so: nobody objects, nor is there any reason to object, to such derivatives when they are properly formed and used. In another article, the derivational potential of -inis, -ė is restricted even further: it is claimed that “another suffix should not be used before this suffix” (p. 135). This is wholly unheard-of. First of all, it is unclear how such a preceding suffix could be used. Perhaps what was meant is that adjectives in -inis, -ė are not formed from words containing a suffix. But that would be a gross falsehood. The adjectival suffix -inis, -ė is precisely one of those that 83 are highly productive today and have relatively few derivational restrictions. One should express one’s thoughts much more precisely, so as not to create the impression that nonexistent rules or linguistic tendencies are being invented. This is extremely important when teaching students, not only at scholarly conferences or in scholarly publications, because only genuine facts should be taught. The collection contains still more made-up rules and excessive generalizations. For example, concerning words with the international combining form hidro, it states: “The combining form hidro cannot be replaced by an independent word. What matters here is whether the second element of the compound is Lithuanian or international. If it is international and denotes a term or a scientific concept [=ir yra terminas], then a compound should be used, e.g., [=:] hidrostatika, hidrodinamika, hidrotransmisija, etc.; but if it is Lithuanian, the compound term should be replaced by a multiword term, e.g., [=:] hidraulinė pavara, hidraulinis siurblys, hidraulinis variklis, etc.” (p. 238). Without dwelling on the infelicities of expression in this passage (though the contradiction between the first sentence and the concluding part cannot be passed over in silence: supposedly it cannot be replaced by an independent word, yet it is replaced immediately!), the main point here is that the standardization of contemporary standard Lithuanian offers no grounds whatsoever for such rules. Quite the opposite. If such a rule were followed (and there are quite a few international combining forms of this kind besides hidro), it would require a considerable upheaval in current language practice and standardization. Where do such ideas come from? Perhaps from an excessively literal interpretation of the State Commission of the Lithuanian Language’s recommendation concerning a few words with the initial element auto (incidentally, this would show how cautiously high-level institutions should intervene in specific usage issues, and how precisely they should formulate their statements when they do so). Not all linguists explain individual aspects of language in the same way. This is no problem. It may be part of the search for scientific truth. However, it is not good when certain assumptions or possibilities are exaggerated. One such case would probably be an absolutized rejection by some of the notion of compounding as a word-formation method, based on some of the interesting and incisive reflections by Prof. V. Urbutis on possible explanations of the formation of compound words (compounds are treated as suffixal derivatives). However, all the academic dictionaries of words 84 descriptions of word formation and school textbooks alike do not lump together the formation of ending-derived words and compounds. University instructors should follow this distinction too (especially those teaching non-philologists), and should not burden the minds of either instructors in other subjects or students with it (p. 70). Likewise, clipped words medpunktas, medsesuo, tubdispanseris, and the like, should not be called compounds or compound terms (pp. 135–136). The publication presents a considerable number of various language corrections. Unfortunately, some of them are questionable, some wholly unacceptable, and in places it corrects things that should not be corrected. Without a broader context, it is difficult to say whether gabaritas is accurately corrected to tūris in the phrase iškirstos medienos gabaritas (p. 41), since these words have quite different meanings. Thus, presented without a broader explanation, this correction may mislead people. Unfortunately, this kind of correction of words and genders divorced from their necessary usage context seems even to be spreading. It is hard to understand why the very much alive expression medžio leidimas is corrected, and how its proposed replacement medžio vertimas, usually used in another sense, is any better (p. 41; for the usage of these words, see DŽ₃ 439 and 923, LKŽ VII 270). It is unclear why the term šaknų papjovimas is considered strange (p. 43). The linguist is seriously mistaken in claiming that saying ačiū labai supposedly violates language norms (p. 77). Language correctors should be much more cautious and, above all, strive to become as familiar as possible with living language and with the theory and practice of language correction, because when perfectly good terms formed on the basis of living language, or even the expressions of that language itself, are set about correcting, the words involuntarily slip from one’s lips: “Lord! What is being done to our language? Why does artificial language seem better to some than living language?!” In general, corrections should be self-evident, very clear, and well-founded; it must be shown precisely what is corrected and in which cases. In places, readers may find it difficult to tell whether individual words or expressions are acceptable, for example, ap-spręsti is treated as a language error in one place (p. 71), but recommended for use elsewhere (p. 224). The claim that pronominal forms are “an essential marker of multiword terms” (p. 42), even though based on A. Pupkis, is greatly overstated. One should even seriously question whether it is necessary to say, as recommended in the same place, only grynasis pušynas, laikinasis sandėlis, natūralu- 85 this regrowth. It is unclear what grounds there are for correcting the genitive modifiers in the word combinations aluminium veins, capacitor motors (p. 128). Surely every specialist and, indeed, every language user would agree that it is usual, or at least more usual nowadays, to say an aluminium spoon, a steel scythe, a silver coin, a copper wire. The genitive is not foreign here either; it is quite familiar, but in present-day language such cases seem to have become the preserve of poetic and literary, rather than technical, language. Now, the expressions capacitor’s motor and capacitor motor plainly designate different concepts, so they cannot be corrected to one another (from the standpoint of language). Unless someone has confused the objects themselves (but that would be an error of subject matter, not language)...” Sometimes the examples given do not have everything corrected that ought to be corrected. For instance, in the sentence When selecting antennas, their prevalence and the completeness of the calculation methodology developed were taken into account, only the word completeness is corrected (p. 69); but if the intention was not to improve the sentence further, it would have been appropriate to revise at least its beginning as well: The prevalence of the antennas selected was taken into account <...