Филологические науки

Margarita Konstantinovna Pak, professor

Dana Bekovna Tleumbetova, undergraduate

Karaganda State University named after academician E.A. Buketov, Kazakhstan

THE PROBLEM OF TERMONOGICAL UNITS MOTIVATION

During a structural-semantic analysis of special lexis, the issue of terminological units motivation is being considered. A point is made of the principles of terminological lexis motivation and the degree of impact of terminological units motivation on the specific nature of their functions implementation in a language.

Key words: anthropocentrism, motivation, term motivation, problem of motivation.

In contemporary science of language the problems related to studying of terms and specific term systems arouse the continued interest. This may be explained with the role of terminology in the system of present knowledge and human practical activities, and with occurrence of outstanding and contentious issues, which the issue of terms motivation is referred to.

Contemporary linguistics is generally being formed as anthropocentric, and according to V. Teliya “studying of linguistic process is proceeded in inextricable connection with the needs of communication activity and implies the regard to a human factor in particular, when a subject of a speech and its recipient are involved in the description of linguistic mechanisms” [1, 36]. Anthropocentric approach to a word, associated with its perception by a human being, has highlighted the motivation as another most important characteristic of the word basing on how a native speaker realise the interdependence of sounding and meaning of a lexical unit.

The problem of motivation, arisen within general linguistics, became the object of consideration for etymology, phraseology, semasiology, and synchronous word formation in lexicology (works of W. von Humboldt, A. Potebnja, S. Ullmann, A. Moiseev, and V. Gak); in onomasiology when considering the means of nomination which are quite important for linguistic theory of motivation (works of V. Gak, A, Ufimtseva, V. Teliya). T. Kandelaki, V. Leichik, S. Grinev-Grinevich, etc. may be mentioned among the researches of terminological motivation of special lexis. However, the problem of motivation has not been completely resolved. It is one of the most difficult and ambiguously understandable issues in terminology studies.

Problems of motivation, its nature, functions in a language and a speech, correlation of motivational form and content, and general classification of term motivation refer to the number of contemporary issues of terminology studies. The issue of terms motivation holds a special place among these problems, for it is directly related to the issue of origins and formation features of terms on the one hand, and one of the fundamental problems of linguistics, i.e. presence/absence of a linguistic sign motivation on the other hand.

The motivation is one of the most important features of terminological lexis, for it is directly related to a social function of the very terms, i.e. to cover the requirements of communication in a certain professional community. The motivation is intended to explain a new linguistic meaning or a new form of a linguistic unit with the preceding linguistic meaning or the preceding form of this or another but correlated lexical unit. From this statement it follows that the motivation of terminological lexis may occur both at the level of the form and at the level of the content.

The motivation of terminological units should be understood as a structural-semantic characteristic of a word, which allows realising the interdependence of sounding and meaning of a term basing on its relatedness to other lexical units of a language and belonging to a certain term system. The motivation is intended to explain a new linguistic meaning or a new form of a linguistic unit with the preceding linguistic meaning or the preceding form of this or another but correlated lexical unit. From this statement it follows that the motivation of terminological lexis may occur both at the level of the form and at the level of the content. V. Gak writes that “the denotation motivated by the form is easy to digest and covers all occurrences of a linguistic fact, but it does not provide any information about its essence or function. The denotation motivated by the content expresses the essence of an object more deeply, but it may, due to multiple meaning of the form, be found inaccurate and even deceptive. In such cases, the term is being demotivated and as often as not interchanged with a conventional formal denotation, especially if the nature of the phenomenon has yet to be determined” [2, 29-30].

The phenomenon of a term motivation itself becomes a subject of a multiple-aspect consideration, including but not limited to the following relations:

– term motivation and comprehension of regularities of objective world (ontological characteristic of the motivation);

– the motivation of a term and its internal form (semantic aspect);

– term motivation and its system significance, and the characteristic of paradigmatic and syntagmatic relations of a motivated terminological unit (the organisation of system relations in terminological lexis);

– term motivation and the process of communication (functional aspect).

Referring of the term motivation to scientific world on the one hand and its belonging to language system on the other hand require analysing nominative processes and studying internal and external functions of a term as a linguistic sign.

Therefore, term motivation as the representation of objects’ features in a sign is considered by us as a multiple-aspect linguistic phenomenon including the mechanism of assigning a meaning to the term as a linguistic sign, and its system significance. The main function of term motivation, i.e. the ability to indicate characteristics and features of the facts of reality and results of human reasoning, is considered in our research as the consistency of functions and allows conducting the research on the material of contemporary term systems in medical sphere.

It is known that the extent to which a word may be motivated makes it possible to speak about complete, partial, and zero motivation of linguistic units. Depending on a degree of motivation, they may be absolutely “clear in their meaning” or form, or has no motivation at all. However, speaking about complete motivation of linguistic units may be only conditional. These conclusions are based on F. de Saussure’s statement that “there are no languages without anything being motivated; but it is impossible to imagine a language with everything being motivated” [3, 165-166].

