Analysis of the Semantic Scope of Two Korean Terms Equivalent to English Court
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Analysis of the Semantic Scope of Two Korean Terms Equivalent to English Court Emilia Wojtasik‑Dziekan1
© The Author(s) 2020
Abstract The article aims to analyze the semantic fields of two Korean terms in the field of a specialized judicial terminology, i.e. court and tribunal, which are usually reflected in English by one hypernym term court. This analysis, although carried out on limited Korean data, is intended to indicate the differences between the use of these two different Korean terms and to indicate the reasons why court is currently the most common English equivalent. At the same time, the author, by pointing to the historical and cultural background, explains the reasons why the term court is not always correct. The methods used in compiling the data are to highlight differences in the semantics of Korean terms covered by an English hypernym court. Keywords Semantics · Korean language · Korean legal translation · Korean language of law · Court · Tribunal
1 Introduction In in-depth translation studies it is impossible not to refer to potential differences between given terms. These differences, in turn, are analyzed in many different ways in order to, starting from the semantic field (cf. e.g. [1, 2]), be able to choose contextually the best possible term, which, despite being taken as a synonym, does not have to be the full one. As a method, an analytical approach to the semantic field of a given word, as suggested by Zajda [3], allows “to analyze vocabulary comprehensively within smaller structures” and at the same time. to trace the history of fields and within them words – components of the structure over many centuries and show the fascinating history of vocabulary – a
* Emilia Wojtasik‑Dziekan [email protected]; [email protected] 1
Faculty of Modern Languages and Literature, Adam Mickiewicz University, Collegium Novum, Room No. 319 B, al. Niepodległości 4, 61‑874 Poznań, Poland
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language subsystem which is a mirror reflection of the nation’s life, culture, and various contacts with the outside world.1 If the significance of the semantic field is also taken into account in determining the ground for a given term and its synonymy or polysemy, etc. (confer e.g. [4]), it will turn out that in in-depth lexical studies it should be the starting point. This research approach can also be applied in the case of the Korean lexicon, although it seems that the diversity and history of creating the Korean lexicon should be particularly taken into account. Korean language is a place—field where not only historically the linguistic influences of other countries, i.e. China (to a much greater extent) and Japan (much less) were clustered but also a field where it is difficult to clearly define the nature of borrowings (cf. [5–7] etc.). Therefore a special attention in the field of semantic fields should be devoted to a specialized terminology, as on the basis of the field it is possible to clarify a scope of a term and thus facilitate the decision-making on
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