The External Form of Terminological Units as an Object of Language Interferences
As Eugen Wüster stated, the external (outer) form of terminological units is the main object of language interferences. It is actually a term configuration, its physical form. It is correlated to the inner form, which must be differentiated from the semantic meaning of a term, that is, its definition. The inner form is in its turn a literal meaning of a term, which is a link between its outer form and its definition. The outer form consists of a phonetic form (pronunciation) and a written form; the latter one has a priority over the phonetic form; especially it concerns international terms. The outer form is determined by the origin of a term, its etymology, not by its meaning [Wüster 1985, p. 34-35].
Oleksandr Potebnâ supposed that the outer form is an articulate sound, the contents that becomes objective with the help of a sound, unlike its inner form that is the closest etymological meaning [Kiâk 1988, p. 12].
Ûrij Maslov declared that the outer form of a term is its morphological structure and its articulation. It depends upon the inner form of a given term, i.e. upon its motivation. It is the inner form that links the definition of a term with its outer form [Maslov 1987, p. 113].
Language form depends upon the contents of the scientific idea [Budagov 1974, p. 124].
The outer form of a term is formed on the basis of its inner form, which includes a number of distinctive features that should be taken in consideration by coining new terms.
The outer form of a term may be also understood as an external appearance of a term, its phonetic, graphical and sound form. Hence one can admit that the outer form of terminological units includes the etymological and the graphic aspects.
When the branch terminology is consciously planned, it is a harmony between the inner form and the lexical meaning of a term, that should be taken in consideration by creating an outer form [Kandelaki 1977; Kiâk 1988].
In European languages the terminological activity touches upon mostly the morphological level, which is actually the main object of terminological activity especially in the sphere of coining new terms [Drozd, Roudný 1980, p. 38].
The spelling of terminological units (depending upon the spelling traditions of a particular language) is also taken into consideration. It also concerns the choice of a source of borrowing as well as the choice between international and national variants.
The Structural Classification of the Outer Forms of Terminological Units
All the terminological units can be subdivided into two large groups: one-component terms, which consist of only one lexical unit (terminological words), and multicomponent terms (terminological phrases).
Multicomponent terms consist of several lexical units, one of which is a key word. Compounds, such as German Zolldeklaration (customs declaration) are also considered multicomponent because the way whether the words are written together or separately, depends on the spelling traditions of a particular language.
It is an international inner form, not an outer form in a particular language, which is a criterion whether this or that terminological unit is one-component or multicomponent. When the international inner form consists of one component whereas in one or another particular language consists of several words, this term is nevertheless considered one-component.
One-component and multicomponent terms are characterized with different structural peculiarities, therefore each of these two types should be characterized separately from each other.
One-component terms may be referred to one of the following types:
Besides, the graphic appearance of one-component both international and merely borrowed terminological units are also taken into consideration. In particular, such graphic shadows can be differentiated:
Multicomponent terms can be classified depending on the presence or absence of an international inner form as well as on the presence or absence of international roots.
The internationality of inner forms of multicomponent terms consists in
the common character of the general scheme (pattern) and the presence of common constituents that may be both international and national.In this case the word order, endings, ways of combination of the components (coining of composites or making-up terminological phrases) and some other features bound with grammar peculiarities of a particular language, are not taken into consideration. The degree of internationality of an outer form is determined by the presence or absence of international roots.
Thus, the multicomponent terms depending on the degree of their internationality, can be subdivided into the following groups (and subgroups that depend upon the two nuances, namely upon adding national elements to international terminological phrases and upon the removal of one or several elements from an international terminological phrase):
The etymological aspect of an outer form of terminological units consists in the ways of coining new terms (gap filling): a direct borrowing of terminological elements or their translation. The translation of terminological elements, in its turn, also has several varieties: calques, coining new words, composition of terminological phrases, deepening of polysemy. In this case one should take into consideration that calque takes an intermediate position between direct borrowings and translation of terminological elements: an inner form is thereby borrowed whereas an outer form is translated. It is a special way of assimilation, an adaptation to the peculiarities of a corresponding language [Volodina 1993, p. 39].
The way of gap filling depends first of all upon particular circumstances. When a language community wants to express a concept for which there is no appropriate word in this language, in this case this language either borrows a necessary word from another language, or coins a new word for a new concept. Thus there are two possible variants: a language may borrow either both a form and a meaning, or a meaning only [Columas 1989, p. 15].
Thus, new terms can be created either owing to direct borrowings, or owing to solely internal resources, or by combined methods (for instance, through the borrowing of an inner form only).
In this case we must note that the etymology and the motivation (inner form) are not identical concepts. Etymology exists beyond the synchronistic state of lexical meaning, therefore one may underline that motivation is a synchronistic concept whereas etymology is a diachronic one [Kiâk 1988, p. 12-13].
Therefore there are all the grounds for introducing such concepts as etymology without motivation and motivation without etymology.
So the direct borrowing of terminological elements is based solely upon the etymology without motivation (or with a zero motivation) [Drozd, Roudný 1980, p. 39] because any loan e word is no longer motivated in a recipient language. By losing its internal form, it becomes opaque. In case of creating new terms by means of calque we deal to the contrary, with motivation without etymology.
Especially important is motivation in case of coining new words. Gajda defined three types of motivation of terms depending on the three ways of coining new terms mentioned above: word-formative (the morphological derivation), connective (the derivation by means of composition) and merithory (the semantic derivation). Sometimes the phonetic motivation (onomatopoeia, phonosymbolism) is also possible [Gajda 1990, p. 89-92].
Etymology of terminological elements, according to Eugen Wüster, is defined depending on the origin of their outer form. Depending on their etymology Wüster has defined the four types of terminological elements:
If new terms are created by means of direct borrowing, terminologists encounter some particular problems bound with due regard for a number of requirements. The main of these problems is a source of borrowing, i.e. a problem of choice of a language, from which this or that borrowing will be more successful. But a sympathy for this or that language also often plays a rather important role. In the 19th century French was such a language. Now it is the English language that plays the role of "Modern Latin". Even the words of the Greek or Latin origin sometimes penetrate into various languages through the English medium.
If a loan terminological element is borrow with regard for its etymology, it enables to preserve the semantic connection with all the cognate words. The matter is that each language adapt loan word to the peculiarities of its own grammar and phonetics.
Neglecting this principle often causes the loss of such a connection. So in Ukrainian, different ways of borrowing of the words lìnìâ and lajner resulted in the fact that these words are no longer perceived by Ukrainian-speakers as cognate words.
However there are some isolated instances when Greek and Latin words in their English or French variant became an internationalism and is used in the majority of the European languages exactly in the English or French graphic appearance. For instance the English word service looks in German also like Service. The pronunciation is also alike.
International terminological elements (mostly of the Greek and Latin origin) and native terminological elements often co-exist in most languages as synonymic duplicates.
There are also hybrid words that have for instance a Latin root stem and a suffix belonging to the language this borrowing is immediately taken from [Lotte 1982, p. 64].
By creating new terms, lexicographers or translators sometimes encounter a specific problem that seems to be not so considerable: how to transmit a new term in a native language, just to make a direct borrowing from a source language (with or without its adaptation to the spelling rules of a target language), or to translate this term into the native (target) language. And if to translate it, then how: word for word (as a calque) or descriptively?
This problem is rather serious because each new term introduce into this or that branch terminological system should be successful, it should harmonize with other units within this or that terminological system; it should be euphonic as well as capable to create derivatives etc. All these conditions are caused by the fact that the technical language requires a monosemantic mutual understanding between the authors of a technical task and its executors [Beloded 1980; p. 111-112]. Therefore any term should be created with regard for its physical substance and its technical idea [Lotte 1982, p. 7].
In any language linguistic methods of designation can be subdivided into three great groups: a) the use of the resources available in a language; b) the modernization of those available resource; c) the use of new resources [Sager, Nkwenti-Azeh 1989, p. 11].
That means that terms are usually created on the basis of either those words that already exist in a literary language if they acquire a new terminological meaning, or with the help of elements borrowed from other languages. Coining new terminological elements consists in the use of lexical and morphological potential of a language through the formation of particular morphological combinations that were theoretically possible before [Budagov 1974, p. 147]. There is another way of formation of new terms. It is a creation of artificial words. Thus, one can came to the conclusion that new terms can be created in the three basic ways:
Dmitrij Lotte also proposed to differentiate the three basic ways of creating scientific and technical terms.
The first way consists in the independent creating derivatives, clipped words and word combinations (elements a term is based on can in its turn be terms that belong to either this terminological system or to another one).
The second way consists in the use of terms that already exist by means of the change of their meaning (Thus, he did not combine the two ways of creating new terms mentioned above, i.e. by means of the use of internal resources).
The third way is bound with the cases of transplantation of terms into the terminological system of this or that language from another language.
In this case different languages may prefer different ways of coining new terms. For instance, the English language uses the way of creating new terms by means of adapting an old term to a new concept more often than other European languages [Lotte 1982, p. 7, 19].
Thus, creating a new term is not obligatorily a direct borrowing from another language.
More often new terms are created by means of the internal resources of a language.
