An Integrated Approach to the Translation of Special Terms
By Zhu Yubin,
Nanjing University, China
zhuyubin [at] hotmail . com
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...with Special Reference to the Chinese term lüse shipin
(green food)
Abstract
The translation of special terms is an unavoidable problem.
This paper attempts to propose an integrated approach to
solve the problem. On the basis of some basic knowledge
about terminology, a translator should search the corpora
of the source language and target language to find the usage
of the term and its possible translation in its own linguistic
context. Then, only after the consideration of the specific
domain can a linguistic choice be made on the translation
of the term. In explaining this integrated approach, we
use the Chinese semi-term "lüse shipin" (green food)
as an example, and propose several tentative translations
of this term.
Key words: term; terminology; translation; corpus-based investigation; lüse shipin (green food)
1. Introduction
Special terms are the linguistic expressions in various
disciplines, and they generally correspond to a single
concept in the given discipline. Thus, they play an
important role in the construction and development of
disciplines. Since the 1980s, scholars in China have
translated and compiled some introductory books on terminology
(Roudeau, 1985; Dubuc, 1990; Feng, 1997); there is even
a call for the establishment of a course on terminology
in tertiary institutions (Zheng, 2003/2005). All this
has shown the importance of terminology. The China National
Committee for Natural Scientific Terms was founded in
1985, and in 1996 its name was changed to China National
Committee for Terms in Sciences and Technologies, CNCTST.
The committee is responsible for the standardization
of terms used in various disciplines. After discussions
on the nomenclature of scientific and technological
concepts, the committee published their agreed linguistic
expressions, i.e. terminology in special fields. On
the other hand, Chinese terminologists and institutions
have established relations with the International Standardization
Organization (ISO) and other institutes on terminological
research to coordinate certain terms and promote scientific
and technological exchange.
The requirements
for the Chinese 'Green Food' of Standard AA are
stricter than those for organic food. |
Compared with general translation, the translation of
terms has its own features. As is known, Chinese terms
and their translations that have been approved by the
CNCTST can be directly used by the translator, but on
those occasions when no authority has stipulated the standard
translations for terms, translating these Chinese terms
into foreign languages is not an easy task. In other words,
"... translators have to work as terminologists when they
are faced with decisions concerning the right choice among
alternative expression forms or the creation of a neologism
or a paraphrase"(Sager, 2004: 252). Thus, qualified translators/terminologists
must acquire some basic knowledge about terminology. Furthermore,
since a term's meaning is fixed in a specified field,
translators must consider the referent of the term in
the Chinese context on the one hand, while on the other
hand, they should let target text (TT) readers pay attention
to and accept the singular meaning of the term. For those
"pioneering" translators, that is, those who translate
the term without any authoritative reference, their trial
must include the consideration of various aspects of the
translation of terms. Only in this way can their translation
of certain term provide an accurate concept for the TT
readers.
This article focuses on the methodology of translating
Chinese terms. Taking the English translation of "lüse
shipin", a semi-term1,
as an example, we will first discuss the basic terminological
knowledge necessary for translators when translating
a term and show the mismatch between existing translations
of lüse shipin and its referent in Chinese
context. Then a corpus-based investigation is carried
out to find the usage of the semi-term lüse
shipin and a similar concept youji shipin (organic
food) in Chinese as well as the expressions green
food and organic food in English, which would
provide insight into the decision-making process of
translators. On the basis of the above analyses, some
tentative translations of lüse shipin are
given in the hope that this integrated approach in translating
terms can be adopted by more translators.
2. A terminological perspective on the translation of terms
a) Basic knowledge of terminology for translators
First, the formation of terms is different from
that of ordinary words. For ordinary words, the
meaning is to be defined from an existing form,
while terms require the form (nomenclature) to be
found for the known referent. This is made obvious
by the research methodology adopted by terminologists
and lexicologists. The former "start from the concept
(referent) to think about the name of the specified
concept, and if it has no name, how to name it?"
