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К вопросу о создании многоязычного словаря туристических терминов
НАУКА И ОБРАЗОВАНИЕ / SCIENCE AND EDUCATION
УДК 81
DOI: 10.24412/2413-693X-2022-1 -25-32
TOWARDS CREATING A MULTILINGUAL DICTIONARY OF TOURIST TERMS
Asmik Armenovna Avagyan,
Candidate of Philology, Senior Teaching Fellow, avagyanasmik@gmail.com Russian State University of Tourism and Service, Moscow, Russian Federation
Abstract. The development of international tourism gives rise to a number of new concepts and special terminology which forms the basis for dictionaries of tourism terms. However, most of them are mono- and bilingual, while multilingual dictionaries would be especially useful for future employees of the tourism industry and international visitors. This article contains a description of main characteristic features of tourism terminology and a brief review of three dictionaries of tourism terms - "The Great Glossary of Terms for International Tourism", "The Multilingual Dictionary of Tourism (Nature - Culture - Travel)" and "Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary. Tourism". The research aims to present possible structure of a new multilingual dictionary based on the advantages of published dictionaries under analysis. It is suggested to compile an electronic dictionary including terms and their definitions in six languages: English, Arabic, Spanish, Chinese, Russian and French. The choice of languages is explained by their popularity around the world. Furthermore, four of them are official languages of UNWTO and all of them are official languages of UNESCO. Such dictionary will help to avoid ambiguous interpretation of key concepts in the tourism industry in six languages most spoken around the world. The research methodology includes a content analysis of tourism dictionaries and an in-depth theoretical review.
Keywords: multilingual dictionaries, tourism terminology, Russian, English
For citation: Avagyan A.A. (2022). Towards creating a multilingual dictionary of tourism terms. Service plus, 16(1), Pp.25-32. DOI: 10.24412/2413-693X-2022-1-25-32.
Submitted: 2022/02/16.
Accepted: 2022/02/22.
К ВОПРОСУ О СОЗДАНИИ МНОГОЯЗЫЧНОГО СЛОВАРЯ ТУРИСТИЧЕСКИХ ТЕРМИНОВ
Авагян Асмик Арменовна,
Российский государственный университет туризма и сервиса, (Москва, РФ) канд. филол. наук, старший преподаватель, e-mail: avagyanasmik@gmail.com
Аннотация. Развитие международного туризма способствует появлению ряда новых концептов и специальной терминологии, служащей основой словарей туристических терминов. Однако, большую часть этих словарей составляют одноязычные или двуязычные словари, в то время как многоязычные словари обладали бы особой актуальностью для будущих работников индустрии туризма и иностранных туристов. Данная статья содержит описание основных характеристик туристической терминологии и краткий обзор трёх словарей туристических терминов - «Большой словарь терминов международного туризма», пятиязычный словарь туристских терминов «Туризм: природа-культура-путешествия» и «Российский энциклопедический словарь. Туризм». Цель исследования - представить возможную структуру нового многоязычного словаря, основываясь на достоинствах изданных словарей. Предлагается создать электронный словарь, включающий термины и их дефиниции на шести языках - английском, арабском, испанском, китайском, русском и французском. Выбор языков обусловлен их распространённостью во всём мире. Более того, четыре из них являются официальными языками ВТО ООН и все шесть - официальными языками ЮНЕСКО. Подобный словарь позволит избежать неоднозначной интерпретации ключевых концептов индустрии туризма на шести самых распространённых языках мира. Методология исследования включает содержательный анализ опубликованных туристических словарей и тщательный обзор теоретической литературы.
Ключевые слова: многоязычные словари, туристическая терминология, русский язык, английский язык
Для цитирования: Авагян А.А. К вопросу о создании многоязычного словаря туристических терминов // Сервис plus. 2022. Т.16. №1. С. 25-32. DOI: 10.24412/2413-693X-2022-1-25-32.
Статья поступила в редакцию: 16.02.2022.
Статья принята к публикации: 22.02.2022.