In the most languages of the world, including such languages, as English, German, Russian etc., the direct borrowing of loan elements is not the principal way creating new terms. In this case foreign elements make up only an insignificant part of the whole word stock.
This part may vary depending on traditions and tastes of these or those terminologists, but almost in all these languages it is exactly internal resources of a language, that are preferred.
Such ways, according to Lotte, may be:
Thus, Lotte gave direct borrowings of term the fifth place only (i.e.
one from the bottom).All the other ways of creating new terms provide for the use of internal resources of a language. Although in this case hybrid words with a loan root may appear (like the Ukrainian words aġreġuvannâ, roz
vantažennâ etc.) or with a loan prefix (antitìlo) or a loan suffix om (like read bel´nij), nevertheless it is exactly native elements that are determinants.Because of a degree their adoption, loan affixes are no longer perceived in such cases as foreign elements.
As a rule, not all the phenomena and peculiarities of the objective reality can be expressed with simple (non-derivative) lexical units only [Kiâk 1988, p. 84]. Therefore it is important to form derivatives with a common root with the aim to preserve the semantic connection between terms that mean homogeneous concepts.
Thus, internal resources of a language serve as lexical "raw materials" for such derivatives. They may include both roots and fully assimilated loan affixes.
On the basis of internal resources of a language scientific and technical terms are usually created in the five basic ways:
The extension of polysemy by means of comparison (spider-like sprue, T-shirt) or metaphor (nose key, tooth lock washer, arm clip) is one of the most widely spread ways of creating new terms by means of the use of internal resources [Sager, Nkwenti-Azeh 1989, p. 11].
The choice of a word for the designation of a new scientific concept is determined by the connection between the new concept and the old one, which makes up the corresponding inner form of the given term, i.e. its motivation [Kvitko 1976; c. 11].
Eduard Skorohod´ko enumerates such ways of creating new terms based upon internal resources by means of changing the meaning of colloquial words and terms borrowed from the other branches of science and technology:
"The most widely spread type of coining new terms by means of changing their meaning is the nomination according to the resemblance of their indication or the resemblance of their function" [Skorohod´ko 1963, p. 18-24].
The transference of meaning may possess a form of classifying subordination of concepts according to the analogy of concepts:
Sometimes terms made up by means of giving available words new shadows of meaning, lose their connection with the words these terms come from. The matter is that on account of its specific technical contents, a colloquial word may acquire a more specific meaning to such an extent that it begins to be perceived as a homonym of its source [Budagov 1953, s.20-21].
Such a kind of homonymy, according to Lotte, may have the following varieties:
By the formation of terms that consist of separate constituents, these elements may also change their meaning and be perceived as homonyms [Lotte 1961, p. 57-58, 62-69].
The phenomenon similar to homonymy is polysemy of terms, when terms are also created with the help of the extension of meaning.
There are almost no exact criteria between the polysemy and the homonymy.
Lotte does not consider the way of the change of meaning of already available words to be so successful. He declares that the discussion about the so called force of inertia has demonstrated, how harmful the creation of unsuccessfully motivated and polysemantic terms is [Lotte 1961, p. 9].
However one may recall many more or less successful cases of creating new terms by means of giving a new terminological meaning to some available words.
For instance the English word mouse (as a computer tool) became an internationalism by the time: cf. Ukrainian miša, Russian myš´, German Maus etc.
This way cannot be considered convenient, because very often such a polysemy causes various complications by reading the scientific and technical literature, sometimes even to misunderstanding of this or that term even through the context.
Therefore Lotte suggested polysemantic terms should be removed irrespective of the degree of their harm, especially it concerns one and the same terminological system.
Each of the terms that belong, for instance, to this or that specific terminological system, should possess only one meaning within this system [Lotte 1961, p. 20]. It also concerns word-formative elements word, first of all suffixes [Lotte 1961, p. 21].
Ruben Budagov admitted also the existence of a particular number of new shadows of meaning that exist in particular stale phrases only [Budagov 1974, p. 149].
Another way of creating new terms on the basis of the internal resources is making up derivatives (derivation) from the available terms or from the lexical units of the colloquial language.
In this case suffixes and prefixes, which turn out to be the most convenient ones for coining new terms because of these or those circumstances, are usually borrowed from the general morphological stock.
In this case morphemes from other languages may also be borrowed.
Some suffixes and prefixes in this case are present solely in the special terms, whereas in the colloquial language they may be absent at all.
In other cases the meaning components of compounds does not obligatorily coincide with the meaning of the lexical and morphological elements they consist of.
There is another specific way of coining new terms, when some suffixes are given a particular terminological meaning (especially in the chemist terminological system).
Motivation of such new terminological units is quite transparent and would facilitate understanding terms by specialists and translators [Skorohod´ko 1963, p. 27-29, 38].
Another widespread way of creating new terms is direct borrowing.
The scientific terminological systems have a rather high capability of borrowing. Direct borrowing form common lexical stocks in different languages, which are not obligatorily kindred. That facilitates mutual understanding among specialists speaking different languages. That means that the extension of the terminological vocabulary in any language is obligatorily accompanied with the process of borrowing of separate words, especially together with borrowing the corresponding scientific concept [Skorohod´ko 1963, p. 58-86].
Direct borrowing is sometimes accompanied with the metaphorization of the primary meaning. For instance in Hindi the word vidyut (electricity) is a Sanskrit borrowing, where this word literally means ‘lightening’; or the Sanskrit word urja (force, power) that means ‘energy’ in Hindi [Sager, Nkwenti-Azeh 1989, p. 23].
The full borrowing provides for the adaptation of a loan word to the phonetic and morphological peculiarities of the corresponding recipient language.
Depending on it, full and partial assimilation are differentiated.
The full a assimilation is a complete adaptation of loan elements to the peculiarities of the corresponding recipient language, i.e. to its phonetic (the substitution of sounds not peculiar to this recipient language; the transference of the word stress, if this recipient language has a fixed word stress; restructurization of syllables; dieresis, epinthesis or prothesis of some sounds in case of a limited phonemic distribution or a limited number of syllable types in a recipient language) and morphological (subordination to the systems of declination and conjugation in the recipient language) rules.
By the partial assimilation some phonetic and grammar peculiarities of the source language are preserved. For example, in Ukrainian some loan words (radìo, pablìsìtì etc.) are not declined. Other direct borrowings preserve the vowel hiatus that is not peculiar for the Ukrainian phonetics (poet, kakao etc.).
By the absence of assimilation loan words preserve their original spelling and pronunciation completely. Thus in English some French words preserve nasal vowels that is not typical for the English phonetics. The preservation of the original spelling of loan words is also a manifestation of the absence of assimilation.
The basic way of the partial borrowing is calque, i.e. literal (word for word) translation of borrowing from the source language into a target language.
Calque can be full and partial.
The full calque is a consecutive word for word translation of all the elements of a word from the source language in a recipient language: Latin Hydrogenium — Russian vodorod (the root hydr- corresponds to the root vod- as well as the root -gen- to the root -rod-).
The partial calque is a translation of not all the elements of a word from the source language in a recipient language: Latin hydrogenium — Ukrainian voden´ (in the Ukrainian translation there is no appropriate equivalent of the Latin root –gen; on the other hand, there is the suffix -en´ that has no equivalents in the corresponding word ìn the source language).
A specific case of calque is the literal translation of separate roots that causes extension of polysemy under the influence of the borrowed motivation.
Sager and Nkwenti-Azeh proposed to differentiate loan words and the loan translation. For instance in Swahili there are many examples with calques from English and other European languages: vita baridi (cold war), nguva farasi (horse-power), pembetatu (triangle) [Sager, Nkwenti-Azeh 1989, p. 21-24].
Lotte was one of the first who accented the attention to the problem classification of loan words. He proposed to subdivide all the borrowings into the literal, transformed and original ones. Under the transformed borrowings he understood words or a phrases transformed at the moment of translation by means of the omission or adding of some elements or substitution of a compound word with a word combination [Lotte 1982, p. 10-14].
There are some cases when borrowing, that has entered this or that language, becomes structuralized.
The reason for this is first of all that other words with the same root or affix begin to enter the same language. Thus the affix that begins to appear in more than one term, sometimes becomes productive and begins to be used in new terms, created with the use of both native and borrowed elements.
In Ukrainian it concerns chiefly Greek and Latin affixes like avto-, arhì-, gìdro-, sinhro-, ul´tra-, polì-, pro-, post-, anti-, proto-, aġro- and many others; or suffixeses cìâ, ìzm, ìst, etc.
All these terminological elements, irrespective of their origin, are quite productive and serve for coining new terms, including the ones with the use of some Ukrainian terminological elements (mainly roots).
Dmitrij Lotte considered that the cases of the application of loan words or separate loan elements is not rare by coining new terms for new concepts, that causes co-existence of words from the native language created with the use of some loan elements, and original borrowings [Lotte 1982, p. 11, 39].
Coining new words with the use of loan elements is thereby a link between the full and the partial borrowings.
Among loan terminological elements that are not present in a recipient language, Latin and Greek elements usually prevail.
Direct borrowings may be both national and international. The criterion of the definition whether this or that borrowing is international or national, is the presence of this word in at least three languages that are not obligatorily kindred [Volodina 1993, p. 33].