(Roudeau, 1985: 19). By contrast, "the latter pin
down the meaning(s) of the linguistic form after
they distinguish a linguistic form"(Roudeau, 1985:
19). Thus, terminologists work "on the basic terminological
principle of concept prioritizing name"(Roudeau,
1985: 19). See Figure 1 in the following:
Figure 1 The formation of terms and general words

Second, terms demand the singularity of meaning
and the unique reference of the referent. Ordinary
words are often polysemous, and many words often
have the same meaning, which shows the richness
of linguistic expressions. In contrast, for a term,
nomenclature and concept are uniquely matched. Although
"there are cases when one term has many meanings
or many terms actually refer to one concept, terminologists
always try their best to avoid or even erase such
phenomena instead of letting them grow uncontrollable
as in the case of ordinary words"(Huang & Chen,
2001: 158)
Such knowledge provides some methodological hints
for translators. First, they can search sources
from the same discipline in the target language
(TL) for the equivalent term, which is the preferred
translation strategy in translating the source language
(SL) term with the same concept of the TL term.
In many cases, however, translators cannot find
the equivalent term in the TL due to the differences
between SL and TL disciplinary traditions and development.
At this time, they should consider various aspects
concerning the translation of the term. Only based
on their thorough understanding of the concept of
the SL term can they choose the appropriate expression
in the TL, or even coin a new TL term corresponding
to the concept of the SL term instead of being content
with achieving a word-for-word correspondence. Furthermore,
the translated term should look like a term itself,
that is, conforming to the reading and cognitive
habits of the TL readers so that they will accept
it as a term with a unique referent.
b) The application of terminological knowledge in
translation
For a translator, the first task in translating
a Chinese term into other languages is the attainment
of an accurate understanding of the term in its
context and identification of its referent. Only
then can the translator begin to search for an accepted
term in the TL. This requires that the translator
know the referent of the similar equivalent terms
in the TL, including their intention and extension,
and then decide which one can be used as an equivalent
term for the SL term. If there is a discrepancy,
the translator should carry out research and choose
the most suitable from several possible translations.
Here, we take the English translation of lüse
shipin as an example to see how terminological
knowledge can be used to understand the term in
translation, that is, the first step of the integrated
approach.
Nicky Harman (2005), lecturer of Imperial College,
London University, translates lüse shipin
into Chinese as "organic food." She argues:

(Our own translation is as follows:)
The requirements for the use of fertilizers in
the production of lüse shipin are:
- protect and promote the growth of crops and
their quality;
- not produce or accumulate harmful material in
crops so as not to affect human beings' health;
- have no adverse influence on the ecological
system. In the production of either Standard A
or Standard AA, lüse shipin, farmers
and growers should mainly use organic fertilizers,
biological fertilizers and inorganic mineral fertilizers,
all of which should have gone through treatment
in advance to make them harmless, and use bacterial
manure, humic fertilizers and amino acid leafy
fertilizers as a supplement.
http://www.defra.gov.uk/farm/organic/introduction/
...... What is the definition of organic farming?
The Compendium of UK Organic Standards as described
in the above link define organic farming as:
"Organic production systems are designed to produce
optimum quantities of food of high nutritional quality
by using management practices which aim to avoid
the use of agro-chemical inputs and which minimise
damage to the environment and wildlife.
The principles include:
Working with natural systems rather than seeking
to dominate them
The encouragement of biological cycles involving
micro-organisms, soil flora and fauna, plants and
animals
The maintenance of valuable existing landscape
features and adequate habitats for the production
of wildlife, with particular regard to endangered
species
Careful attention to animal welfare considerations
The avoidance of pollution
Consideration for the wider social and ecological
impact of the farming system."
Harman, 2005
According to the description of lüse shipin
(taken from Lüse Shipin Manufacturing
Website, Jixian County, Tanjin, China) and the
definition of organic farming (taken from
the website of Department for Environment, Food
and Rural Affairs, abbreviated as DEFRA, UK), Harman
thinks that lüse shipin is identical
to organic food. Actually, the above two quotations
cannot even be compared: the first one is about
the requirement for the use of fertilizers in the
production of lüse shipin, while the
second one is about organic farming. The
comparison itself is problematic. On the other hand,
New Age Chinese-English Dictionary (2005),
a bilingual dictionary compiled by Chinese scholars,
directly gives green food as the English
equivalent for lüse shipin. Facing such
a situation, the translator could resort to the
basic terminological knowledge mentioned in Section
2.1 to analyze the appropriateness of the two different
understandings of lüse shipin.
