The Function Of Terms And Professional Vocabulary In The Documentary Text

Abstract

The authors of the article identified and analyzed the basic (frequency) professional vocabulary and terminology, lebeled a classification of specific terms, identified language (lexical, morphological) features of professional vocabulary and terminology, imarked the main principles of the usage of professional vocabulary and terminology in legal documents. Specific of the multicomponent terminological combinations was analyzed in detail. The linguistic level of relative stability and nomenclature steadiness characteristics of the documentary texts of a particular company was indicated. The sphere of business communication arouses the great interest in many scientific subjects and, firstly, in documentary linguistics, which deals with functioning of the compositional-sapid and speech features of a documentary text. The specificity of the terms' usage in the text has become the subject of study the different spheres of linguistics – terminological theory of the text, which performs a detailed terminological analysis of the text. Nowadays, it's defined the main concepts and approaches of scientific research in practical document linguistics and identified controversial issues: the formation of the basic requirements for the terminology and the definition of the principles of terminological units' unification. To identify the peculiarities and function of the professional and terminological vocabulary in document, it was made an experiment with the help of the official document of UNO “The Regional Office of the Fund overhaul of the block of flats”. Having studied the regulatory framework of this company and the specifics of its work led us to consider how this company operates with the professional vocabulary and terminology.

Keywords: Business communicationdocument textfunctional criterionlexical componentprofessional vocabularysubstantive terminological constructions

Introduction

The sphere of business communication arouses the great interest in many scientific subjects and, firstly, in documentary linguistics, which deals with functioning of the compositional-sapid and speech features of a documentary text in synchrony and diachrony (Buslaeva, 2016; Gorban et al., 2017; Kushneruk, 2016; Sheptukhina, 2019).

The specificity of the terms' usage in the text has become the subject of study the different spheres of linguistics – terminological theory of the text, which performs a detailed terminological analysis of the text. Specifics of using terms in Russian and other languages, in texts of different genres and types of discourse (Bursina, 2018; Degtyarenko, 2017; Gadomsky, 2018; Latu & Levit, 2017; Onal, 2019; Pomirko et al., 2020).

Nowadays, it's defined the main concepts and approaches of scientific research in practical document linguistics and identified controversial issues: the formation of the basic requirements for the terminology and the definition of the principles of terminological units' unification. The laws of selection and usage of special units of the language are among the most relevant issues (Shufang & Shelov, 2017).

The issue of the types of texts, where we meet terms, is reflected in the pioneering linguistic works of Bakhtin (1986) , Kushneruk (2007), Kosova (2012, 2016) and other researchers.

Analyzing terminology in a documentary text, a genre is deserved special attention by Bakhtin (1986), according to this method, it's considered a communicative goal, the author's image, the addressee, the past and the future, the type of a content and linguistic embodiment.

These days, the system approach to study of terminology, formulated by Leychik (2007), is the cause of undoubted interest for documentary practical linguistics. Analyzing the documentary text, the researcher differentiates terms into term-using (the pre-fixed terms in vocabulary), term-fixing (terms are reflected in explanatory, terminological dictionaries, encyclopaedias and reference books) and term-generating terms (terms are appearing in the formulation process or presentation of new concepts, theories, and discoveries) (Leychik, 1990).

Kushneruk (2007), a specialist in the documentary linguistics, noticed in one of his works:

It is impossible to talk about the extraction of units, which can be used in document communication, the unification of document means and the construction of terminological standards for all areas of document linguistics without studying the lexical and phraseological structure of documentary texts. (p. 20)

The researcher Kosova (2016) calls “the ordering of the terminological apparatus (systematization, structuring)” is one of the most important ways in studying of the speech organization of a documentary text (p. 12). In our opinion, the approaches, mentioned above, allow to identify the specificity of using the terminology in documents of different types, to explain the existing classify, to analyze intermediate varieties of documents, to adjust the requirements for terms which are used in the business text, to determine the norms of the usage of these terms and to develop the principles to unify the terminological units.

As you know, the text of a document, which is a special linguistic object, is influenced by both linguistic factors and regulations that have non-linguistic, standardizing and unifying basis (Topaz, 2019).

“The lexical and grammatical semantics of the main vocabulary determines the combination of the language units, which restrict a combinatorial context in the documentary text, and the standard speech formulas where they are used” (Kosova, 2010, p. 17).

For example, the texts of official business documents are less uniform in their terminology than the texts of scientific and technical ones. The content of terms in official context is determined by the subject of the document. The text of the official style includes terms reflecting the concepts of the sphere of communication – those units which belong to the metalanguage of the official style, including a hybrid system of economic, administrative, legal and other topic units.

The purpose of our work is to identify the specifics of the professional vocabulary and terminology in documentary text.