К вопросу о создании многоязычного словаря туристических терминов
1. Introduction
In our technological era international tourists often use online resources for translation of unknown words from foreign languages. Although some linguists may argue that most of these words belong to the group of general (common) vocabulary of an average citizen in any country of the world, it is definitely reasonable to classify a large group of lexical units as special terms used in the tourism industry. This statement can be proved by the ongoing discussions among tourism professionals concerning the meaning of different terms. Therefore, we deal with a separate terminological system which can and should be developed by linguists and specialists in the tourism industry.
The present research aims to represent the results of a brief review of three Russian dictionaries of tourism terminology - "The Great Glossary of Terms for International Tourism", 'The Multilingual Dictionary of Tourism (Nature - Culture - Travel)" and "Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary. Tourism" - and analyze possible structure of a new multilingual dictionary. For this purpose, the research methodology includes a content analysis of chosen tourism dictionaries and an in-depth theoretical review.
2. Characteristic features of terminology of tourism
It has been a long time since tourist texts have been considered a special type of discourse, as they share a number of linguistic features. Tourism discourse is seen as "a written form of discourse, with the author of the text and its recipient being its participants interacting through the text space for purposes of mutual benefit which has a travel as its key component (concept)" [1: 6]. However, there has been a gap in theoretical research on the language of tourism, as the concept of 'terminology of tourism' has ambiguous interpretation in linguistic literature. In particular, there is no single generally accepted term for language units used in the tourism industry. In Russian and foreign literature, we can find the following terms having the same meaning: terminology of tourism science, tourist terminology, terminology of tour business, terminology of the hospitality industry, terminology of tourism and
service, terminology of social and cultural service and tourism, terminology of balneology and tourism, terminology of tourism and hospitality industry and many others [2: 39]. The most popular term is the terminology of tourism which is used throughout this paper. Another fact pointing to the lack of research on terminological system of tourism is the use of so-called pre-terms in Russian, for example, заявка на получение визы - visa application. Such phrases mainly consist of words which belong to common vocabulary, as they are used not only by tourism specialists but also common consumers of tourist products [7: 17].
In common understanding, terminology is a system of special words used in a particular professional area. When analyzing the etymology and structure of terms used in the tourism business, linguists will definitely find out characteristic features typical for the language of tourism. Previous research on Russian terminology of tourism allowed to identify four criteria of its analysis. Therefore, terminology can be analyzed based on general, formal, semantic and functional criteria.
General criteria
First, any terminology is examined from the historical and statistical perspectives. On the one hand, researchers attempt to explain why terminological system 'Tourism' has emerged and identify the stages of its development. According to L.V. Vinogradova (2011), there are four stages in the history of English tourism corresponding to four stages of the development of English terminology.
The first stage covers the period from antiquity to the beginning of the 19th century. During this period the tourist activity emerged and developed and a terminology for basic concepts connected with the sphere of tourism appeared (e.g. carriage, board).
The second stage which dates back to the 19th century is associated with the beginning of mass tourism. The English words tourist and tourism as well as the largest part of tourist vocabulary appeared. A lot of terms describing tourist services appeared during that period (e.g. booking, buffet). In addition, new words were borrowed from French (maître d'hote!), German (Baedeker) and other
languages.
The third stage lasted from the beginning of the 20th century to the World War II and saw the further development of mass tourism. Since it was also the period of active development of transport and hotel business, new jobs and types of tourist services, such terms as shuttle, penthouse, hotelier and reservation appeared.
The fourth stage started after the World War II and continues at the present time. As it is characterized by the emergence and rise of special types of tourism, such words as agrotourism, familiarization trip are associated with this period. Modern linguists note that current stage of tourism development can be described as a period of complex terms and word combinations which imply the emergence of a well-formed concept structure (e.g. tour operator / tour participant) [10: 11-12].
The terminology of tourism in Russian was formed later and developed in a different way. However, researchers distinguish between four stages, as in the history of English terminology. The first stage covering a long period from the end of the 17th century to the end of the 19th century gave rise to single terms, such as ночёвка, путевая книжка.
