El proceso de fermentación de las aceitunas de mesa arbequinas

Semasiologyandonomasiologyare concepts from (lexical) semantics (Bussmann, 1996; Burkhanov,

1998), lexicology (Temmerman, 2000, pp. 4/5) and lexicography (Hartmann and James, 1998) which concern the starting point of an investigation (i.e. the direction) into the paradigmatic

construct thought to be represented by asyntagmatic item.

A detailed review of the use of this concept pair in the terminological literature is likely to be difficult because of the abundance of the restatements and replications of the traditional views. It is generally believed that traditional terminology (Wüster, 1985) tends towards the

onomasiological end and reasons from the (classical) concept to the term. Translated into a more

philosophical terminology, this represents a deduction, i.e. a reasoning from the general to the

particular. Sociocognitive terminology – on balance – seems to prefer reasoning fromsyntagmatic

item or term to theparadigmatic construct and therefore the path of induction, i.e. of reasoning

from the particular to the general. Rita Temmerman notes:

We take a semasiological approach to the studies ofcategories in the life sciences

by starting from the terms that designate units of understanding and investigating how these units of understanding and their designations are defined and explained in texts. [...] In lexicology the distinction between semasiology and onomasiology identifies two different perspectives for studying the relationship between words and their semantic values. The semasiological perspective starts from theformal aspect,

i.e. the words. Theonomasiological perspective starts from the content aspect of the

sign, i.e. the meaning. Words with shared semantic features are grouped together.

Temmerman (2000, pp. xiv, 4/5)

Unlike the pseudo-dichotomy of synchrony and diachrony above, which may be resolved on a

viable heuristics for its resolution, the resolution of the problem ofonomasiology vs. semasiology

is significantly more sensitive and stratified as it is – when understood as a problem of the

evidence used for advancing a hypothesis or knowledge claim – invested in a composite of strong

and widespread philosophical and linguistic theories17_.

1.3.3.1 Philosophical aspect: deduction and induction

The primary problem here is that of theacceptance of the validity of inductively (i.e. semasio- logically) obtained results, such as those upon which the study (Temmerman, 2000) as a whole

rests:

Based on traditions of terminological standardization in science [...], and on their own work in technology, Wüster, Lotte and their associates began a process of the- ory construction [...], for instance, Wüster’s writings on terminology, culminating in [...] his posthumously published book attempting to construct an overarching the- ory. This effort at theoretical disarticulation [...] has generated a debate that has, paradoxically, concerned itself with describing subsequent work as either Popperian hypothesis falsification or Kuhnian paradigm articulation. While Popper and Kuhn

can be perfectly accommodated within the same mould, a number of our colleagues have been disingenuously Popperian in orientation, ostensibly to secure prominence in the historiography of terminology as reinventors of the wheel.

Antia et al. 2005

The reference there is oblique and indirect both in relation to the problematic knowledge claim and its originators. One possible, readily recognized implication is that the adherents of the sociocognitive school of terminology – if one considers it a school, like Montero-Martínez and Faber-Benítez 2009 – were in essence attempting to disprove or falsify “traditional” terminology using the evidence their research had produced. On a second glance, there are even deeper implications, which concern the way that this evidence was prepared.

In order to understand them – and relate them to semasiology/ onomasiology as methodical

choice – we would need to consult a text on who Karl Popper was and what he said. With regard to the validity of inductive statements, Popper was an “anti-inductivist”, which means someone who believes that a “hypothesis cannot be directlysupported” by evidence; instead, a hypothesis

can only be falsified by means of the hypothetic-deductive method, which is probably better

known as the scientific method (Lacey, 1996, 158-161, induction).

In terminology research, for which we assumed that – whatever form of qualified or augmented – concept analysis or paradigmatic analysis is the de facto method, any attempt at falsifying

a concept theory supporting a rival hypothesis could be reduced to an attempt to test the definition of a concept – in this case a definition ofconcept ascategory against one ofconcept as general concept, or concept with “classical” structure – against a counterexample – in this case a

discourse sample or a widely accepted intensional definition (ibid, Margolis and Laurence 2011). This attempt would again fall into the stated dilemma or “infinite regress” of concept analysis

(1.2.3.1).