To achieve this goal, there were set some aims:

• to define professional vocabulary and terminology in the documentary text;

• to develop a classification of terms used in the documentary text;

• to identify the language (lexical, morphological) features of professional vocabulary and terminology in the text of documents.

To identify the peculiarities and function of the professional and terminological vocabulary in document, it was made an experiment with the help of the official document of UNO “The Regional Office of the Fund overhaul of the block of flats”. Having studied the regulatory framework of this company and the specifics of its work led us to consider how this company operates with the professional vocabulary and terminology. For analyzing special vocabulary in the documentary text it was used such methods and techniques as: selection, descriptive and analytical methods of forming topic groups and classification.

We have found out in the research the terms which were used more often, and identified the classification of the professional vocabulary used in the documentary text of the Regional Operator.

As you know, the classification of professional vocabulary is based on the following criteria (Figure 01 ):

• function (main);

• composition (single-component, dual-component);

• evaluation;

• the degree of prevalence.

See Full Size >

Problem Statement

To differentiate professional vocabulary, we selected a functional criterion which is the basic one. Functionality means as the purpose and the orientation to the semantic meanings of certain lexemes. According to the “functionality” standard, we identified the following lexical groups (Figure 02 ).

See Full Size >

The diagram shows the results of differentiation of terms by functional criteria (Figure 03 ).

See Full Size >

The analysis of the lexical material showed that special (36%) and general (30%) terms divided the frequency limit of the terminology in the documentary text. It should be noted that professional terminology is also represented in the studied material (23%), which is explained by the specifics of the legislation framework of the Regional Operator, where there are a lot of professionalism. Economic terms are the least frequently used (11%). We consider that the reasons for that is the specifics of the documentation support of the company.

The classification of terms is a dynamic structurally organized complex linguistic object, which provides the variety of components, forms of organization, the intricacy of logical, meaningful and structural characteristics of a particular company (Table 01 ).

One of the professional vocabulary's features in a document text is its orientation to the activities of the company where it's used. In this case, the following professional lexis is used: special account, which shoes us the degree of evaluation in the analysis, such collocation as a “common pot”, which means the concept of a special account only in colloquial speech but not in the document text.

Typology of terms is a dynamic structurally organized complex linguistic object, which consists of the variety of components, forms of their organization and complexity of logical and structural characteristics.

Analyzing terms, we should pay attention to the structural relationship between a terminological unit and its semantics. The semantics of the terminological unit is formally expressed by the term's structural features more often than it is in the international vocabulary. To sum up, the brevity of the term in whole is called one of its main properties (Tatarinov, 1995).

Speaking about the distribution of the multicomponent terminology combinations in the document text, you can indicate the relative level of its stability and nomenclature steadiness.

The terms with a large number of components may be a reflection of their subject status and stability in the system of the document circulation of the company.

More often, multicomponent terms are used in the research material, indicating the desire to maximize the form in the special concepts, as we use a large number of special terms, it means the decline of multicomponence of terminological linguistic units.

During our research we have found out that a multicomponent term is characterized by a variety of options and the semantic connection between the components is weakened: a technical customer, technical support, overhaul.

If we talk about frequent grammatical constructions which we can find in the documentary texts of the company, we notice a prevalence of terminological phrases (Figure 04 ):

N+Adj...(n + n+ADJ) or N+N + ...(n + n+...). + Sch.), that have their nominal elements, for instance: the individual storage period of document, the historical reference to the archive fund, accounting unit for archival documents, etc.

See Full Size >

Research Questions

We marked the main feature of the terminological unit of the documentary texts of a specific company as the substantive character of the discussed collocations.

According to Khizhnyak (1997), modern systems can be represented with sufficient completeness by nouns and phrases based on them.

The active vocabulary used more often in documents of studied company documentary texts: the energy complex, the fund, the legal entity, etc. Another type of words includes the restricted access: to pay fees, contributions for overhaul, etc. The other terms are outdated or fallen out of active usage: indirect property, exclusive powers. There are also special terms, appeared during a certain “active” period of the Regional operator's activity: the building preparation, next financial year and the amount of funds.

Analyzing the linguistic features of professional vocabulary and terminology in the company's documentary text, we marked that the documentary text used a compound name: General – General Director; in the colloquial speech of builders we can hear the word “kapitalka” instead of the overhaul; service staff of the calculating Department is called as typists and “eveemschikami”, etc. (they are used more in oral communication but sometimes we can meet them in internal documents of the company).

The derivation of terms is also varied. Terminology of existing words in the language, i.e. scientific rethinking of the well-known lexical meaning, is usually carried out in two ways:

1) the refusal of the generally accepted lexical meaning and giving the word a strict, precise name;

2) full or partial usage of those features that serve as the basis of the lexical meaning of the word in popular use, i.e. similarity, adjacency, etc.

