Terminology work in the Irish language

Evaluation criteria

Differences

• Context

• Approaches

• Results

• Evaluation criteria?

Context

• Sociopolitical and economic factors– Language of the poor and marginalised– Low status– English for progress and emigration– Domain loss, lack of domain cultivation

/gain /expansion, domain renouncement– Little or no terminological corpus material

Liberty for ¾ of island brought

• Effort to revive and sustain Irish as national language

• Irish-medium education

• Necessity for technical terminology for school curricula and exams

Approaches

• Committees and subcommittees established to coordinate and approve terms

• Priorities identified for domain conquest– Science, maths, biology, geography

• Domains identified for domain reconquest– Trades, crafts; later flora and fauna, literature,

sailing

Dissemination

• Bilingual glossaries published, updated, revised, expanded

• No definitions: terms come through English – all speak English, know or can research terms in English

• Material input in online databases• Terminological advice service to public• Talks given in universities and other

venues

Domain conquest and expansion: approaches

• Find native words, prefixes etc• Adapt native words• Import scientific terms: transliterate from Greek

& Latin• Devised principles for term formation and

transliteration• Focus on secondary school curricula mainly –

terms for textbooks• Traditional link with university in west where

some 3rd level courses taught – professors on subcommittees

Domain reconquest

• Solicited lists of native terms from teachers and others in Gaeltacht (= Irish-speaking area)

• Collected from folklore material in archives of Folklore Commission

• Subcommittees formed to review, revise, expand• Compiled and edited lists for publication• Some included in general purpose dictionaries• Specialized terminology lists and dictionaries

published

Some examples

• Flora and fauna– Birds (éin)

• Magpie (snag breac)– Azure-winged magpie Cyanopica cyanea (snag breac

gormghlas)

– Bats (ialtóga)• Long-eared bat Plecotus auritus (ialtóg chluasach)

– Dragonflies (snathaidí móra)– Keeled skimmer Orthetrum coerulescens (scimire na

sruthlán)

Cultivating new domains

• Computing and IT– First dictionary compiled by Science

Subcommittee during 1980´s– Revisited in 1990´s with revisions and

additional terms– Published as book, CD and online– At beginning of Microsoft localization project

90% of terms already published– Irish users tend not to use IT terms in English

Results

• Instead of extracting terms from corpora, corpus material contains terms provided by Terminology Committee

• Published as special-purpose lists or dictionaries (20+)

• Miscellaneous terminology arising from stream of enquiries from the public– Some technical, some jargon, some translation or

grammar problems– Tag miscellaneous terms with general domain fields:

Biol., Lit., IT etc

Other sources

• Media– Liaise with us

• Legislation– Access to our sources but devise their own

terms

Evaluation criteria for term devisers

• Concept-oriented• Natural• Identifiable• Easy to use• Easy to remember• Grammatically uncomplicated• Coordinated within field, across fields• Accessible in sources

User evaluation

• Identify user groups– Teachers and students– Translators and editors– Media– Specialists– General public

Feedback

• Teachers/students say technical terms too difficult– Underlying problem:

• language registers, language levels, • technical terms difficult in all languages• English disguises semantic relations

• Translators/editors happy resources are available• Media use resources, may simplify• Specialists liaise with us and support the work voluntarily

with generosity and good will• General public

– Those who acquire Irish as second language accept– Many native speakers cynical, prefer English terms to devised terms,

use caveats such as “As the new Irish calls it”

Challenges

• To meet demands

• To maintain transparence

• To raise public awareness about terminology as universal phenomenon– Relating to language registers– Relating to language rights