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Swearing supposedly ran along the lines of social status and gender. And swearing was always something of a performance. If you wanted to be believed by your neighbours, swearing a solemn oath with one hand on the Bible was the best option. The legal system was built on that promise to tell the truth, so help me God. But this was an invocation that spilled over into other arenas. As John Bunyan (d1688) complained, vain swearers “tell their jestings, tales, and lies, and then swear by God that they are true”. And the phrase ‘by God’ was just a beginning. Oaths sworn in the 16th century were many and various.
Noob: Chances are, if you’re reading this, and thinking of starting to play games, then you are a noob. Derived from ‘newbie’, this word is used to describe people who are inexperienced at gaming in general, or at any specific game.
Pwn: Pronounced ‘P – own’ this word is used to describe a humiliating defeat. “Did you see Chris get pwned?”. It is believed that this word started as a typo, deriving from the word ‘own’; as the letter ‘p’ is next to the letter ‘o’ on most keyboards, a slip of the finger could have happened. Griefer: Griefers are game players who seem to get their enjoyment for causing other players problems: that is, giving other players grief.
Co-op: Like the popular British supermarket chain, this is a shortening of the word co-operative; in gaming, it’s when you have to work with other players to achieve a common goal.
This book, or rather handbook, is a great guide for translators and students of translation who want to learn about specialized translation and how to manage terminology. The author, Noa Talaván Zanón, has a PhD in English Studies from the Universidad Nacional de Educación a Distancia (UNED, Spain) and specializes in English for Specific Purposes, Computer Assisted Language Learning, and Audiovisual Translation. She is also a lecturer at UNED for English for Professional Purposes, Translation, and English as a Foreign Language.
The handbook is great for beginners and an excellent guide for teachers because it offers exercises and a key (sample responses), as well as a short glossary with financial, legal and administrative terms. Mind you, not a long glossary but I think it can help beginners and students to get a grasp on the topics.
From a psychological perspective, association takes place when a person mentally associates A with B. In terminology work and other controlled vocabularies they are usually registered under “related terms”, “see also”, “see related”, or “other”. In the paper “Semantic Relationships used in Controlled Vocabularies”, Marzia Zeng points out that associative relationships are difficult to define, indeed, I have found that some of the definitions on the Internet might be confusing and even subject to debate. Even so, if the relationship is not equivalent nor hierarchical it is probably associative, as explained by Bean and Green in their book “Relationships in the Organization of Knowledge”
History credits the sixty-four years of the Victorian era with peace, economic success, intense emotions, sophisticated tastes, and national pride. Though Jane Austen died before Queen Victoria took the throne in 1837, her literary works give a window into the people over which the monarch governed. Let’s look at ten revealing words and expressions from Jane Austen’s iconic novels. >LEGGI TUTTO
"Pudding" can refer generically to the sweet, final course of a meal, what Americans know as "dessert." (Because it's the UK, this has class implications. Nancy Mitford, in a famous essay comparing the speech of upper-class Britons with everyone else, categorized "pudding" as used by the elite and "sweet" as used by the proletariat.) But a pudding can also be a specific dish — and a British pudding still isn't the same as an American one. American puddings are closer to what the Brits would call "custard."
A British pudding is a dish, savory or sweet, that's cooked by being boiled or steamed in something: a dish, a piece of cloth, or even animal intestine. The earliest puddings, in this sense of the word, were sausages; black pudding, a type of sausage made with pig's blood, is sometimes included in a traditional English breakfast. And just to make things a bit more confusing, some dishes are referred to as "puddings" that are sometimes baked but formerly were boiled or steamed. The best example is sticky toffee pudding, a date cake with caramel sauce that's traditionally steamed but is now often baked. (It also might originally be Canadian, not British.)
Contrary to what most people believe, states Mr. Riediger, special languages do not always rely on neologisms to form their vocabulary, but rather take existing terms and re-categorise them, thus giving them a new meaning. Terms can therefore be divided into polysemic and monosemic types, the former being homographs that have different meanings within different domains and the latter being terms that have a single meaning within a single domain. Before describing how a glossary is structured, Mr. Riediger identifies three phases a terminologist has to go through while writing it. During the preliminary phase the work must be organised, the domain must be defined and relevant documents related to the topic have to be analysed. During the following phase, the main one, the terms are selected and validated in each language, and the terminological cards are filled out. Lastly, during the conclusive phase, the glossary is finished and ready to be published.
"We linguists know better than anyone else that there will never be a machina sapiens. Especially for content like language that is constantly evolving and related to each thought of the human brain in so many different cultures, man will always teach the machine and will always select its output. So, the machine is not a competitor but a tool."
EurTerm, a project of the IATE Management Group, was created to collect contributions on terminology from all EU institutions and to provide support and resources in the field. The website offers language wikis where translators can discuss terminology, contacts for terminologists and other experts, a calendar for all institutional and external events concerning terminology, and a vast collection of institutional and external resources, such as links to terminology-focused websites, online training, databases and more.
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The process of terminology work includes 4 steps: (i) extraction of key terms, names and concepts identified in the source text; (ii) research and documentation of the terms in the terminology management system (TMS); (iii) distribution to vendors or freelancers, which more and more includes an authoring process in which the source text is checked for spelling errors and corporate language; and (vi) feedback and maintenance in which you update your termbase when, for example, a client asks you to change a term. Usually between 5% and 10% of term entries need to be changed, but if you have done an effective documentation process this could take less time.