The important part of this work has become the definition of the “invariant” as the opposite term to the “variant”. Both of them characterise the same object or phenomenon. However, the “invariant” denotes an abstract object and the “variant” denotes a real one. We can consider that documentary texts have lexical and phraseological kind of the text matter but it is quite limited, regulating with unifying tools. However, the variation of terms' usage causes ambiguity and sometimes misinterpretation, which is unacceptable in the document text. As Kosova and Sharipova (2016) note “the phenomenon of variation in terminology is found in the sphere of multicomponent terminological phrases: land cress – land tax, management processes – managerial process” (p. 247).

Thus, the information about different levels of units and relationships, that are used professional vocabulary and terminology in documentary texts, determines the study the principles of the use of professional vocabulary and terminology in document texts. The parts of speech in the analyzed documentary texts reveal its substantive nature. The main meaning of professional words and terms determines the degree of compliance them with reality and affects the efficiency of the company's records management. The unambiguity of the terms, used in the documentary text, the absence of ambiguity define a specific concept and the “correct” reading of the documentary text, which provide legal protection for subjects. This standard, that regulates the usage of terms and special vocabulary in the document in the clerical work and archival affairs is GOST R 7.0.8-2013 “The clerical work and archival affairs. Terms and definitions” (GOST R 7.0.8-2013, 2013).

Purpose of the Study

So, the system of terms in the clerical work and archival affairs is a dynamic orderly complex linguistic object, that is proved with the variety of components, forms of their organization, the complexity of logical-semantic and structural characteristics.

Having analysed the documentary texts UNO “Regional branch of Fund of overhaul of block of flats”, it was identified the basic (frequency) professional vocabulary and terminology; we formulated the classification of specific terms, we determinate the language (lexical, morphological) peculiarities of professional vocabulary and terminology. During the research, it was found out that the classification of terms is a dynamic complex linguistic object, where we could meet the variety of components, the form of their organization, the complexity of logical-semantic and structural characteristics. This study showed us the principles of using professional vocabulary and terminology in documentary texts.

Research Methods

The research convinced us that multicomponent terminology combinations had a relative level of stability and nomenclature steadiness.

This work should be continued, because of the specific multicomponent terminology of documentary text, which needs more detailed understanding and systematization. The study of the problems of terminology and professional vocabulary in the documentary text of a particular company gives the advantages for expanding the opinion about the document as a linguistic object that has a special characteristic.

The research is analytical and can be used in the development of the practical courses on “General stylistics” and “Scientific discipline of documentation”.

Findings

The important part of this work has become the definition of the “invariant” as the opposite term to the “variant”. Both of them characterise the same object or phenomenon. However, the “invariant” denotes an abstract object and the “variant” denotes a real one. We can consider that documentary texts have lexical and phraseological kind of the text matter but it is quite limited, regulating with unifying tools. However, the variation of terms' usage causes ambiguity and sometimes misinterpretation, which is unacceptable in the document text. As Kosova (2016) notes “the phenomenon of variation in terminology is found in the sphere of multicomponent terminological phrases: land cress – land tax, management processes – managerial process” (p. 250) .There are some examples of such terms: contracting agency – the organization of contractors, state support – the support of government, founder's contribution – Foundation fee.

Conclusion

Thus, the information about different levels of units and relationships, that are used professional vocabulary and terminology in documentary texts, determines the study the principles of the use of professional vocabulary and terminology in document texts. The parts of speech in the analyzed documentary texts reveal its substantive nature. The main meaning of professional words and terms determines the degree of compliance them with reality and affects the efficiency of the company's records management. The unambiguity of the terms, used in the documentary text, the absence of ambiguity define a specific concept and the “correct” reading of the documentary text, which provide legal protection for subjects. This standard, that regulates the usage of terms and special vocabulary in the document in the clerical work and archival affairs is GOST R 7.0.8-2013.

So, the system of terms in the clerical work and archival affairs is a dynamic orderly complex linguistic object that is proved with the variety of components, forms of their organization, the complexity of logical-semantic and structural characteristics.

Having analysed the documentary texts UNO “Regional branch of Fund of overhaul of block of flats”, it was identified the basic (frequency) professional vocabulary and terminology; we formulated the classification of specific terms, we determinate the language (lexical, morphological) peculiarities of professional vocabulary and terminology. During the research, it was found out that the classification of terms is a dynamic complex linguistic object, where we could meet the variety of components, the form of their organization, the complexity of logical-semantic and structural characteristics. This study showed us the principles of using professional vocabulary and terminology in documentary texts.

