Returning to our case of the formation terminology science, we can now draw the following
conclusions. With regard to theacceptability of the term, we can say that it might have been
the lack of this elusive quality which Sager lamented in the “illiterate” term pair terminology science/ terminology work in our above example.
Acceptable language use, as as the same author contests, is measured in terms of adherence to conventions. The double-bind therein, however, lies in the fact that the conventions that make
a certain use of lexis acceptable to a given ((sub-)sub-)culture are botharbitrary andunspoken,
ortacit. We can surmise that this should have made the standardizer’s rather task difficult20:
[C]onventions are regularities in behaviour which have emerged as arbitrary but effective solutions to recurrent problems of interpersonal coordination. Because they
have proved effective, these solutions become the preferred course of action for in- dividuals in a given type of situation. Conventions grow out of precedent and social habit. They do not have to be explicitly agreed, but they presuppose common knowl- edge and acceptance.
Fokkema, cited in Hermans, 1999, 80/81, my emphasis
Assuming the perspective developed here, this would makeconventions as they are internalized
by the individual a form of the paradigmatic or cognitive stereotype. Lexicalizations in special
language formed on this basis – i.e. terminologicalandconventional phrasal stereotypes combined
with non-stereotypical, e.g. prototypical or logical formations – will be consideredacceptable (or,
in the constructivist diction, viable) if they conform to the language user group’s conventions.
These, in turn, can be seen to intersect partially – but not fully – with the set ofsocial stereotypes
that make a given group identifiable.
What remains to be clarified now are in essence thecontexts where these considerations apply,
the particular granularity that can be applied to the distinction of these contexts, and the
practical role of these considerations outside such heavily controlled “laboratory” conditions as they prevailed in this chapter.
Our proposed further development includes relating the reflections on concept theory to par- ticular activities terminology management cannot be imagined without, i.e. subject delimitation and term selection and description, especially in a contemporary, largely computerized environ- ment .
20
To recall the results of our corpus-based micro-study, there was nologicalobstacle to using the termterminology science at all.
Figure 2.2: The expected stereotypical associations attributed to stereotypical characters evoked by a decontextualized word. In this case German “Masse”, approximately English
3 Understanding declarative and procedural
scientificity
Introduction
The last chapter has provided a proving ground for our view of concept analysis. To repeat,
this was achieved by incorporating an interactive, process view involving a combination of both
paradigmatic and syntagmatic (discourse) analysis. We have applied the method to reconstruct
and explain the emergence of different discipline labels for the field ofterminology research and
found that a logically justified motivation alone does not conveyacceptability to any formation
(as has been observed in a different context, e.g. by Pavel, 1993). Terminological formations also have to prove viable in the face of conventions, which are apparently strongly dependent
on the speaker community’s intended use the term, which is in turn influenced by expectations. This has led us to hypothesize the role of stereotypical constructions in concept theory as used in terminological studies in general and to consider an appropriate conception forphilosophical terminography in particular.
First we have collected various elements of a possible practical understanding of stereotype
and set these in relation to the sociocognitive theory of terminology’s understanding ofprototype
constructs in the life sciences. Then we have reconfigured an existing typology of cognitive and linguistic stereotypes – Zybatow’s translation studies conception – in (2.5.4). To reiterate our
understanding: stereotypes are, at the simplest, cognitive structures that reflect tacitly acquired
and unreflected group conventions in the individual. They help reduce complexity in their social reality, a property that they will be seen to share with models and other ideal types. Cognitive stereotypes – which can, but need not includesocial stereotypes – can be hypothesized to produce
signature lexicalizations that will be observable. These can – but need not – overlap the class of
linguistic stereotypes proper. To link the considerations back to the idea ofthick concept, we can
state thatstereotypes can certainly be thought to constitute an ingredient of these constructs.
Other ingredients can be said to beideal types, whichappear stereotypical but can – in theory
– be reduced to logical considerations.
In the following chapters, our aim is to harness this typology to three perennial problems encountered in terminography:
1. Multilingualism and the diversity of the natural language speaker communities which pro-
duce material for terminological evaluation and preparation;
2. Subject delimitation, which is generally recognized to be an important factor in reducing
that range of material to manageable proportions;
3. Indeterminacy, which is a problem of term description and – in our view – partly related to
specialists and discourse producers. This is derived from (1), and partly linked to the phenomenon of imports andinter-domain borrowings, in which case it follows from (2).
It is hoped that the adaption of the construct ofthick concept – which combines the established
concept theories with the idea ofstereotypicality and motivation – will add to the apparatus of ex-
isting terminological methods and specifically facilitate a personalized, semi-automatic approach to philosophical terminography that we will call the perspective of terminology as a practical philosophy of information or regenerative theory construction. This will then be situated as a
second-order approach toterminology research growing from the understanding ofterminology as applied philosophy of science (Budin, 1996b). This is the particular aim of the present chapter.
While the later chapters of the thesis will be dedicated to the investigation of “obvious” stereo- types and a number of specific cases for inducingheuristics for the study of the human sciences
in particular, the present chapter is concerned with bringing forth a hypothesis on the genesis of stereotypical preferences from informal logical premises orideal types, some of which may seem
like “folklore” (like the debate on “positivism” versus “interpretivism”, (1.2)) because they are to some extent “buried” in time1 or in other disciplinary “fields”. The question is, where do stereo-
types and ideal types come from and how do they blend into athick concept like scientificity or
into each other?
While we still make reference to the thick concept of scientificity as it was derived from our
observations in (2.2), we regard these reflections as necessary, given the purported view on what constitutes athick concept. The aim here is generalizing outward from the particular case. The
idea of scientificity (and later, disciplinarity) is a heuristic for understanding classifications of
subjects (or distinction in general in this context) in fields outside of technical standardization or the life sciences as a matrix that can be used for empirical case studies later on. As these two
thick conceptscan generally be seen asstratified, consideration should also be given tocomplexity.
Arguably, the complexity surrounding the structure of subjects – whether socially or onto-
logically delimited – and the conceptual description of lexical units therein governed by varying conventions is such that practitionersmust rely onstereotypes and other cognitive simplifications
up to a point. These means can be seen to be to some degree “curated” by the discourse com- munities themselves, which may account for the impression of self-centeredness (Temmerman,
(2.5.5.2)). However, as is to shown here, not all simplifications seem to be non-rational, as it may follow from the observation that not all stereotypes are prejudicial. Some can in theory
be reduced to some logical proposition expressing the limits or preferences of what will in the following be considered ideal types. Separating the one from the other as far as possible is the
concern of distinguishing thethick concepts ofscientificity, ortheory-ladeness, anddisciplinarity,
orsubject-specificity.