During the second stage which started at the end of the 19th century and ended in 1936 excursion business had been developing and caused the emergence of corresponding concepts and terms. The words образовательная экскурсия, экскурсант and палатка are among them. Moreover, the words турист and туризм were borrowed from French during that period.
The third stage started in 1936 when tourism became a type of sport. Many compound terms were used at that time, and most of them were derived from the same roots, for example, маркировка маршрута, маршрутный лист, радиальный маршрут.
As soon as the third stage ended in 1990, the fourth stage of terminology development started. It can be definitely described as a period in history which saw both the disappearance of a large group of words and the emergence of new concepts and terms. At the same time it is a period when English terminology is being actively borrowed (e.g.
каучсерфинг, глэмпинг). Due to the rapid development of terminology and frequent use of borrowings, a large part of terms has not yet been fixed in dictionaries [10: 12-13].
Based on this periodization L.V. Vinogradova concludes that there is a developed terminology of tourism in English while Russian terminology is still developing. She explains it by the dominating number of complex terms, i.e. terms consisting of more than one word, in Russian [11: 28].
Formal criteria
Analyzing terminology on the formal level, linguists distinguish between two large groups of terms: one-component and multi-component terms. Obviously, the first group is represented by single words (e.g. cruise, transfer) while multi-component terms consist of at least two words (e.g. hospitality industry, sightseeing tour). The second group is larger and indicates the fast development of the terminological system of tourism. According to L.V. Vinogradova, 53,4% of terms used in tourism are two-component terms, 5% - three-component terms and 0,1% - four-component terms [11: 28]. Therefore, 41,5% of terms consist of one component [11].
As for word-building, the most productive ways of creating terms are affixation and wordcomposition. 22,6% of terms are formed with the help of suffixes (e.g. бронирование, дестинация), 3,1% - with the help of prefixes (e.g. заезд, несезон) and 1,7% - with the help of prefixes and suffixes (e.g. сверхбронирование). The most important models of word-composition are the following ones: noun + noun (e.g. музей-заповедник) and an international uninflected bound component + noun (e.g. авиарейс) [11].
Semantic criteria
The analysis of terminology based on semantic criteria often requires much more effort than research of history or structure of terms. In our opinion, the complexity of semantic analysis does not depend on the language or professional area under research, as semantics is widely recognized by linguists as one of the most complex branch of linguistics.
Some terminological systems are categorized
К вопросу о создании многоязычного словаря туристических терминов
as full systems, i.e. systems containing terms used for all existing concepts. At the same time some terminological systems may lack terms for the description of particular concepts. In other words, they may have lacunas. To categorize a system as full or incomplete, linguists have to collaborate with specialists who definitely have better knowledge of tourism on the conceptual level. Therefore, research of terminology is of interdisciplinary nature, as it unites linguists, tourism professionals, economists and specialists from other fields. Furthermore, this type of research often implies a comparative analysis of terminological systems of tourism in at least two languages.
According to L.V. Vinogradova, such phenomenon as synonymy is presented in Russian wider than in English, while polysemy occurs in English much often than in Russian. Both languages have a relatively small number of homonyms used in the tourism industry and a large number of antonyms. The overall lexico-semantic analysis again proved the fact that English system of tourism terminology is well-developed while Russian terminology of tourism is still being formed [10: 17-18].
Functional criteria
Based on functional criteria researchers classify terminological systems as open or closed. Open terminological systems allow new words or subsystems to enter them, while closed terminological systems are never expanded by new terms. It is widely known that most terminological systems are open whereas closed systems are typical for non-functioning fields of knowledge.
To our mind, tourism can be characterized as an open terminological system, as it is actively expanded by new terms - either through internal language resources or with the help of borrowings from other languages. In the first case we often have to deal with such phenomenon as transterminologization. The terms corporate rate, agency agreement and catalogue used in economy, law and advertising illustrate the phenomenon of transterminologization, as all of these words have become a part of vocabulary used in the tourism industry. This phenomenon takes place not only in tourism but also in many other fields of knowledge
and industries of an interdisciplinary nature. With their development a lot of 'new' words migrate from one professional field to another, although this 'migration' is not always realized even by native speakers. In fact, no matter how broad a terminological system is, it is inevitably exposed to the phenomenon of transterminologization at a particular stage of its development.