Slang, or “short language”, consists of a lexicon of non-standard, informal words and phrases which can refer to a precise social phenomenon, geographical location, and can be used to indicate membership of a particular group. The etymological origins of slang are difficult to trace, largely because it is a spoken discourse which is not registered in corpus linguistics. When Elisha Coles became, with his English Dictionary of 1630, the first lexicographer of Standard English to include slang terminology, he explained that ‘Tis no Disparagement to understand the Canting Terms: It may chance to save your Throat from being cut, or (at least) your Pocket from being pick’d’. The lexicographer, usually male, middle-aged and middle-class, was very much excluded from this contemporary language of criminality known in England as cant. In a society where printing was a relative novelty, books tended to be devoted to the concerns of the educated and powerful, and slang was simply ignored.
My mate said, and added: “ I figured you’d get a kick out of that”. And of course I did!
Some of you might have come across this piece of information while browsing the infinite void that we call “the Internet”. After some research, I found out that the word to express these two meanings in Danish is “gift”, which brings a whole new level of greatness to the situation.
Just imagine the infinite number of puns that the Danes must be enjoying. I feel left out already. Also, imagine how much pleasure you’d get when walking around an English-speaking country and reading “GIFT SHOP” above the door of some store!
The glossary needs to be comprehensive yet concise. It should contain all terms regularly encountered in your specialist field, together with their respective translations. However, it should not contain duplicate terms. For example, if a glossary contains the terms ‘light’ and ‘component’ and their respective translations it does not need to also contain the term ‘light component’ with the respective translation. Neither should the glossary contain general language terms which can easily be found in a dictionary as these simply add bulk to the glossary, making it less user friendly.
Here’s an ambiguous sentence for you: “Because of the agency’s oversight, the corporation’s behavior was sanctioned.” Does that mean, 'Because the agency oversaw the company’s behavior, they imposed a penalty for some transgression' or does it mean, 'Because the agency was inattentive, they overlooked the misbehavior and gave it their approval by default'? We’ve stumbled into the looking-glass world of “contronyms”—words that are their own antonyms.
1. Sanction (via French, from Latin sanctio(n-), from sancire ‘ratify,’) can mean ‘give official permission or approval for (an action)’ or conversely, ‘impose a penalty on.’
2. Oversight is the noun form of two verbs with contrary meanings, “oversee” and “overlook.” “Oversee,” from Old English ofersēon ‘look at from above,’ means ‘supervise’ (medieval Latin for the same thing: super- ‘over’ + videre ‘to see.’) “Overlook” usually means the opposite: ‘to fail to see or observe; to pass over without noticing; to disregard, ignore.’
A study by The Economist found that nearly all (97 percent) of business executives have experienced misunderstandings due to poor communication, while 83 percent have actually seen negative business outcomes arise from something as simple as a poor choice of words. On the other hand, businesses and individuals with more mature communication profiles have much stronger chances of achieving higher levels of efficiency, flexibility, and profitability. It's not difficult to conclude that the words we choose to use, how we position ourselves during negotiations, and even how we speak to ourselves will have a lasting impact on our lives. The sooner you can identify and eliminate the words and phrases you use that drain your team's motivation, diminish your customers' interest in your business, and erode your own sense of self-confidence, the quicker you'll be able to start making the positive changes you seek. Naturally, much will depend on the circumstances, but here are the words I've found to be most counterproductive to achieving success in business. >LEGGI TUTTO
There are some feelings that can’t be expressed through words.
Except wait. They can. Just not in English, because our language is often pretty rubbish and doesn’t have the words we need.
Like kummerspeck (literally grief bacon, meaning the weight put on through emotional eating) and schadenfreude (taking pleasure from other people’s bad luck).
And in matters of love, it turns out other languages have got a bunch of romantic feelings covered, word wise. While we fail.
Emma Block created illustrations for a bunch of ultra romantic untranslatable words for Vashi. They’re lovely, but make us feel a bit crap about the English language. We need equivalents for these, asap. >LEGGI TUTTO
IATE, the publicly accessible terminology database of the EU institutions, has undergone some improvements. IATE contains over 8 million terms in the 24 official languages of the EU and is constantly updated and maintained by the translators and terminologists of the EU. These improvements will make searching IATE easier and more informative for its millions of users all over the world.
"This English-Spanish Wordbank of Social Security Terminology contains everyday words and expressions as well as technical Social Security terminology. It is intended to promote uniformity in language usage and avoid misinterpretation of Spanish language materials issued by the Social Security Administration. It is designed to be used by Social Security personnel who meet and interview the Spanish speaking public, and who prepare correspondence and other Spanish language documents as well as public information materials. The Wordbank was initially composed by a group of Social Security employees in our Central Office and has been updated though the years with the cooperation and review of many Social Security Field office employees from all regions. Also, each regional office was given opportunities to review the Wordbank and submit ideas and suggestions. The group members were chosen to represent various Hispanic origins and backgrounds. This Wordbank will continue to be updated as new terms appear in the various SSA administered programs. Users of the Wordbank are encouraged to submit ideas and suggestions for improvement through the Regional Public Affairs Officers."
Via Stefano KaliFire
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