As applied to terminology, distinguishing of word formative-morphological, syntactic and semantic types of motivation, which correspond to three main ways of terminological word formation, may be considered as the most objective. Therefore, all affixally formed words-terms, terms-compound words, terms-word combinations, and words that became terms in the result of semantic transfer may be considered motivated. Non-motivated (or sign-oriented) terms consist of denominations for which the motive of their formation is unknown from synchronous perspective. These are non-derivative Russian formations, borrowings from other languages, and calque-terms. The terms arisen of proper names through metonymic transfer are also non-motivated. The scholar T. Kiyak suggests with a reason that “for many words various combinations of motivation types may be specific to” and “it is not possible sometimes to draw a clear line between the types of motivation distinguished in linguistics” [4, 35]. On that basis, the scholar has developed the following classification of lexical units motivation, distinguishing its three types: 1) sign-oriented (semiotic), this is a «weak» type of motivation; it is peculiar to all lexical units that really function in a language as linguistic signs, for a word is motivated with the very fact of its existence and usage; 2) formal (word-formative), within which the scholar specifies the motivation according to external form (phonetic or absolute motivation) and internal form, which in its turn implies morphologic and semantic types of motivation; 3) substantive (intensional), which “characterises the ability of internal form to indicate the most relevant features of linguistic content of a word, i.e. reveals its structural-semantic peculiarities. Substantive motivation is a structural-semantic characteristic of a lexical unit explicating rational lexical-semantic connection between the meaning and internal form of a given unit by means of a language. Intensional motivation synthesisedly considers both word-formative structure and substantive side of a linguistic unit, which predetermine systematic study of the form and the meaning” [4, 38]. This is precisely why, according to the scholar’s opinion, this type of motivation is more applicable to terms and less applicable to common words.

Basing on such approach to term motivation, where not a manner of composition but structural features in comparison with a lexical meaning are brought to the forefront, the following types of motivation are distinguished: “1) complete motivation of internal form (when a form expresses the feature that is completely included to the meaning); 2) partial motivation (when there is a part of linguistic content of a unit common for internal form and lexical meaning); 3) no motivation (i.e. none of the morphemes included in internal form finds correspondence in the meaning); 4) uncommon type, or absolute motivation (complete correspondence of semantic features of internal form and lexical meaning)” [4, 39]. This approach to the issue of terms motivation is the most acceptable one, for it extends to terminological units different in a form and a way of formation.

It should be noted that not all researchers absolutely follow this classification; for example, according to A. Superanskaya, there are no completely motivated terms, for “any concept is characterised with different features, and its name indicates only one of them and not always a guiding one” [5, 89]. A contrary opinion may be found in S. Shelov’s works intended to study of the motivation at syntactical level. The scholar proves the existence of absolutely motivated terms and absolutely component-motivated terms as a particular case of absolute motivation [6, 163–170]. Nevertheless, researches of T. Kiyak, S. Shelov and other linguists prove that each term meets the requirement of motivation existence.

Upon more detailed studying of particular terminological systems, it is becoming apparent that the number of mandatory requirements traditionally specified for a term by domestic terminology researchers (A. Reformatskiy, L. Kapanadze, D. Lotte, etc.) is a set of preferable and expected from the term characteristics, which are peculiar to terms in general but not to each taken separately. However, the motivation of terminological units is acknowledged by all researchers, with the variation of approaches to this universal.

Basing on the studied approaches to the classification of the motivation, we may conclude that the motivation has apparently to be considered as a correspondence between internal form of the term and its semantics, and as a certain rational and logical propriety of the connection between form and content. It is indicated with the definitions of S. Grinev-Grinevich, who understands term motivation as its semantic transparency and the ability of its form to give the perspective of a concept named by the term [7, 165]. T. Kiyak considers term motivation as an act of reflection of one or more characteristics of an object in its name by linguistic means and as an indicator of a term’s “propriety” [4, 33–34]. In her turn, O. Blinova almost equates internal form of a word to the motivation, which is understood as a semantic-structural characteristic of a word, and thereby the rationality of the connection between the meaning and sound form of the word basing on its lexical and structural relatedness is realised [8, 30].

Therefore, terms motivation is of the key importance when forming their external form, for a motivated term is quicker to remember, and there is the possibility to determine its relations with other terms and named concepts, i.e. to determine its place in a given conceptual and linguistic system. However, the motivation should not be limited to word formation; it should be considered in a broader lexical-semantic aspect but not equated to the orientation of terminological units. The characteristic of term motivation is of a great importance in the process of its direct application and functioning in a language. Regardless of the variety of approaches to the studied linguistic universal, all linguists acknowledge the connection between the plane of content and the plane of expression of lexical units, and the motivation in the broad sense of the word is the connection between the form and the content.

List of references

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8 Blinova O. Termin i ego motivirovannost / Terminologiya i kultura rechi. – М.: Nauka, 1981. – P. 28–37.