>. In certain expressions, the dative of purpose is corrected to an infinitive too one-sidedly, for example: 1) For the construction of a system of tolerances (= To construct a system of tolerances), a unit of tolerance is established (p. 70); For such angle measurement (= To measure such angles), a sine bar is most often used (p. 70); 3) Great attention is devoted to evaluating the quality of the products being manufactured (= Much attention was devoted to evaluating the quality of the products being manufactured) (p. 65). In such cases, it would be better—and, above all, more lively—to write, for example: 1) To establish a system of tolerances, a unit of tolerance is determined; 2) Such angles are most often measured using a sine bar; 3) Great care is taken to evaluate the quality of the products. There are also one or two things to criticize in the language of the article authors themselves. Here it is an inappropriately used word or little word, there a grammatical gender, for example: 1) systematicity of definitions (= systematicity), p. 34; 2) younger and older (= lower and upper) grades, p. 100; 3) It is not enough to state the importance of language in scientific cognition (= for scientific cognition), p. 21; 4) <...> 86 a properly f o r m u l a t e d (=formulated, constructed) linguistic environment <...>, p. 66; 5) <...> it is necessary to greatly expand <...> one’s k n o w l e d g e o f i n t e r n a t i o n a l w o r d s i n L i t h u a n i a n (= knowledge of international words used in Lithuanian), p. 164 (besides, this assertion itself is highly questionable). The partitive genitive is quite often overlooked, for example: 1) As a result, s t r u c t u r a l v a r i a n t s o f i d i o m s arise (=structural variants of idioms; even better: there arise <...> variants), p. 25; 2) <...> synonymous phraseological units may also form in s y n o n y m o u s f r a s e o l o g i c a l u n i t s (=synonymous phraseological units, even better: there arise <...> phraseological units), p. 27; 3) We have also included various f o r m u l a s o f p o l i t e n e s s (=various formulas of politeness; even better: various polite expressions), p. 102; 4) <...> they are taught <...> to form s e n t e n c e s (=sentences) with that word themselves, p. 132; 5) <...> it is easy to find minimal texts-syntagms r e a c h i n g t o w a r d s p r o t o-l a n g u a g e p e r i o d s (=texts-syntagms reaching towards proto-language periods / tiny texts-syntagms), p. 194 and elsewhere. Alas, alas! Increasingly, linguists themselves, apparently distancing themselves from living speech, no longer use the partitive genitive even in cases where the spirit of living speech urgently demands it. Lately, the fashion for reversing the order of mixed (agreeing and non-agreeing) modifiers has been spreading widely. And the monument was erected in the most honorable place in Vilnius to the Lithuanian Grand Duke, rather than to the Grand Duke of Lithuania. There is quite a jumble of these in the publication under review, too. Even the titles of several articles seem to arrange modifiers according to some logical preference rather than the tendencies of the language, for example: “Cultivating Correct Stress in Professional Language” (p. 11), “Deficiencies in Lecturers’ Written and Spoken Language” (p. 68), “Characteristics of Teaching Professional Language to Doctoral Students” (p. 189), and others. It would be smoother, more idiomatic, and livelier to say and write teaching correct stress in professional language (stress is taught; “cultivated” is unsuitable here), lecturers’ written and spoken language, doctoral students’ professional language. Without delving into the various inaccuracies in the publication under discussion, I would nevertheless like to add a word or two about the spelling of personal names from foreign countries. In the book, personal names from countries that use the Latin alphabet are most often printed in their original form, often with Lithuanian endings added. But here and there, mixed in among them, one finds spellings Lithuanianized according to pronunciation, for example, a certain 87 most often, while Lithuanian endings are often added. But mixed in here and there are also spellings Lithuanianized according to pronunciation, for example, a certain W. von Humboltas (p. 46; for some reason the foreign spelling of the first name has been retained in this case), Heigensas (p. 22), and others. The addition of Lithuanian endings is even more inconsistent, with the result that one author may write Wittgensteinas (p. 20; by mistake, the word is printed in the publication with q rather than g), while another writes Wittgenstein (p. 124). In such a case, it is difficult to tell whether a man or a woman is being discussed. There is much confusion here, and no consideration at all is given to the fact that, at least throughout this century, Lithuanian endings have generally been used to distinguish the surnames of men and women: thus, Mr. Heidegeris (pronounced, and often written, [Heidegeris]), Osgoodas [Osgudas], Sapiras [Sepiras], but Mrs. Heidegger [Heideger], Osgood [Osgud], Sapir [Sepir] (these examples were selected from pp. 46, 124, and 125; they are presented incorrectly there). Clearly, this shows that much about this matter remains unclear to the writers. This handful of comments has not been written with the intention of disparaging that rather interesting collection, as I called it. No! The only aim was to draw readers’ attention (especially that of non-linguists) to the fact that this book, like any other, should be read thoughtfully and critically, and that one should never blindly follow whatever someone says or writes, wherever and however they do so. The authors of “Terminologija ir dabartis” sought the truth. It does not always shine forth immediately. Perhaps, then, the thoughts and doubts set down here will help them take a small step forward on the path of learning, teaching, and studying their native language. Stasys KEINYS 88