Borrowings from other languages can be of three types: direct borrowings, loan translations and hybrid words. According to L.V. Vinogradova, most Russian words of foreign origin belong to the first type of borrowings, and they can be borrowed with the help of transliteration (паркинг / parking) and transcription (ресепшн / reception) methods. The word combination караванный туризм appeared in Russian through loan translation from English (caravan tourism). The third type of borrowings can be illustrated by such terms as веллнес-центр, лаунж-зона (EN: wellness centre, lounge zone/area) [10: 20].
3. Review of tourism dictionaries
The literature review has shown that the compilation of dictionaries requires deep knowledge of special rules and principles which need to be respected throughout the whole process of creating dictionaries, from a thematic distribution of terms to the structure and content of dictionary entries. Most terminological dictionaries are organized in an alphabetical order and contain definitions of selected terms. One of the most successful examples is "A Dictionary of Travel and Tourism Terminology" which, above all, provides alternatives expressing disagreement with definitions published in other sources [3]. In this article, we have summarized the general information about three dictionaries of tourism terms published in Russia.
3.1. "The Great Glossary of Terms for International Tourism" (2005)
"The Great Glossary of Terms for International Tourism" is a professionally-oriented English-Russian dictionary of terms with explanatory articles in Russian. There are more than 25,000 terms with definitions in this dictionary. It is created according to the terminology of the tourism industry based on the
Federal Law "On the Fundamentals of Tourist Activity in the Russian Federation" as of 1996, State Standard R 50960-2000 and recommendations of the World Tourist Organization. Most concepts are oriented to the historical traditions of Moscow and St. Petersburg academic school of tourism (National Academy for Tourism) [4].
All terms and phraseological combinations are divided into topics, so the last edition of the dictionary consists of 20 parts: travelling and tourism, organization of the tourist business, accommodation, transportation, food, entertainment, shopping, places of interest, tourism and religions, medical support of tourism, training; exhibitions and trade fairs, congress tourism; a glossary of special Latin terminology, a glossary of special terms - tourist slang used in Australia, New Zealand and Oceania, common abbreviations in business correspondence, resorts, tour business, cultural tourism, security in tourism, ecological tourism. As we can see from the contents, the dictionary covers broad topics related to tourism.
3.2. "The Multilingual Dictionary of Tourism (Nature - Culture - Travel)" (2013)
"The Multilingual Dictionary of Tourism (Nature - Culture - Travel)" is one of the latest dictionaries with terminology of tourism. It was published in 2013 under the aegis of the Russian Geographical Society. The dictionary contains more than 4,300 terms related to general concepts of tourism, organization of the tourist activity, tourist infrastructure, transport, accommodation, catering, some of the most popular types of tourism and natural, economic and cultural objects of tourism, elements of traditions and customs and environmental protection [5: 70].
Unlike special literature on tourism, this dictionary is designed for a broader audience. Its main advantage lies in the fact that all terms are given in five languages: Russian, English, French, German and Spanish. Russian terms are accompanied by brief definitions in Russian. As the main language of the dictionary is Russian, the terms are organized in an alphabetical order of the Russian language and numbered. Some paragraphs also contain frequently used synonyms, and this is another advantage of this dictionary. At the end of the
dictionary there are four alphabetical lists of terms in foreign languages and a subject index in Russian.
3.3. "Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary. Tourism" (2018)
Today "Russian Encyclopedic Dictionary. Tourism" is one of the largest dictionaries of tourism terminology. It contains 3,115 entries and definitions of terms representing the tourist sphere. In the process of creating the dictionary the authors used the following methods: methods of historical analysis, logic, philosophy, ontology and theory of knowledge, cultural science and philosophic anthropology, economy and law, special methods of history and theory of tourism. The chosen methodology proves the interdisciplinary nature of the tourism industry [12].