First, we can examine the formation of lüse
shipin in the Chinese context. On December 18,
1991, the State Council, People's Republic of China
gave a reply to the request from Department of Agriculture
on the situation and problems of developing lüse
shipin, in which the State Council pointed out:
"The development of lüse shipin (unpolluted
food) has a far-reaching influence and real significance
in protecting the environment, improving the quality
of agricultural products, promoting the development
of the food industry, enhancing people's health,
and increasing the export volume of agricultural
products to earn foreign currency. This is a new
task, and our country is just at the beginning stage.
Effective measures must be taken to further this
initial task, and all departments concerned must
give their full support. (Accessed online: http://www.greenfood.org.cn/lsspfg/pifu.htm
<January 7, 2007>) After more than ten years
of development, lüse shipin now has
a complete set of standards (cf: http://www.greenfood.org.cn/lsspbzh/wen1/yj05.mht).
Therefore, "the standards of lüse shipin
are based on China's own standards with a reference
to advanced international standards. Chinese enterprises,
by adopting the standards of lüse shipin,
can use technical innovation effectively, improve
quality control in production and promote the level
of management and performance of their staff. The
standards of lüse shipin also provide
technical support for the unconditional exchange
with sustainable food and organic food after China's
entry into the WTO. It creates a favorable condition
for the self-protection and independent development
of our agriculture, especially ecological and sustainable
agriculture in the process of opening up to the
outside world." ("A general introduction to the
standards of lüse shipin," accessed
online: http://www.greenfood.org.cn/lsspbzh/lsspbzh.htm
<January 6, 2007> ). Therefore, "lüse
shipin refer to those agricultural and processed
foods which are produced in a sound environment
and under stipulated technical standards. Their
quality is under control during the whole process
of production, so they are without pollution, of
proven quality and provided with a special logo
to designate their quality. " (Conceptual features,
from the official website of the Chinese Green
Food Development Center, accessed online: http://www.greenfood.org.cn/sites/MainSite/List_2_2444.html
<February 20, 2007>)
In contrast, organic food is defined as
the following:
Organic food is food produced according to organic
standards, which means crops grown without the use
of conventional pesticides, as well as artificial
fertilizers or sewage sludge, animals reared without
the routine use of antibiotics and without the use
of growth hormones and food processed without ionizing
radiation and without the use of a wide range of
food additives. It is produced on all levels without
the use of genetically modified organisms. Historically,
these farms have been small family-run farms. There
is evidence that these organic farms are more sustainable
and environmentally sound, among other benefits.
2
(Wikipedia, http://en.wikilib.com/wiki/Organic_food
<January 7, 2007>)
If a producer wishes to have his products certified
as organic food, they must conform to the standards
for the production of organic food and become accredited
by an authoritative institution. For example, products
in Australia must adhere to the Organic Standard
of National Association for Sustainable Agriculture,
Australia (abbreviated as NASAA) to be certified
as organic food; in the United Kingdom, they must
be accredited by the Organic Farmers and Growers
Ltd. (OF&G) authorized by DEFRA, UK; and in
the United States, they should conform to the National
Organic Program set up by the US Department of Agriculture.
Now these standards concerning organic food are
recognized among most countries of Europe and the
Americas. Organic food is closely related to organic
farming, which was developed in industrialized countries
as a response to the damage brought by the industrialized
agriculture. In 1972, International Federation of
Organic Agriculture Movements (IFOAM) was founded
in Versailles, France with the aim to exchange practices
and standards of organic farming among different
countries.
