Oil and gas industry lexis translation: discourse-cognitive approach (notions versus terms)

Abstract

This work reveals a correlation of factors determining the adequacy of oil and gas lexis translation from English into Russian. They govern decision-making processes when translators choose between the two basic strategies (domestication and foreignization) limited by discursive practices and cognitive structures of source texts. When used within a specific type of discourse, specialized lexical units obtain influential characteristics affecting the choice of translation strategies, but in many cases these discursive parameters are not taken into account, as foreignization strategy predominates in specialized vocabulary translation. However, domestication strategy appears to be more effective in particular cases. We argue that discursive and cognitive analysis resulting in conscious strategy choice will allow translators to make adequate decisions about oil and gas lexis translation methods, as they also correspond to translation strategies: the strategy of foreignization leads to translation techniques that preserve formal characteristics of original lexical units, while the strategy of domestication imposes semantic and functional methods of translation. Consequently, the study presents a translation algorithm for specialized lexis in oil and gas source texts to bolster the decision-making effectiveness and to increase translation adequacy in target tests. The algorithm is based on discourse-cognitive approach drawing the connections between alternative discursive parameters representing different types of knowledge by means of oil and gas lexical units and translation strategies with correlating translation techniques.