This dictionary is organized in an alphabetical order and includes lexical units used in practical tourist activity, legal documents, business correspondence and negotiations. Each title or term of the dictionary entry is translated into English. In addition, it contains brief information about military trade routes, historical terms connected with travelling and biographies of famous people and outstanding personalities in the sphere of Russian tourism.
4. Structure of a new multilingual tourism dictionary
The analysis of three dictionaries of tourism terms suggests the possible structure of a new multilingual dictionary which can be created based on the strong points of published dictionaries. Firstly, it is recommended to publish an online dictionary. The advantage of online dictionaries is the opportunity to update terms, i.e. to add new terms which will inevitably appear over time [9: 192]. Fast access, a diversity of search strategies are other factors attracting Internet users [9]. The inevitability of new terminology is explained by the continuous development of international tourism as a branch of economy and global changes (e.g. crises) and events leading to new concepts. For example, since the start of the coronavirus crisis, tourists all over the world have witnessed the appearance of new words, such
К вопросу о создании многоязычного словаря туристических терминов
as coronaction (coronavirus + vacation), covexit (COVID + exit) [8: 170].
Secondly, it is suggested to provide selected terms and definitions in six languages: English, Arabic, Spanish, Chinese, Russian and French. These languages have the largest number of native speakers in the world. Furthermore, the choice of languages is explained by the facts that four of them are official languages of UNWTO and all of them are official languages of UNESCO. Therefore, not only travelers but also tourism professionals can use this dictionary.
Thirdly, it is assumed that some terms will be accompanied by synonyms, as in "The Multilingual Dictionary of Tourism (Nature - Culture - Travel)". Furthermore, the dictionary may contain antonyms, as the language of tourism comprises a lot of terms which have similar or opposite meanings. For example, the word combination inbound tourism has both synonyms (incoming tourism) and antonyms (outbound tourism, outgoing tourism).
A multilingual subject list would also be helpful for a fast access to particular terms. However, since a large part of terminology is expected to be interdisciplinary and fall into several topics, the subject list should contain narrow topics, so that readers can easily find the words they need.
Finally, due to the polysemy of many terms, each dictionary entry should contain an example sentence. This may help to avoid misunderstanding or misinterpretation of terms not only by native speakers but also by language learners. This means that the target audience of each dictionary entry in each of the languages is expected to include people who use them as foreign languages. In our opinion, it would be appropriate to give the same example sentences in all six languages, so that readers can compare two or more sentences (if needed) to make sure the meaning of the terms is understood correctly. Our review of currently available dictionaries has shown that multilingual dictionaries do not usually contain example sentences and
provide definitions only in one of chosen languages. For example, "A Dictionary of International Tourism Terms" which comprises about 1,200 terms in four languages (Russian, English, French and German) provides definitions only in Russian [6]. This is another advantage of an online dictionary: each dictionary entry may include much more additional information that its printed version.
Taking into account the interdisciplinary character of this dictionary we assume that its creation will involve a team of specialists from different scientific areas. Firstly, this dictionary is expected to be a result of close collaboration of linguists (lexicographers) and tourism professionals (specialists having special education and work experience in the tourism industry). Secondly, the compilation of this dictionary will require participation of specialists from related fields of study (geography, hospitality industry). Thirdly, IT specialists will definitely take part in creating and updating online dictionary entries.
5. Conclusion
The research has shown that the language of tourism represents a specific type of discourse and serves the basis for terminological dictionaries. As a special part of vocabulary, tourism terminology can be analyzed based on general, formal, semantic and functional criteria. The last two decades have seen a few successful examples of bi- and multilingual dictionaries containing terminology of tourism and definitions of key terms used in the tourism industry. Based on achievements of modern Russian lexicographers and tourism professionals, it is suggested to create a new multilingual online dictionary which will comprise tourism terms, their definitions and contexts of use (example sentences) in six languages: English, Arabic, Spanish, Chinese, Russian and French. To achieve the goal and create a dictionary which will be useful for both travelers and tourism employees, it is sensible to invite an interdisciplinary team of researchers.
References
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