The research convinced us that multicomponent terminology combinations had a relative level of stability and nomenclature steadiness.

This work should be continued, because of the specific multicomponent terminology of documentary text, which needs more detailed understanding and systematization. The study of the problems of terminology and professional vocabulary in the documentary text of a particular company gives the advantages for expanding the opinion about the document as a linguistic object that has a special characteristic.

The research is analytical and can be used in the development of the practical courses on “General stylistics” and “Scientific discipline of documentation”.

Acknowledgments

The research is analytical and can be used in the development of the practical courses on “General stylistics” and “Scientific discipline of documentation”.

References

1. Bakhtin, M. M. (1986). The problem of text in linguistics, Philology and other Humanity science / Esthetics of verbal creativity. Iskusstvo.
2. Bursina, O. A. (2018). Synonymy in emerging term systems (on the example of the term mobbing in modern English). Science Journal of Volgograd State University. Linguistics, 1(17), 143-150. DOI:
3. Buslaeva, E. S. (2016). Documentality as a property of the text (PR PR). Science Journal of Volgograd State University. Linguistics, 1(30), 70-76. DOI:
4. Degtyarenko, K. A. (2017). Structural and Semantic Features and Ways of Translation of Military Discourse Terminology (on Material of English Periodicals). Scientific Dialogue, 5, 33-43. DOI:
5. Gadomsky, A. K. (2018). Lexicographic description of terminology of theolinguistics (on the example of Russian and Polish languages). Science Journal of Volgograd State University. Linguistics, 1(17), 17-28. DOI:
6. Gorban, O. A., Ilyinova, E. Yu., Kosova, M. V., & Sheptukhina, E. M. (2017). Cossack military charters of the mid-18th century: genre distinction. XLinguae Journal, 3(10), 123-136. DOI:
7. GOST R 7.0.8-2013. (2013). The clerical work and archival affairs. Terms and definitions. https://legalacts.ru/doc/gost-r-708-2013-natsionalnyi-standart-rossiiskoi-federatsii/
8. Khizhnyak, S. P. (1997). Anglo-American and Russian terminology of law: sociolinguistic aspect of origin and development. SGAP.
9. Kosova, M. V. (2010). Special vocabulary in the document text: aspects of linguistic analysis. Science Journal of Volgograd State University. Linguistics, 2(12), 7-17.
10. Kosova, M. V. (2012). Systemicity as a property of the documentary text. Science Journal of Volgograd State University. Linguistics, 1(15), 7-11.
11. Kosova, M. V. (2016). Method of documentary analysis in linguistic research. Science Journal of Volgograd State University. Linguistics, 1(30), 7-17. DOI:
12. Kosova, M. V., & Sharipova, R. R. (2016). Termination as the basis for classification of documentary texts. Science Journal of Volgograd State University. Linguistics, 4(15), 245-252. DOI:
13. Kushneruk, S. P. (2007). Documentary linguistics. Flintа.
14. Kushneruk, S. P. (2016). Linguistic correlates of documentation requisites as the main object of documentary linguistics. Science Journal of Volgograd State University. Linguistics, 1(30), 28-36. DOI: 10.15688 /jvolsu2.2016.1.3
15. Latu, M. N., & Levit, A. A. (2017). Technical terms of the category Locus and their semantic relations within a terminology. The Rupkatha Journal on Interdisciplinary Studies in Humanities, 1(9), 21-35.
16. Leychik, V. M. (1990). Features of functioning of terms in the text. Philological Sciences, 3, 80-87.
17. Leychik, V. M. (2007). Terminology: subject, methods, structure. URSS.
18. Onal, I. O. (2019). Terminological Collocation as Object under Study. Scientific Dialogue, 1, 73-87. DOI:
19. Pomirko, R., Koval, R., Romanchuk, О., Danylevych, М., & Cherkhava, О. (2020). Neologisms of physical and rehabilitation medicine terminology in French. XLinguae Journal, 1(13), 37-49. DOI:
20. Sheptukhina, E. M. (2019). Genre Parameters of a Narrating as a Document of the Mid-18th Century in the Aspect of Creating a Linguistic Corps. Scientific Dialogue, 11, 114-129. DOI: 10.24224/2227-1295- 2019-11-114-129
21. Shufang, S., & Shelov, S. D. (2017). Term as the main unit of terminology: diversity of definitions and unity of understanding. Topics in the study of language, 6, 102-114.
22. Tatarinov, V. A. (1995). History of national terminology In 3 vols. 2. Directions and methods of terminological research. Moscow Lyceum.
23. Topaz, A. I. (2019). Concepts of record keeping and archival business in terminological standards: comparative aspect. Science Journal of Volgograd State University. Linguistics, 3(18), 217-226. DOI: