Terminological vagueness and achieving referential accuracy
| Authors | |
|---|---|
| Year of publication | 2006 |
| Type | Article in Proceedings |
| Conference | Discourse and Interaction 2. Sborník prací Pedagogické fakulty Masarykovy univerzity. (Edit. R. Povolná a O. Dontcheva-Navrátilová). |
| MU Faculty or unit | |
| Citation | |
| Keywords | Terminology; denotative vagueness; referential accuracy; verbal context; context of general experience; situational context; synonymy; polysemy. |
| Description | Although systematic terminologies are assumed to consist of unambiguous terms with precisely defined denotation, synonyms as well as semantically broad and polysemous expressions can be found frequently. Even the relatively exact field of activity, finance and accounting, which was used as the source of linguistic material for this research, relies on a terminological system where synonyms and naming units with several meanings are not rare. Despite this drawback, reference in the practical application of financial and accounting terms is achieved quite successfully. The paper analyses the reasons for terminological plurality and vagueness, and looks into the ways in which users of such terminologies make their meaning clear. The concepts of a term and vagueness are revisited in this connection. |