In order to escape this circle, it is pragmatically advantageous to concede that theories of terminology more closely resemble philosophical theories than strictlyscientific theories, which

in turn means suspending – or replacing – the criterion of strict falsifiability:

Karl Popper is famous for his criterion of “falsifiability” to distinguish between scientific and non-scientific theories. But what did he say about the status of phi- losophy? In the last few pages of a paper entitled “On the Status of Science and of Metaphysics”, Popper state [sic!, PBN] the problem of philosophical theories in the following way: “If philosophical theories are all irrefutable, how can we ever distin- guish between true and false philosophical theories?” (Popper 1958, 266). That is,

how can we make rational, persuading and useful speculations?

Vidal, 2007

This makes the claim above doubly problematic. “Proof” obtained frominductive reasoning (or

thesemasiological investigation of terminological particulars) would probably not be considered

fit to disprove a hypothesis from the hypothetico-deductive standpoint, and would therefore not stand up as “good” scientific practice in a more generally “scientific” discipline. This is however a feature of the aspect ofscientificity that could be termedtheory of truth, as will emerge later

(3). Theories of truth, as will be seen, are however to be considered theory-specific rather than subject-specific, which necessitates further considerations ((6), (7)) on what else may contribute

to perceptions of “good” practice.

The “irrefutability” of particular theories to some extent creates a logical paradox for disciplines and orientations that derive their claim to scientificity from the adherence to a philosophical

theory (3.3.2). Therefore, one possible criterion for selecting and constructing data for aphilo- sophical terminography in an organized fashion could be provided by studying the phenomenon itself.

For now, the upshot of thus modifying the demands placed on theonomasiological perspective

as a means ofdeducting possible lexical forms from hypotheses about intended meaning and the semasiological perspective as a means of deriving support for such hypotheses from particular

observations (compare thescandals of induction and deduction previously mentioned) would be

to regard both perspectives of mutually complementary and interacting, and to shift attention

to the second, more empirical aspect of the dichotomy.

1.3.3.2 Linguistic aspect: structuralist signifiers and signifieds

The linguistic aspect of the semasiology/ onomasiology dichotomy can largely be traced back

to Ferdinand de Saussure and the linguistic theory of structuralism, (Culler, 1986, pp. 18-51, Glasersfeld, 1999a), where it can be considered as correlated with the distinction of thesignified

and its realm of langue and the signifier and its realm of parole, or the distinction of the paradigmatic andsyntagmatic perspectives (after Rey 1995, the “two visions of the same object”)

as a shorthand for this.

At the highest level of generalization, it can be seen as the distinction oflangue as what “words

can mean as a potential” andparole as “what they do mean as an actual occasion” (Beaugrande,

1994), or the distinction between language – which is thought to be studied paradigmatically

and onomasiologically – and discourse – which is thought to be studied syntagmatically and semasiologically.

It is fair to say that this distinction is, in some way, accepted in sociocognitive and traditional terminology alike, which may be due to the fact that any attempt to overcome structuralism

must engage with structuralism18. This observation should constitute a starting point for the

18

How Budin (2007a, p. 67) formulated it in a similar context: “the relation between post-modernism and mod- ernism is of an oedipal nature: Post-modernism defines itself through the opposition to modernism”. This can

present discussion. In sociocognitive terminology, its relevance is underlined from the perspective of post-structuralism and deconstruction, with reference to Jacques Derrida:

Against the essentialist notion of certainty of meaning, Derrida mobilises thecentral insight of structuralism – that meaning is not inherent in signs, nor in what they refer to, but results purely from the relationships between them.”

Temmerman, 2000, p. 55

With regard to this relationship, Rondeau (1980, p. 14), notes that “[t]he term is essentially a linguistic sign in the sense defined by F. de Saussure (1916), that is, a linguistic unit having an

expression form and ameaning”, or a signifier and asignified.

If there is a distinction between an “expression form” and its “meaning”, and if the meaning is arbitrarily associated with the form while meanings relate to each other on the potential or paradigmatic level, and thecombination of expressions is likewise arbitrary (Temmerman, 2000,

p. 58) and conventional on asyntagmatic level19, then an interpretation of a particular instance

of a sign also presupposes the interaction of these two levels of observation and reasoning in the act ofconcept analysis.

When syntax and syntagmatic are thus reduced to their etymological “bare bones” from the long diachronic perspective, one can derive a justification for the synthetic treatment from the

observation that on theparadigmatic view, experiential phenomena are “put together” (or gath-

ered), while the “arrangement” is put “in order” or organized on thesyntagmatic view. This is

most notable once the association with an expression form has taken place. However, this in itself does not tell us how toformulate the process, nor does it give any indication of the constraints

that orient the “weaving of this conceptual web” which apparently extends into realm ofsigns.