TERMINOLOGY WORK IN BASQUE
Araceli Díaz de Lezana Donostia/San Sebastián, 2018.11.22 Basque language: euskera
• Basque Autonomous Community: co-official with Spanish • Navarre: co-official with Spanish in part of the territory • Northern Basque Country: French, the only official language Euskera
No family No references in relation to other languages around. For example: en restorative circle fr cercle restauratif es círculo restaurativo ca cercle restauratiu eu ???? Basque terminology
Different levels in Terminology:
– scientific-technical terminology: international terms eu biodiesel es biodiésel fr biodiesel en biodiesel
– traditional Basque terminology: traditional activities (fishing, hunting; agriculture, animal husbandry…) eu uxatzaile es ojeador; batidor fr batteur; traqueur; rabatteur en beater
– pseudo-terminology: socio-economic area (food, clothing, furniture, household affairs…) many linguistic loans: from Spanish and from French
eu kazadora es cazadora fr blouson en hunting jacket leotardo leotardo collant tights gasolina; ezantza gasolina essence petrol
– Legal terminology 2 legal systems: Spain and France Basque terminology
References:
• Euskaltzaindia-Royal Basque Language Academy: standardization of Basque https://www.euskaltzaindia.eus/
• Terminology Committee: EUSKALTERM Basque Public Term Bank www.euskadi.eus/euskalterm
• Corpora: general, specialised (science and technology, legal texts)
• Translation memories (public administration)
• Didactic materials (primary and secondary school, vocational training, University): PhD theses in Basque, school textbooks, handbooks (original and translated into Basque)
• Official gazettes (Basque Government and Government of Navarre, and governments of the provinces of Biscay, Gipuzkoa and Alava/Araba)
• Scientific publications.
• Media in Basque.
• Dictionaries (monolingual, bilingual, …) ESSENTIAL TOOL: Google search engine Basque terminology
1999, General Plan for Promoting the Use of Basque
Terminology Planning: - 2001, Basque Public Term Bank: EUSKALTERM - 2002, Terminology Committee Basque terminology: EUSKALTERM www.euskadi.eus/euskalterm Basque terminology: Terminology Committee
Created by Decree 179/2002 inside the Basque Advisory Council (last decree 176/2007).
Main functions:
• To establish priorities in the field of terminology.
• To make proposals of work to be integrated into the annual action plans.
• To set criteria for acceptance of terms.
• To establish priorities between competing terms.
• To approve terms.
• To propose ways for the dissemination of terminology, and recommend approved terminology. Basque terminology: Terminology Committee
Priorities of Basque terminology:
• Socioeconomic area (food, clothing, furniture, household affairs…) • Education (vocational training and University → jobs and employment) • Public administration (legal sphere) • ICT • Sports The aim is to establish the basic terminology for as many areas as possible Criteria for acceptance of terms: Linguistic (Academy), terminological, and sociolinguistic criteria
Two documents: • The Inventory of terminological problems • Normalization dossier Basque terminology: Terminology Committee
Establish priorities between competing terms, approve terms and recommend approved terminology.
Acceptability of terms:
0 Rejected term (Terminology Committee does not accept it) 1 Used term (but not yet analyzed and approved by the TC) 2 Proposed term (by the experts but not analyzed and approved) 3 Accepted term (but not recommended) 4 Provisionally normalized / recommended term (pending approval from the TC) 4 Normalized / Recommended term Basque terminology: Dissemination of approved terminology
- EUSKALTERM, the Basque Public Term Bank www.euskadi.net/euskalterm
- Publications: 58 dictionaries Basque terminology: dissemination of approved terminology Dictionaries in pdf format to be downloaded Basque terminology: ensuring quality Cooperation: public institutions + private entities
Basque Gov. contracts dictionaries through a public tender (UZEI)
technical committees: experts + linguists (4)
Terminology Committee*: approval and recommendation of the terminologies
EUSKALTERM Publications Basque Public Term Bank
* The TC approves dictionaries made by other agents Basque terminology: Evaluation of the use of recommended terminology
Monitoring and evaluating the degree of acceptance of recommended terms Basque terminology: conclusions
Quality of terminology is very important also for the integration of Basque in ICT:
Quality Translation Memories Quality corpora
Quality Machine translation Eskerrik asko Thank you Merci beaucoup