Collocations and Term Variation in Mechanical Engineering Discourse

Vesna Cigan

doi:10.31820/f.30.2.3

Abstract

Terminological collocations1 are one of the most typical and very frequent units of representation of concepts in many disciplines. Although traditionally considered to be unwelcome in terminology, synonymy is amply present in specialized languages. Consequently, the same phenomenon is reflected in terminological collocations. This paper aims to investigate synonymous collocations extracted from mechanical engineering texts in terms of the most frequent and relevant types of denominative variation in the selected English collocations as well as of their equivalents in German and Croatian. The analysis of variations in terminological collocations gives insight into the (non)substitutability of collocation constituents as one of the major characteristics of collocations. Extracted collocations are analysed within a two-tier framework structured at a paradigmatic and a syntagmatic level, which allows for the identification of the three types of term variation: morphological, syntagmatic and semantic. Focusing on the collocations with the structure noun + noun and adjective + noun the results show that constituents of both syntactic structures allow substitution. The denominative variants are prevalent in adjective + noun collocations in which synonymous lexical elements functioning as collocates do not entail a concept change (admissible load ↔ allowable load). Lexeme substitutions are also annotated in noun + noun collocations expressing a slightly different dimension or facet of the concept (face gear vs. crown gear vs. crown wheel). The majority of German equivalents are nominal compounds that outnumber their morphological variants offering multiple equivalences.

Highlights

Science, research and other specialist areas have recently undergone the development and diversification of specialist knowledge marked by an increased need for specialist communication at a global level
This paper aims to investigate the denominative variants9 of terminological collocations extracted from mechanical engineering texts in English, German and Croatian, as the synonymy becomes more perceptible when equivalents are compared across languages
The list of collocations was futher filtered and a somewhat greater number of occurrences of the synonymous collocations in the English subsample was identified for the adjective-noun collocation pattern (Figure 1)

Summary

Introduction

Research and other specialist areas have recently undergone the development and diversification of specialist knowledge marked by an increased need for specialist communication at a global level. The traditional theory of terminology according to Wüster aims “to achieve univocity in professional communication, especially at the international level” (Cabré, 2000: 41). The ideal of univocity has recently been challenged by cognitive science, linguistics and communication sciences in the light of subsequent contributions to Wüster’s theory and the relevant research results applying the interdisciplinary approach. A strong proponent of unambiguous accurate professional communication Wüster realized the divergence of his ideal terminological system from specialized language reality and accepted that synonymous word combinations with understandable elementary relationships and specializations impose less burden on the memory, are unavoidable when they express a different perception of the same concept (Wüster, 1970: 96)

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