Term and translation variation of multiword terms

Abstract

Phraseology is central to specialized language. In scientific and technical communication, multiword terms (MWTs) (e.g. volatile organic compound) are the most frequent type of phraseological units. Rendering them into another language is not an easy task due to their cognitive complexity, the proliferation of different forms, and their unsystematic representation in terminographic resources. This often results in a broad spectrum of translations for MWTs, leading to higher term variation as a result of their composition by two or more constituents. In this study we carried out a quantitative and qualitative analysis of English term variants of MWTs from the environmental domain and their translations into Spanish. The focus was on translation variation and its occurrence in different linguistic resources.