Borrowings on the national level are made independently, in a separate language, sometimes with a so called "creative moment" [Lotte 1982, p. 11].
One of the specific ways of coining new terms is the invention of artificial words with neither etymology nor motivation.
In European language there are rather few words of such a kind: gas, nylon, Kodak. However they cannot be called absolutely artificial and non-motivated. In the most cases they are either hybrid words, or artificially distorted words already available in the living language [Budagov 1953].
So, the word gas was invent by the Dutch scientist of the 17th century Jan Baptist van Helmont. It was coined most probably under the influence of the Greek word chaos and the German word Geist (spirit) [Šanskij 1973, p. 100; Vartan´ân 1987, p. 67].
The English word nylon was created most probably on the basis of an abbreviation and the ending on, typical for words denoting chemist substances.
The word kodak is an onomatopoeia of the clicking sound typical for the
shutter of a photo camera, when its snaps into action.However in some non-Indo-European languages coining new terms through the invention of artificial words (creation of new roots) is or was sometimes rather productive [Svadost 1968, p. 207].
For example, in Estonian the invention of new roots was at one time rather popular due to I.Aavik’s creative activity. Elieser Ben-Jehudah created many artificial roots in Hebrew.
Svadost gives some examples, how Aavik used to overcome the so called "conditionality
complex in the Estonian language. In the 1920-30s Aavik introduced several dozens of artificial roots into the literary Estonian language, filling thereby the lexical gaps.For instance, the word ‘rabbit’ had in some equivalents in Estonian. However neither of them was successful: eg. the word combination kodujähes, i.e. ‘a domestic hare’ or the Russian borrowing truss (‘a coward’). Aavik introduced the new word küülik, which was adopted very quickly [Svadost 1968, p. 210; Tauli 1968, p. 69].
On the basis of the specific structure of Hebrew roots Ben-Jehudah proposed to create new roots from the consonant combinations that were not used, though this way was lately given up [Podol´skij 1985, p. 7].
Ben-Jehudah himself invented hundreds of Jewish words. He used them in his newspapers published in Hebrew. The invention of new words became something like a national sports and was used by Jewish writers both in Palestine and other countries [Rabin 1990; c.31].
However Budagov stated that this way of word formation does not deserve any great attention [Budagov 1953, s.57-59]. Svadost, to the contrary, considers such a way rather successful [Svadost 1968, p. 210].
Ways of terminological borrowings
As it was already affirmed above, borrowing is only one of coining new terms, moreover not the principal one.
However borrowing is not a homogenous process. Loan words can be differentiated not only judging whether this or that loan word is an international borrowing or not.
The way of borrowing is also an important factor. Depending on it, borrowings can be direct (immediately from the source language) and indirect (through the medium of some third languages). It is also possible to differentiate the borrowings from the classical languages and borrowing from the modern ones.
The way of borrowing is one of the factors that define the etymological aspect of creating new terms. Sources of borrowing depend first of all on the traditions bound with this or that particular language.
In different epochs different languages served for the replenishment of the scientific terminological system.
In the Middle Ages and in the first centuries of the New Age each cultural-historical area had its own "international" language that dominated within this area.
During the last time the development of both the general scientific and branch terminological systems becomes more or less international irrespective of the cultural-historical background of this or that language.
What concerns the European cultural-historical area, Latin and Greek were used here as international languages during the long time. And this is quite understandable, if to recall that during many centuries exactly these languages were used as languages of science.
In the West Europe Latin during the Middle Ages and in the Renaissance period was the only language that was used for writing scientific works [Budagov 1953, p. 88].
That was undoubtedly reflected on the fact that the Latin vocabulary became the main source of replenishment of all the terminological systems in the modern European languages.
Since the classical Latin itself was overfilled with Greek borrowings, the Greek language also became a lexical reserve for creating new terms.
Thus within the European cultural-historical area Latin and Greek dominated as languages of the international communication during several centuries.
As a rule international is associated in our consciousness with borrowings from modern languages and with the use of "neutral" elements of the Greek and Latin origin.
Exactly terminological elements of the Greek and Latin origin are real internationalisms, because they do not belong to any of the modern languages. Therefore they are equally strange and at the same time native for any of the languages. In addition, elements of the Greek and Latin origin are capable to create easily new terminological derivatives.
International terms of the European area are mostly borrowings from Latin and Greek, as well as new structures created in the later time from the Latin and Greek equivalents (Latinistic and Hellenistic terms). Latin is no longer used independently as a language of science. However it continues to serve as a source for creating new terms that are adapted to the graphic and phonetic norms as well as to the grammar rules of recipient languages [Skorohod´ko 1963, p. 59-68].
Romanized forms have an advantage before the national forms that became international, because they are more neutral and more stable in comparison with the latter ones. As a result, they are accrete with the structures of national languages to such an extent, that they no longer perceived as strange elements [Drezen 1936, p. 19-25].
They are more convenient, in the opinion of the scientist, for creating derivatives and terminological phrases. Ethnic forms, to the contrary, often provoke resistance of purists like for instance Comité d’études des termes techniques français, that has adopted a resolution about the substitution of all the terms of the English origin with the Latinistic forms in French: déviation, or dérivation instead of by-pass (a term from the fluid technology), additif instead of dope (a term from the chemist industry), artère, or conduite de transport instead of feeder (a term from electrical engineering) etc. [Nedobity 1989, p. 174].
There are even words that were absent in Latin but were created from the Greek and Latin elements. Especially it concerns technical terminological systems, where new terms were created from Greek and Latin elements even for absolutely new concepts, which were not peculiar for the time of the Roman Empire.
Unlike the languages of the Moslem cultural-historical area (Persian, Urdu, Pashto and some other languages with the Arabic script), where the words of the Arabic origin preserve their spelling completely, in the European cultural-historical area Latin and Greek words are usually adapted to the peculiarities of this or that particular language. It concerns first of all spelling of these words in the modern European languages using the Latin script. For instance, Latin suffixes in these languages are usually substituted with the specific national suffixes (Eg.: the Latin suffix -itas is transmitted in the modern European languages in such a way: English ity (nationality), French ité (nationalité), German ität (Nationalität), Italian ità (nazionalità), Romanian itate (
naţionalitate), Spanish idad (nacionalidad), Portuguese idade (nacionalidade), Swedish -itet (nationalitet); or the Latin suffix tio: English tion (organization), French tion (organisation), German tion (Organisation), Italian zione (organizzazione), Romanian ţie (organizaţie), Spanish ción (organización), Portuguese ção (organização), Swedish tion (organisation) etc.) [Wandruszka 1976; Urdang 1981; Urdang, Humez 1984].One may get convinced in it comparing the spelling of identical internationalism, for instance, in German and in English.
The English language tries to preserve the original Latin spelling as full as possible, whereas in German the preference is given to the spelling in accordance with the pronunciation.
It is clearly seen with the example of the letter C. In English it is used consecutively, in all positions and irrespective of the pronunciation. In German, to the contrary, this letter is substituted with the letters z and k, depending on the pronunciation (cf: English centre — German Zentrum; English caution — German Kaution etc.). The most assimilated are the terms that belong to applied sciences, on account of their active use in the colloquial language [Skorohod´ko 1963, p. 59].
In Romance languages terminological elements of the Greek and Latin origin acquire their national colouring. Sometimes Romance and Latin elements co-exist like, for instance, in French: ancêtre — ancestral, santé — sanitaire, espace — spatial, fleuve — fluvial, mer — marin, père — paternel, doigt — digital, śul — oculaire etc. [Wandruszka 1976, p. 21].
Latin and Greek as well as modern European languages, do not create new terms. Stems exist relatively constantly, during many centuries. The most productive strategy of the extension of vocabulary, according to Ehlich, is the use of prefixes and suffixes [Ehlich 1989, p. 139].
With the help of the available Greek and Latin suffixes it is possible to coin new international terminological elements, which exist now in classical languages only potentially, but which harmonize with the rules of the Latin and Greek word formation.
A special attention should be paid to the Greek and Latin elements in the Germanic languages. The cultural contacts between Rome and the Germanic tribes, and later, between the Romance and the Germanic worlds may be considered as a fixed phenomenon that has been continuing since the very beginning Christian era.
Thus, many Latin words adopted by the Germanic tribes, in the modern Germanic languages, particularly in German (such words like Fenster, Pforte, Mauer, Kohl, Speigel), are fully assimilated and no longer perceived as strange elements.
Just in the same way, the Germanic languages, particularly German and English, have adopted a great number of Greek and Latin affixes. In Modern German there are about 35 prefixes and about 26 suffixes of such a type. In different branches of science their number grows (in biology, for instance, correspondingly 71 and 122). If to pay attention to the assimilated variants of morphemes (for instance, prefix ad- and its variants ac-, af-, ag-, al-, ap-, ar-, as-, at- etc.), it turns out that the number of prefixes will grow up to 111 [Ehlich 1989, p. 144].
In the late Middle Ages the role of the Latin language began to be reduced. It was gradually substituted with the modern European language [Drezen 1936, p. 10].
Later the role of "Latin" has been played by the modern European languages. First it was French, then English.
Correspondingly, these languages also began to serve as sources of replenishment of the international terminological vocabulary, sometimes parallel to Latin and Greek. Therefore a great number of international terms during the last time entered the international lexical word-stock exactly from the modern European languages [Skorohod´ko 1963, p. 60].
French and English, among all the European languages, became actually the greatest donors in the modern history of the European languages, because they adopted the Latin vocabulary in a rather great amount [Braun 1989, p. 163].
In the 20th century French was gradually substituted by English. During the last decades became very popular and supplanted French from the international communication almost completely. The international vocabulary of the English origin has overcome the borders of the European and American cultural-historical area and is observed now in many languages of the world.
This can be explained with several reasons. The main of them consists in the fact that English-speaking countries, first of all the USA, made great success in economy and gradually began to influence the rest of the world and not only the countries of the third world (some of them chose the American model as an example for imitation), but also the developed countries such as the West European ones or Japan.
This is partially bound with the fact that all the basic English-speaking countries, first of all the USA and Great Britain, won the World War II. Thus, they began thereby to force their own standards to other countries, first of all the defeated ones. English became thereby to be perceived as a language of victors.
In addition, the British empire was one time one of the greatest empires of the world. It possessed colonies in all the parts of the world. This fact also influenced that in all the parts of the world there are countries where English is a state language or an official one (or at least, one of the official ones).
Another main reason for a wide dissemination of English is an extremely simple grammar. Due to this circumstance English beyond comparison among all the European languages.
This undoubtedly affected the development of national terminological systems in the languages of many peoples of the world. Especially it concerns such branches of science as economy and computer science. The English terminological system of these branches served as a basis for the formation of appropriate terminological systems in many other languages.
However the English both the branch and the general scientific terminological systems are not devoid of a number of drawbacks. Especially it concerns the American technical literature, which is cluttered with slang as well as "terminological units" of a very limited sphere of use (for instance, within one or several companies), so called trade names and trade marks. Though such pseudoterms sometimes gradually become real terms with a high degree of dissemination [Skorohod´ko 1963, p. 63].
Another drawback of the English terminological elements consists in the fact that the word of the Greek and Latin origin are very often distorted because of complicated phonetic changes in the English language. Those words are quite normal for the English language by their external structure and phonetic appearance, however they are unusual for speakers of other languages.
This results in the situation that Latin and Greek words that enter other languages through the English medium, lose their semantic connection with cognate words, which were adopted by those languages immediately from Greek or Latin.
Such words are no longer perceived by speakers of the recipient languages as cognate ones. Especially it concerns languages with non-Latin scripts or with purely phonetic principles of spelling.
Now within Europe, especially Central Europe, there is a tendency towards the parallel use of English and some of the regional languages (mostly German).
This happens because of a wide dissemination of the technical and scientific literature in German. This circumstance also affects the development of national terminological systems. The German-English bilingualism is undoubtedly a positive phenomenon in comparison with an unlimited domination of the English language, because it prevents the English language from the transformation into something like a Procrustean bed in the process of formation of national terminological systems. Branch specialists, when they know both German and English dealing with the literature in the both languages, have an opportunity to compare the corresponding German and English equivalents choosing a more successful variant for creating new terms in their native language.
Sometimes one and the same word is borrowed twice, but from different languages. That brings to the situation when so called etymological duplicates appear thereby. In such cases they are usually delivered different meanings. Such a situation is called the etymological paronymy.
Discrepancies, according to Dmitrij Lotte, may happen by both the secondary borrowing from one and the same language and recurring introduction of this or that element into the terminological system with the help of different language mediation. This may be caused by such reasons:
International and National Elements in the Process of Terminological Activity
There are no such languages, which would develop in a complete isolation.
Any language obligatorily undergoes the foreign influence; some languages influence other ones [Skuji
ņa 1994, p. 255].On the other hand, terminological planning possess the indication of both internationalization and "nationalization" [Drozd, Roudný 1980, p. 36; Beaugrande 1994].
The terminologists all over the world wish to develop the information exchange in the modern conditions, combining thereby the elements of the internationality of terminological systems (to facilitate the international communication) with the national identity.
The process of borrowing of loan elements in the majority of the languages was considerably made more active, when the vocabulary of any literary language is constantly enriched, sometimes getting cluttered with borrowings.
This is in its turn bound with the problem of the correlation of the international and national in the terminological activity. Therefore that is quite natural to put up a question, whether any borrowing can be called an internationalism. And whether it is worth while making resistance to the adoption of loan words.
The international, in the opinion of the majority of branch specialists, is associated with borrowings, whereas the national, with purism. However such a stereotyped pattern is rather primitive. First, because it is not an external form only but also an internal one, that can be borrowed. Second, the real purism consists in not in the simple calquing of loan words and word combinations, but rather in the complete neglecting of the loan elements, including the loan motivation.
As an example of the extreme purism, Icelandic can be taken as a vivid example, where by creating new terms it is exactly the international inner form that was completely neglected.
So the Icelandic word mynd (a photo, a snapshot) means literally "an image, a picture", whereas the Ukrainian word svìtlina and its German equivalent Lichtbild seem to be a manifestation of purism on the face of it only. In fact these words have much in common with the Russian word fotografìâ. The motivation of these two words is connected with the word light (cf: Ukrainian svitlo, German Licht, Greek
phôs). Another Icelandic word sjóður (‘a bank’) is a result of extension of polysemy of the word that literally means ‘a purse’ (cf: the Italian word banca literally means ‘a bench’). The majority of the Icelandic compound words also have almost nothing in common with calque. The word heimspeki (philosophy) literally means ‘the world wisdom’, ‘or the wisdom of the Universe’ (cf: the word philosophy literally means ‘love to wisdom’) [Maslov 1987, p. 209].On the other hand not all the loan words are internationalisms.
For example the Ukrainian word ġazda cannot be called an internationalism because that is a non-international borrowing from Hungarian. In other languages (which are in addition neither Slavonic nor Finno-Ugric) this borrowing is not observed.
As it was already stated above, internationalisms differ from simple borrowing with one particular feature.
Any element can be called international only in the case when it is met in at least three non-kindred languages. If such a condition is not fulfilled, in this case there are no grounds to call such a borrowing an internationalism. In such a case this is an ordinary borrowing on the national level. On the other hand, not only an external but also an inner form may be international.
Hence one problem appears: if calque can be considered a manifestation of the international form.
The necessity of adoption of new international elements, according to Ìvan Bìlodìd, appears in the case when interlingual tendencies towards their manifestation coincide with their own internal needs and the abilities of a particular language. The replenishment of the terminological vocabulary facilitates the bilingual communication and economizes the efforts in the process of adoption of any language [Beloded 1980; p. 40-61].
In the opinion of Vasyl´ Akulenko, the methods of investigation of internationalisms that reflect considerable features of this objective interlingual category, are
Language parallels are usually understood as the presence of common elements (particularly, lexical ones) in two languages that are not obligatorily kindred.
Such language parallels can be casual and naturally determined.
Casual lexical parallels can be caused by a casual coincidence of words in two not obligatorily kindred languages like English and Persian bad, or Latin habere and German haben (although the words in the both languages coincide in their meaning, their etymology is however different); or English tip and Ukrainian tip (a casual coincidence by the full absence of common elements in their meaning). Naturally determined lexical parallels are caused by the conscious borro
wing of lexical elements by one language from another [Dubičinskij 1995, p. 26].Lexical parallels can be also caused with a territorial community, when within a particular area (territorial, religious, cultural-historical etc.) there is a more or less common lexical ij stock.
Braun affirmed that in the European languages a so called pan-European element is present, which consists in the presence of common lexical elements in the majority of the European languages.
Many European languages (and not only European) have a considerable number of loan elements, which are results of international contacts with other political, cultural and economic areas. This caused the appearance of language enclaves with common supranational elements.
Braun referred such indications of the common word stock to such a community:
The identical vocabulary (language parallels) may be divided in its turn into the three categories depending on spheres of their use:
Language parallels can appear on the level of the scientific and technical terminological system in connection with the fact that by creating new terms foreign elements are rather often borrowed.
Eduard Skorohod´ko has defined the four types of correspondence of the lexical parallels in national terminological systems:
The ideal international forms have an absolutely identical meaning in different languages. Such forms can be understood by persons, who do not know foreign languages [Felber 1980, p. 75].
However in practice such ideal forms of internationalisms are found extremely rarely.
By the direct borrowing any terminological element speakers of different recipient languages pay attention to different semantic indications of the form they adopt. This causes semantic discrepancies in different languages concerning identical lexical units. Lexical parallels can possess absolutely identical internal forms only by the direct borrowing of terms from the language, for which this lexical unit is also a loan word borrowed from a third language.
In all the other cases the semantic discrepancies are inevitable to this or that extent. Thus so called misleading words appear thereby.
A special danger is present by the technical translation, when they delude a translator or just a reader with fallacious association s with particular terms of the mother tongue, when they are similar by their external form, but different by their contents.
A specific group is made up by misleading words in kindred languages: Ukrainian gora (‘a mountain’) — Bulgarian gora (‘a forest’); Ukrainian nedìlâ (Sunday) — Russian nedelâ (a week); English also — German also (thus); English gift (‘a present’, ‘a souvenire’) — German Gift (‘poison’); Spanish pomo (‘a flask’) — Romanian pom (‘a tree’). These misleading words bear no relation to direct borrowings. They can be caused by different trends of the semantic development of one and the same lexical unit in different kindred languages.
Another thing is misleading words, which appear exactly by direct borrowing of loan elements. Especially dangerous is this in the case when they enter the scientific terminological system.
The presence of different semantic discrepancies may be explained with the fact that international terms adopted by speakers of this or that language, undergoes the influence of the national cultures, adding new shadows of meaning to the initial complex of meanings [Beloded 1980; p. 77].
This means in its turn that very often such borrowings bring to different discrepancies in the meaning of one and the same element in different languages, because, according to Maslov, foreign elements acquire after their borrowing new shadows of meaning, which are no longer international. Sometimes they even lose their primary common meaning [Maslov 1987, p. 208].
The reasons for appearance of such semantic discrepancies in lexical parallels also consist in the fact that by borrowing of one and the same term by different languages different semantic shadow are usually taken into consideration.
Because any language develops in its own specific conditions, borrowing particular numbers of international terminological elements for satisfaction of its particular needs in the nomination of this or that concept.
Therefore there is no wonder in the fact that any international element (mostly of the Greek and Latin origin), which in the source language has already several meanings, is borrowed by this or that language not in all the meanings, but only in some particular ones, which in comparison with other languages may coincide only partially, or may not coincide at all [Akulenko 1971, p. 256].
The discrepancies in the meanings cannot give an occasion to call such lexical parallels real internationalisms.
Eduard Skorohod´ko defined the basic reasons for the appearance of misleading words. Such reasons for the casual contiguity of outer forms (when the corresponding inner forms are different) can be:
The translation difficulties in such terms consist in the fact that the translator, knowing about the presence of a similar lexical element in his/her native language, considers its a semantic equivalent of the corresponding foreign term, especially if these terms have something common in their meanings.
Eduard Skorohod´ko called partial internationalisms relative equivalents, understanding under them terms, that express concepts, generic to the concept expressed by the corresponding translated term.
Misleading words belonging to the international terms were divided by Eduard Skorohod´ko into the groups depending on their origin:
Sometimes by borrowing, terms acquire a more particular meaning, sometimes, to the contrary, a more generalized one. Sometimes the meaning is transferred to another object according to some particular adjoining indications.
Among the reasons for the appearance of misleading words, Dmitrij Lotte defined such ones:
Ruben Budagov, in his turn, proposed to classify different types of the semantic discrepancy into the following categories:
Changes of meaning are usually evolutionary. Such changes of meaning, according to Dmitrij Lotte, may belong to the following groups:
The discrepancies between the meanings of a loan term and a prototype term can also take place in the moment of borrowing [Lotte 1982, p. 17-19].
More often this is possible through the conscious choice of some particular meaning, or even its intentional change.
According to the presence or absence of at least one common meaning misleading words are subdivided into partial internationalism and pseudointernationalisms
Vasil´ V. Akulenko affirmed that the concept of internationalism does not obligatorily mean an ideal perfect equivalent; even partial misleading words can on the whole remain internationalisms. In this case misleading words, which have something common in their meaning in different languages (only shadows of this meaning are different), considerably differ from pseudointernationalisms, i.e. interlingual homonyms, which have nothing in common in their contents and are only separate cases of misleading words [Akulenko 1971, p. 260; Akulenko 1969, p. 373].
Hence, one may come to the conclusion that the absolute majority of internationalisms are partial internationalisms, whereas full internationalisms are also a special case of partial internationalisms.
Of course, the degree of discrepancies between the meanings of these or those lexical parallels are not equal. Therefore all the lexical parallels not bound with affinity of languages can be divided into two categories: internationalisms and pseudointernationalisms. Internationalisms, in their turn, can be also divided into two groups: full and partial ones.
Thus, there are three types of lexical parallels:
Pseudointernationalisms are also words, which were made up on the basis of international morphemes and did not exceed the bounds of a particular source language, i.e. they were not borrowed by other language (like the Russian word
liftёr) [Dubičinskij 1993, p. 63].Thus, misleading words combine both partial internationalisms, and pseudointernationalisms in themselves.
During the last decades the tendency towards the rapprochement of the meanings of international terms and gradual overcoming their semantic discrepancies becomes more considerable.
Of course, this process will be very long. In addition, it is quite impossible to get rid of misleading words once and for all. However concerning creating and standardization of new terms it is quite possible to do this. This is often confirmed with the appropriate international documents. Thus, the International Standards Organization (ISO) has elaborated a special document. It is called "The International Unification of Concepts and Terms (ISO/R 860-1968/E/)". In this document it particularly runs that to make a success in the co-operation, contacts and exchange of the terminological information, technical terms should possess identical meanings in all the languages they are used in [Drozd, Roudný 1980, p. 36].
The Problem of Definition of the Concept of Internationalism
The problem about the correlation of the international and national elements in the process of terminological activity is bound first of all with the problem of the definition of the criteria of internationalisms and differ international words from ordinary national borrowings. Because real internationalisms and simple borrowings are often confused: any borrowing, even if it was made by one language only, may be mistaken for an internationalism.
On the other hand, in the scientific terminological system there are terms made up by means of the borrowing of not a word itself, but only its contents, i.e. its inner structure [Skorohod´ko 1963, p. 62].
Speaking about the resemblance of the international signs, one should mean that not only pronunciation or spelling, but also motivation or the internal form of signs can be international.
In this case the three types of motivation can be possible:
In fact, judging by the morphological motivation of words, it is possible to compare the motivation of stale (particularly terminological) word combinations, which is determined by meanings of the words compared, as well as their morphological form and syntactical relations. Internationalisms have always similar meanings, whereas the resemblance of forms may rest upon a particular number of indications [Akulenko 1971, p. 256].
Especially important is the problem of the criteria of definition of international elements and a simple borrowing in the scientific and technical terms [Gajda 1990, p. 98-106; Volodina 1993, p. 31-41]. Because there is a natural question, if each loan term is international. And, to the contrary, if any translation of international terminological elements is always a manifestation of purism.
The exact criteria of definition of the concept of internationalism are unfortunately absent, therefore different scientists explain this concept differently. The scientific definition of the concept of a lexical internationalism was given by Ìvan Bìlodìd. He affirmed that it is especially important forms of lexical community, which should be considered internationalisms in linguistics. They should be thereby interlingual synchronistical categories that are revealed only by the collision or comparison of languages [Beloded 1980; c. 13].
In the opinion of the majority of scientists, internationalisms have an international nature of use (they cannot be referred to the words of a native language). They should be identical by their meaning and analogical by their pronunciation in at least three unrelated (not cognate) languages. In this case they are not obligatorily loan words (they stand beyond borrowings), because many words of a native language became internationalisms [Kiâk 1992; c. 144-145].
Anyway, a national form, even if it has been adopted by any other language, may be at once considered international only if there are forms etymologically identical with it in several other languages. All these forms should be thereby similar whereas the languages should belong to different language families [Beloded 1980, p.120; Nedobity 1989, p. 174].
Internationalisms are usually not considered as elements of a particular language, because it would deny their international nature [Kiâk 1992; p. 144-145].
On the other hand, it is also rather difficult to consider them strange for this or that language, because this statement would deny their international nature again.
Hence one may come to the conclusion that the concept "international" exceeds the bounds of the two opposite concepts "own—strange" that exclude each other. This is rather own and strange at the same time.
If in any language any loan element were considered strange, its internationality would in such a case become doubtful. Any loan element is considered genuine if it is well adopted, and to the contrary, strange elements are those when there is no necessity in their adoption.
The basic criteria for considering any word as "strange" or "not strange", according to Dmitrij Lotte, are the following:
Vasil´ V. Akulenko affirmed that the concept of internationalism has a particular number of criteria that differentiate this phenomenon from other manifestations of the lexical community, particularly simple loan words. The main of them consists in the fact that just loan words touch upon only one language, whereas internationalisms concern several languages at once. In addition, in one separate language this category cannot exist. Internationalisms are not obligatorily ideal equivalents. Even some discrepancies in meaning do not make this or that element less international. The resemblance of international forms, which may be based upon one, two or three indications from the number the indicated ones, is also relative. [Akulenko 1971, p. 251-260].
Here, of course, the question is not about the absolute identity of the outer forms of internationalisms or their meanings. The identity can be revealed only partially, in the contiguity of separate elements by their forms and meanings.
Of course, these words cannot be absolutely identical at least because of the natural discrepancies in the articulation bases of each language.
There are no such languages, which would be able to adopt absolutely all the sounds, which are only possible in human language. In addition, in the majority of languages not all the types of syllable are possible. The phonemic distribution may also be limited. And if to take into consideration the existence of discrepancies in writing systems concerning spelling principles, one may come to the conclusion that the resemblance of international words is relative only.
A special place is taken here by the problem of borrowing of international terminological elements.
A scientific definition of the concept of a lexical internationalism in possible exactly within the concept of this sphere. It is well known that internationalisms in linguistics are not all the manifestations of internationality in language, but only especially important forms of interlingual community in vocabulary. Internationalisms are an interlingual synchronistical category, which is revealed only in the case of collision and comparison of languages [Beloded 1980; c. 13].
Hence one may give a final definition of the concept "an internationalism". Thus, this or that element is international only if it fully or partially coincides in its external and internal forms at least in three non-kindred languages.
Though one should not absolutize international signs concerning their presence non-kindred languages, because, in the opinion of Vasil´ Akulenko, their relativity is revealed in many problems including such as the genealogical relations of languages that belong to isoglottic lines of internationalisms, as well as the correlation of their forms and meanings. What concerns the presence of internationalisms in non-kindred languages, here there are opinions about some three non-kindred language families. Sometimes a criterion is a requirement so that at least two of these languages were "world languages". However such a criterion, in the opinion of Vasil´ Akulenko, is only a conditional draft admittance [Akulenko 1971, p. 255].
Internationalisms should be differed from exoticisms, which mean realities and phenomena, that do not take place in the everyday life of speakers of a recipient language. Such terms enter a recipient language in their own original form (a phonetic borrowing), more seldom in the form of calques [Skorohod´ko 1963, p. 87].
In Europe a specific language of science and theory based upon the Latin language was gradually formed.
Greek and Latin roots are not perceived by speakers of the European languages as strange, unlike the borrowings from the Oriental languages [Ehlich 1989, p. 139].
On the other hand, internationalisms are not obligatorily direct borrowings. Not each borrowing is an internationalism, as well as not each internationalism should obligatorily be a direct borrowing. Not only an outer form, spelling and pronunciation can be international, but also an inner form, i.e. motivation.
There are several principles of classification of the international elements.
Internationalisms can be particularly classified according to the ways of borrowing and according to the choice of the sources of borrowing.
According to the way of borrowing, internationalisms may be subdivided into the internationalisms with a common external and internal form, and internationalisms with a common internal form only. According to the selection of a source of borrowing internationalisms are subdivided depending on their etymology into the internationalisms of the classical origin (taken from extinct classical languages, such as Latin, Greek, classical Arabic, Sanskrit etc.) and the internationalisms of a national origin (words taken from the modern languages, that became internationalisms).
Vasil´ Akulenko, speaking about the resemblance of forms of the international signs, pays attention not only to the pronunciation or spelling, but also to their motivation or "internal form" including their synchronistic characteristics, their "literal meaning" etc. In this case the main role can be played by all the three possible types of motivation (phonetic, morphological and semantic).
The morphological motivation of words can be also compared with the motivation of stale word combinations (including terminological ones), which are determined by the meanings of the constituent words, their morphological form and syntactical relations.
Vasil´ V. Akulenko has particularly proposed his own principles of classification of internationalisms according to the way of borrowing, differentiating the seven types of international lexical signs:
In its turn, internationalisms with identical external forms can be united into one group called absolute internationalisms (unlike quasi-internationalisms (internal internationalisms) that have identical motivation, but differ in their external forms).
Ruben Budagov also affirmed that internationalisms can be not only direct borrowings, but also "words formed according to the structural models of the corresponding foreign words, but do not borrow their material basis" [Budagov 1953, p. 89].
The last type of internationalisms can also be called quasi-internationalisms or internal internationalisms. Absolute internationalisms are called so because they are international according to their both external and internal forms, whereas quasi-internationalisms are international according to their internal form only. Their outer forms are national, thus, the elements of purism are nevertheless present here.
Such internationalism include both international and national elements. Therefore it is worth while calling such elements rather quasi-internationalisms with partial purism. Then the manifestation of full purism is the case when the inner form is also not international.
So called word-formative models, i.e. exact translations of integral terminological phrases can be single cases of calque: English rocket-carrier, Finnish kantoraketti, Ukrainian raketa-nosij; Finnish autokoulu — Ukrainian avtoškola [Nìkìtìna 1996, p. 47].
According to the choice of the source, Felber particularized the 4 types of international forms:
In fact there are more types of international community of signs in the vocabulary of any language: among bound forms these are international lexical and derivation morphemes and stems; among free forms they are international words analogues (phonetic, word-formative, semantic and phraseological) [Akulenko 1972, p. 20-21].
Another type of classification of internationalisms (mainly absolute ones) can consist in the degree of correspondence of meanings. In accordance with this classification, internationalisms can be full and partial.
Full internationalisms fully coincide in their meanings. Besides at least one or several common meanings in each language partial internationalisms have some other meanings that are not international.
Of course, such a classification is fair concerning two particular languages only. Such a classification is not applied to pseudointernationalisms, which lost their common meaning, or which coincide in their outer forms only casually.
As a rule, internationalisms can be global and regional.
Internationalisms of the first group can be present in most languages of the world, irrespective of the area of their dissemination and the historic conditions their literary norm was formed under. Recent borrowings mostly in scientific and technical terminological systems, as well as different exoticisms belong to this group. Regional internationalisms are disse
minated within a particular cultural-historical area [Žuravlev 1982, p. 144].During the long time there was a fallacious opinion as if internationalisms were peculiar to the European area only; moreover they had to be solely of the Greek and Latin origin.
Melliet was the first who paid attention to the presence of international elements in other areas formed around the international languages of the feudal epoch [Melliet 1936, p. 59; Akulenko 1971, p. 252].
Thus, the geographic (area) classification of languages bound between each other culturally and historically, may be also defined parallel to the genealogical and typological classifications of languages.
Vasil´ V. Akulenko called the area linguistics an aspect of the linguistic geography and introduced a special term for the definition of common features in non-kindred languages within at least one cultural-historical area. This term is called "a linguistic affinity" (in fact, the question is here about the difference between genealogical and area affinity).
Under this term the author understood the resemblance not explained by the genealogical affinity of languages. Thus, Vasil´ V. Akulenko came to the conclusion about the isoglottic lines of the area cognation, which,
having nothing in common with the genealogical affinity, unites languages that are not obligatorily genealogically kindred, in one area. Very often genealogically kindred languages turn out in different areas, whereas language that have nothing in common between each other, co-exist within one area.
The area vocabulary, i.e. the common word stock within this or that particular area, deserve a special attention. This is revealed first of all in the conservation of the phonemic or graphic contiguity of words, that exceed the bounds of the genealogical borders, or parallel elements made up by means of calque [Akulenko 1972, p. 15-16].
Very often the concept of the area cognation is confused with the concept of language union (for instance, South-East Asia or the Balkan peninsula).
The difference between these two concepts consists in the fact that the language interferences are the main criterion of this grouping. Language union is determined by subconscious language interferences, first of all by adstratum, whereas language areas are determined by both subconscious and conscious interferences, mainly corpus planning and extralinguistic orientation (religious, political etc.).
Since the absolute majority of cultural-historical areas were formed in the feudal epoch, the principal factor of their determination was religion [Baziev, Isaev 1973, p. 26]. Though one should remember that the influence of this or that sacral language on vocabulary in different cases was not identical.
It is reflected to a greater extent in the languages of the Moslem peoples; the Latin influence on the West European languages was considerably weaker.
In the terms of the Latin and Latinistic types the greatest degree of the international contiguity is possible in the written form. The orthographic resemblance is especially revealed in English, French and partially in German. The phonetic writing facilitates people to work with language, but this advantage can be achieved owing to the possibility of the international unification of the written forms of terms. From this point of view the etymological principle of spelling of the Latinistic terms should be preferred as far as possible [Beloded 1980; c. 121].
The areas of lexical cognation and language unions are very close but not identical. According to Vasil´ Akulenko, it concerns the concept of an area of lexical internationalisms, first of all because internationalisms are bound with the concept of a language norm. That means that if a language union is determined by subconscious interferences only, a cultural-historical area is determined by both conscious and subconscious interferences, but the areas of lexical internationalisms are determined solely by conscious interferences. That means that language norm is a result of a conscious activity only. On the other hand, the areas of internationalisms, according to Vasil´ Akulenko, are a solely synchronistic concept. These area are not always accompanied by the regional manifestations of contiguity in grammar and phonology of a language. Therefore they sometimes become much more wider than language unions, though the presence of internationalisms speaks considerably less about the degree of language proximity [Akulenko 1972, p. 18].
Nowadays there are several areas formed under the influence of the great international languages of the Middle Ages and partially the New Age.
It is very difficult to define the borders between the areas because these areas partially overlap each other, creating transitional zones on the crossroads.
However each of these areas is peculiar to a particular region. These are the European and American area (the Christian (Atlantic) area) area with Greek and Latin, later also French, English and some other languages; the area of the Nearer and Middle East and some separate languages of Asia and Africa (the Moslem area) first of all with classical Arabic as well as Persian, the area of the languages of the former USSR with the traces of the Russian influence (it partially overlaps with the first two areas); the area of the Indian ocean (South Asia; the Hinduism and Buddhist areas), i.e. the area of the Sanskrit and Pali influence (in the North-West of India there is also a transitional area with the Persian and Arabic influence); the Far East area with the Chinese and (in the recent times) Japanese influence. According to Vasil´ Akulenko, these areas should not be absolutized [Akulenko 1973, p. 261], because as it is stated above, besides pure areas there are also transitional ones.
During the last time the influence of sacral languages was considerably reduced [Beloded 1980; c. 41]. Though cultural-historical areas will still exist very long time and evidently will not disappear in general, now a fast rapprochement of areas is observed, as well as the disappearance of the exact borders between them. Especially it concerns creating new terms and concepts. In the majority of modern developed language of different regions that traditionally belong to different cultural-historical areas, the international vocabulary of the Greek, Latin, English, French origin is widely used. Earlier that was peculiar to the European languages only.
The absolute majority of modern international words belong to the global ones. They are used now not only within the European cultural-historical area, but also beyond its borders. Especially it concerns scientific and technical terms. This, of course, does not mean that now the regional classical languages are not used for creating s new terms at all. The question is only that the penetration of the European languages exceeds the bounds of European area.
In the countries of Asia and Africa there are two conflicting tendencies between each other that are observed during the last decades. These tendencies are the classicalization (the orientation to the sacral languages) and the westernization (the orientation to the European languages) [Sager, Nkwenti-Azeh 1989, p. 24].
The Correlation between International and National Elements
Hence the problem of calque and other types quasi-internationalisms (that have common internal forms but different external ones) appears from the definition of the concepts "internationalism" and "purism".
Though the problem of the predominance of international and national elements in quasi-internationalisms, as well as the problem of manifestation of purism in calques is still being discussed.
The percentage correlation of international and national elements are not identical in different languages. All depends upon preferential tendencies in each particular language. However the presence of international elements considerably facilitates the communication between speakers of different language in any way.
Particularly Braun has determined such advantages of international branch terminological systems. So, the common word stock
The cases of co-existence of native elements and borrowings deserve a special attention, when they mean one and the same concept.
In this case one’s own element can also turn out international, it has an international internal form, whereas borrowings can be purely national, if it is not adopted by other languages.
In this case a substitution of native language words with loan words may happen; or to the contrary; or both elements may co-exist as synonyms.
Often borrowings may be found even in those cases, when this particular language has its own devices of expressing this or that concept. The relations between borrowing and s native elements are sometimes rather complicated: new elements can supplant native language words or co-exist with them as synonyms [Kolca, Tukan 1973, p. 318-319].
In the cases when "native" and "strange" words co-exist, they are in fact absolute synonyms; however a scientific term is usually expressed with a loan word, whereas its native equivalent is used mostly in the everyday speech [Lotte 1982, p. 40-64].
Sometimes an old word and a new term from such a pair of words have different meanings (denotative or connotative) [Skorohod´ko 1963, p. 23].
On the other hand, any achievement in the scientific and technical progress in one country under the conditions of modern contacts between peoples and between different cultural-historical areas automatically becomes an achievement of the whole human civilization.
In addition, it requires an inevitable introduction of new terms into an appropriate language, the speakers of which have done this scientific discovery.
On the other hand, speakers of other languages have to solve another problem, how exactly to transmit these terms by means of their native language.
The rational correlation between national and international elements was first proposed by Leibnitz. He insisted on a peculiar balance between purism and borrowing foreign elements, recognizing thereby a diversity of vocabulary replenishment sources, a diversity of resources, which may be used by this or that language its own development [Columas 1989, p. 7]. In Columas’ opinion, the reason for the resistance to the international influence and striving for purism is the following thesis: "our heritage is real, therefore it is good, but everything strange bad" [Columas 19892, p. 187].
Vasil´ V. Akulenko considered the correlation between international and national elements in a language from the positions of contiguity of the elements up to the degree identification: on the one hand they have common peculiarities (that makes them an objective interlingual category); on the other hand, each language has its own systematicity and distinctiveness. The correlation between international and national elements, in the opinion of the scientist, cannot be explained as a contraposition. To the contrary, an international element is a constituent part of any national system [Akulenko 1973, p. 263-264].
Ìvan Bìlodìd did not also oppose international and national elements, affirming about a co-existence of the both phenomena and the absence of exact borders between them. Like Vasil´ Akulenko, he affirmed that international elements are incarnated in national systems, therefore the internationalization of vocabulary is one of the ways of language development [Beloded 1980; c. 10-42].
Ruben Budagov differentiated "necessary" and "unnecessary" borrowings, underlining the role of purism as a phenomenon necessary for refining a language of unnecessary borrowings. Purism is transformed in such a case into a patriotic movement for a subsequent development of the native language, for its national identity [Budagov 1953, s.90-94].
Dmitrij Lotte proposed to compare on the one hand the number of concepts with the number of terms in general, and from the other hand, the number of loan terms with the number of all the terms; then to compare the number of new loan elements with the number of all the adopted elements used earlier the same meaning in other disciplines. That would be a way of finding a more or less exact idea about the percentage of loan terms.
In any discipline there are several times less new loan elements than the general number of terms made up with the help of loan elements [Lotte 1982, p. 97].
The graphic aspect of the outer form of terminological units consists in the external graphic appearance of these terms, i.e. in the principle of their spelling. The spelling principles of the terminological units depend upon such factors as the principles of a writing system this or that language uses [Wüster 1985, p. 70-75], phonetic and grammar peculiarities of a particular language etc. Particular traditions bound with this or that writing system also play an important role here.
As it was mentioned above, literary languages are subordinated to writing systems they use [Columas 19892, p. 184-185]. This, in its turn is reflected in the outer forms of lexical units including terms; namely in their graphic appearance. Depending on the writing traditions of this or that language the spelling of scientific and technical terms acquires particular specific features bound with their specific indications of the corresponding writing system.
On the other hand, the graphic appearance of any term can be influenced by some linguistic and extralinguistic factors. Among the linguistic factors one may mention the peculiarities of the phonetic and syllabic structure of a language (a set of phonemes, possible types of syllables, the phonetic distribution), its grammar (particularly morphological) structure etc. The extralinguistic factors, which influence the external form, may be realized in particular orthographic traditions of the corresponding language. Such traditions may consist in the orthographic principles (etymological, morphological, phonetic), in the attempts to preserve the original spelling, or, to the contrary, to rewrite a loan lexical unit according to the orthographic rules of a recipient language.
If to take into consideration the fact that writing systems, unlike other aspects of a language, are more moveable, more capable for changing [Fierman 1991; c. 261], one may come to the conclusion that the orthographic rules are regulated and changed much easier, than the vocabulary of a language, to say already nothing of closed systems, especially grammar.
The Principle of the Graphic Appearance of New Terms
First of all the graphic e appearance concerns international elements, adopted by this or that language. Because terms that consist of native elements are subordinated to the orthographic rules of the corresponding language. Another thing concerns loan elements, for which different exceptions are rather often made.
Therefore, depending on the graphic appearance loan (international) terms they can be divided into such categories:
Nedobity, in his turn, defined such types of terms that are absolute internationalisms:
According to Columas, writing is not just a visible speech, but rather a devise of oral communication. "The modern community cannot function without writing systems." In addition, the concepts "a writing language" and "a standard language" are not identical. moreover writing systems do not realize, or even do not stimulate any modernization at all. In other words, compound forms of the social organization require the creation of writing systems and writing languages [Columas 1989, p. 12].
The graphic appearance of loan and international elements are subordinated to particular orthographic traditions of a corresponding language. If such traditions are absent because this or that language is not well developed, these traditions are formed gradually, in the process of adoption of loan elements by this language. So, a great number of borrowings adopted by the Russian language in Peter the Great’s lifetime, facilitated the elaboration of the rules of their Russian spelling. In addition, both the pronunciation and the spelling of loan words were taken into consideration here. But the pronunciation or spelling can be reflected in transcription only to particular limits, because any transcription is conditional, therefore it is only one aspect, pronunciation or spelling that is preferred thereby [Superanskaâ 1978, p. 13-14].
The etymological spelling principle includes two aspects, the conservation of the historic spelling and the orthographic transplantation.
Concerning international elements, the etymological spelling principle consists first of all in the conservation of the original spelling of both international elements and non-international borrowings of the Greek and Latin origin, as well as borrowings from modern languages.
This is especially noticeable in languages with Latin-based alphabets, that are widely spread within the European area, where there is an old tradition to preserve the original spelling from a source language. This phenomenon is called ‘the orthographic interlingual interference’, or ‘the orthographic transplantation’ [Superanskaâ 1978, p. 25].
It is very widely spread among the majority of peoples of the world that use the Latin script. In other words, this is an attempt to preserve the original spelling of foreign proper names and some barbarisms.
"The problem how to read, for instance, Milano, Paris, Budapest, Kraków, Kecskemet etc. in English, is referred to the readers’ skills and are not usually regulated by reading rules of a recipient language" [Reformatskij 1960; c.96].
In the European languages a considerable layer of the international vocabulary is made up by the words of the Greek and Latin origin.
The East European languages (Slavonic, Finno-Ugric etc.) try to preserve the pronunciation by considerable deviations from the original spelling. The languages of West Europe (Romance and partially Germanic), to the contrary, are inclined to the conservation of the original spelling. In the best way the Latin spelling was preserved in English and French [Nedobity 1989, p. 174].
