Amalgames de la terminologie allemande : Problématique pour l'accès aux données terminologiques multilingues et la traduction

Abstract

This paper deals with German compound words and translation units within the framework of medical terminology. The German language creates compound words often based on (already) complex terms. From a bilingual point of view, the opposed syntactic structures between French and German phraseological units raise issues when considering the composition of bilingual or multilingual databases: French complex terms are listed under the main term of the compound, i.e. the head of the noun phrase, whereas German compounds are listed under the modifier, specifying the head of the noun phrase. Access to information in bilingual dictionaries or electronic databases is therefore often unsuccessful. We suggest the addition of a partition sign between the constituents of the compounds as a word separator. A test with the ZLOC software showed the advantage of presenting the different terms constituting a German compound word as main entries in the dictionary. Looking for information in a dictionary is therefore facilitated by a more logical classification of "sealed" German translation units, within a general ontological approach of medical terminology.