In English, where the etymological principle is peculiar to the national orthography in general, such an attempt is revealed, for instance, in the words of the Greek origin transmitted with a rather great precision with the help of the Latin traditional transliteration of the Greek words: the Greek
character χ is transmitted with the help of the digraph CH and pronounced like [k]: school, character, chord etc.; the letter φ is transmitted with the help of the digraph PH, which is pronounced like [f]: phone, photo, physics; the letter θ is transmitted with the help of the digraph TH, which is pronounced like [θ]: cathedral, mathematics. Just in the same way the Greek letter υ is always transmitted in English with the letter Y: symbol, crystal, style, type etc.. The original spelling is also preserved in the modern borrowings from German, French, Italian, Spanish and some other languages: ersatz, chance, àgio, giro, eau de Cologne, cañon, junta etc..In the German orthography there are some deviations from the original Latin spelling. Particularly if in the English orthography the letter C in the Latin words is fully preserved, in German it is usually substituted with the letters Z and K, depending on the pronunciation: Zentrum, Zirkel, Kapital, Kodex. On the other hand, in the Latin and loan words in general the letter V, regardless of the German orthoepy, is pronounced like [v], and is never substituted with W: November, Aval, vakant, Venus. French words preserve their original spelling partially, depending on the time of their borrowing: Büro (instead of Bureau), but Friseur (instead of Frisör), Journalist. Especially often the original spelling is preserved in the English borrowings (for instance, in economic terms) under the strong English influence: blue chip, deadweight etc..
Analogical orthographic phenomena are also observed in the languages of the Middle East, which use the Arabic script (except Uyghur). It concerns the uniform spelling of Arabic and Persian words in all the languages of the region. Just the same concerns the use of common hieroglyphs in Chinese, Japanese and partly in Korean.
The phonetic spelling principle is an exact antithesis to the etymological principle. It consists in a full adaptation of a loan word to a recipient language and in neglecting its original spelling. The phonetic spelling principle can be found mostly when there are some differences in writing systems of a source language and a recipient language.
A special dissemination of the phonetic spelling principle is observed in the Oriental languages that use their own writing systems (which, in addition, differs in its principle from the Latin), especially when the number of syllable types is limited in this or that language (especially in the languages of East Asia). For instance, the international elements are badly distorted in Japanese. In Vietnamese (on account of a limited number of syllables) international words are distorted in the same way: hô-kây (from English hockey), bok sơ (from English box), ban công (balcony), xiếc (circus), đăng-xinh (dancing), phim (film) etc.
In its turn, some Japanese words that became internationalisms, are usually spelled in the European languages according to the Hepburn romanization system, that is oriented mostly to the Japanese pronunciation (unlike the more morphologically and etymologically oriented Kunrei-siki system): tsunami (Kunrei-siki — tunami), judo (Kunrei-siki — zyudo), geisha (Kunrei-siki — geisya), hibakushi (Kunrei-siki — hibakusi).
However the phonetic spelling principle of loan words is also observed in some European languages: Italian (direttore, progetto, istruzione), Portuguese (produção), Byelorussian, Serbian (apsolutizam, produkat). However, unlike the Oriental languages with limited numbers of syllables, the phonetic spelling principle in the European languages consists in another aspect, namely in neglecting the spelling and the pronunciation of the corresponding loan element in the source language and its morphological structure.
The phonetic spelling principle is rather convenient for those who does not want to learn foreign languages these words are borrowed from. On the other hand, the etymological principle makes the process of teaching writing and reading more complicated, but facilitates mastering other languages [Fierman 1991; c. 276].
However the languages with a purely etymological or purely phonetic principle of spelling of international words are rather rare. The reason for this is a circumstance that none of the developed languages uses alphabet, which would be phonographically ideal, i.e. which would reflect all the phonemes available in this or that language with an absolute adequacy.
Any orthography expresses phonemes only approximately, more or less exactly. An ideal phonographic alphabet can be created only for a language that has no writing yet [Superanskaâ 1978, p. 8]. Therefore, concerning developed languages with old writing traditions, it would be fair to say about the morphonetic (morphonological) spelling principle. It is undoubtedly the mostly widespread way of the graphic reflection of loan terms. This principle does not provide any orthographic transplantation, but, on the other hand, it is not purely phonetic.
During the last time in the languages of the world (or, at least, in the languages within the European area) a tendency towards the unification of spelling of their proper names, exoticisms and international elements is noticeable. It concerns, first of all, the borrowings from modern languages regardless of the orthographic and orthoepic traditions of these recipient languages. This undoubtedly facilitates the communication between speaker of different languages and simplifies the international identification of terminological data banks. Moreover, in Europe pay more attention exactly to the spelling of loan words, but not to their pronunciation.
In the language parallels of the European languages, according to Braun, there is a tendency towards the extension of internationality, which consists in the fact that the modern borrowings are not always subordinated to the phonetic and orthographic rules of a recipient language. The conservation of foreign sounds and forms are related first of all to the extralinguistic factors [Braun 1989, p. 162].
At the beginning of the 30s Eugen Wüster insisted upon the necessity of the standardization of scientific and technical terminological systems. Approximately at the same period Verkade insisted in the same way upon the standardization of spelling of chemist terms. In 1932 he expressed his opinion concerning this problem in his own comment to the international organic chemistry nomenclature, adopted in 1930 [Nedobity 1989, p. 173].
In the last decades the orthographic interlingual interference has exceed the bounds of the European area. In many Asian countries there is a tendency towards the integration of the local languages to the uniform modern global cultural-historical area through the introduction of parallel romanized alphabets for the languages that use other writing systems. Moreover, with the development of automation and mechanization of the information transmission, the inconvenience caused by discrepancies in spelling, will be increased [Superanskaâ 1978, p. 9].
Hence, the problem of transliteration is considered from point of view of terminology, but not just orthography [Paclt 1946, Bìlodìd, Kornìlov, Neroznak, Vakulenko 1996; Vakulenko 19951-2]. As it was already stated above, transliteration in accordance with the international norms and standards, should be monosemantic.
That means that there is a noticeable analogy with terms: On the one hand, any term should be monosemantic, and any concept from of this or that branch of knowledge should be marked (in the ideal variant) with not more than one term. On the other hand, in transliteration each symbol of transliteration (it can be compared with a term) should correspond to a particular symbol of the original writing system (i.e. the corresponding concept). Therefore the creation of a transliteration system should be considered as a constituent in part of the terminological planning. As a result, one obtains the monosemantic and standardized "international" system of expression of non-Latin writing systems.
Moreover, the chief purpose of transliteration is a guarantee of a complete and unambiguous reconstruction of the transliterated text in the original spelling without any distortion (the inverted transliteration).
Aleksandr Reformats´kij has formulated the following requirements to transliteration:
Besides, it should not depend upon any particular language, unlike the practical transcription [Reformatskij 1960, c. 97].
Transliteration can and must be international, because it is not oriented to any particular national alphabet, whereas the practical transcription is based upon the spelling of a and reading rules of a particular alphabet [Reformatskij 1967, c. 379].
Hence, according to the modern requirements, transliteration should be adapted to the possibilities of the automatic computer conversion [Bìlodìd, Kornìlov, Neroznak, Vakulenko 1996; Vakulenko 19951-2].
First the necessity of creating uniform universal transliteration was affirmed by the British linguist Lepsius in his monograph "Standard Alphabet", where the author formulated the structure of the universal Latin transliteration of all the basic languages with bot Latin and non-Latin writing systems [Lepsius 1863].
On the global level the system of transliteration of non-Latin writing systems were elaborated particularly by the International Standards Organization (ISO). This organization has elaborated exact and monosemantic systems of transliteration, where each non-Latin symbol has its monosemantic Latin equivalent. In this case the use of digraphs is completely excluded. Such is, for instance, the universal transliteration of the Cyrillic signs (without taking into consideration all the peculiarities of this or that Slavonic alphabet). The first version of this standard was issued in 1968 [ISO/R 9 — 1968]. The new version of this standard, to which the Cyrillic signs for non-Slavonic languages were also added, was published in 1995 [ISO 9: 1995]. Such systems of transliteration exist on the national level too, like the variant of The US Congress Library [Reformatskij 1967], or the British Standard [British Standard 1958].
On the national level, some rules of the monosemantic reflection of this or that writing system by means of the Latin script concerning particular languages were also elaborated. So, in 1958 the All-Chinese Assembly of People’s Representatives adopted a Latin-based phonetic alphabet for the Chinese [Prâdohin 1960; Serdûčenko 1959; Gilârevskij, Grivnin 1964, p. 214-215]. In Japan as early as in 1937, the special commission created the romanized system Kunrei-siki. The Hepburn system is used parallel to Kunrei-siki [Dunn & Yanada 1965, c.i; Gilârevskij, Grivnin 1964, p. 217; Saito 1988]. An ideal varia
nt of transliteration is the two parallel Serbian alphabets [Sedáček 1989]. In the Soviet Union there were also attempts to introduce a parallel Latin transliteration system for the Russian alphabet [Ŝerba 1940; Reformatskij 1960; 1967]. In accordance with the international requirements, the Terminological Commission in Natural Sciences (Termìnoloġìčna komìsìâ z prirodničih nauk, TKPN) of Taras Ševčenko National University in Kyjiv has created a monosemantic transliteration system for the Ukrainian alphabet, as well as a software for the automatic conversion in the both directions [Běloděd, Kornìlov, Neroznak, Vakulenko 1996; Vakulenko 19951-2].