Therefore, the two terms have their respective
origins and their referent is fixed in their own
linguistic contexts. If their standards are the
same, it can be argued that the two terms, lüse
shipin and organic food, are equivalent
terms and they can be mutually substituted in different
languages. However, they are not the same. China
has set up two general standards for lüse
shipin, i.e. Standard A and Standard AA. According
to the research of Xie Yongping from Nanjing
Agricultural University, "Lüse shipin of
Standard AA is organic food, but not vice versa.
Only those organic foods whose productive environment,
operations in the production, product quality and
packaging all conform to the Standard AA of lüse
shipin can be certified as lüse shipin
of Standard AA. In other words, organic food
is the quasi-lüse shipin of Standard
AA" (1998: 7). Standard A of lüse
shipin is less strict than that for organic
food. Thus, the two concepts are related but different.
Their relationship could be shown in Figure 2:

Therefore, from a terminologist's perspective,
Harman's view is incorrect. Organic food does not
correspond to lüse shipin, and their
referents are not the same, which violates the terminological
principle that name and concept should be the same.
As for the translation of the term green food
provided by the New Age Chinese-English Dictionary,
we have carried out a corpus-based research to see
its usage in English as well as the reception of
youji shipin (organic food) in the Chinese
context, and then evaluate this translation.
3. A corpus-based research of the reception of the terms
a) A corpus research of terms in the SL
By investigating the usage of some words in the modern
Chinese corpora, translators would obtain some unexpected
hints in the process of translation. As the case study
is concerned, we examined the frequency of lüse
shipin and its similar term youji shipin (organic
food) in Modern Chinese. For this purpose, the online
queries of the Modern Chinese Corpus managed by the
Center for Studies of Chinese Language and Linguistics,
Beijing University (abbreviated as CSCLL in this paper)3
and the Modern Chinese Corpus managed by the Institute
of Applied Linguistics, Ministry of Education (abbreviated
as IALME in this paper)4were
made use of. The search results are as follows:
Table 1 The Frequency of the terms Lüse Shipin
and Youji Shipin
| |
lüse shipin (green food) |
youji shipin (organic food) |
| CSCLL |
4.18 per MC (481) |
0.14 per MC (16) |
| IALME |
0.8 per MC (16)5 |
0 |
* Notes:
- MC means million characters.
- The number in the brackets is the total frequency
in each corpus.
- In IALME, lüse shipin is considered
as one word with the attached tag, n.
From Table 1, it can be seen that lüse
shipin is a familiar term for the Chinese people,
while youji shipin is a new term with an obviously
lower frequency. In CSCLL, its frequency is as only
slightly over 3% as that of lüse shipin,
and in IALME, it does not appear. Of course, the scale
of the corpus constitutes one factor for this phenomenon,
but a conclusion can be drawn that Chinese have not
totally accepted the term youji shipin. In other
words, youji shipin has not become a semi-term,
and it is used most often by those experts in the specified
field. In contrast, lüse shipin has invaded
the daily speech of the Chinese people. This proves
our classification of lüse shipin as a semi-term.
Next, we can further examine the concordance lines of
the two terms. There are ten co-occurring concordance
lines of lüse shipin and youji shipin,
occupying 62.5% of the total concordance lines of
youji shipin. The co-occurring concordance lines
are provided below:

From those materials, we can see that youji shipin
is a rather specialized concept, belonging to the
category of pure terms, at most a general term. Many
writers of the corpus's texts mention it with direct
explanation following the term for the convenience of
the reader, such as in concordance lines 1, 2, 4. Other
writers do not know the difference between lüse
shipin and youji shipin, such as concordance
lines 3, 6, 7, 8, and there are even some writers consider
lüse shipin as exactly youji shipin,
such as concordance lines 6, 7, 8.
Thus, through the corpus-based research, it can be
shown that lüse shipin, due to its concreteness
and vividness, is a semi-term in Chinese, for its literal
meaning, "green food," produced a favorite association
with natural food. In contrast, youji shipin is
borrowed from abroad, and those who do not understand
the concept of this term are likely to consider it identical
to lüse shipin in China. This certainly
flouts the terminological principle of unique correspondence
between name and concept. The way of saying that organic
food is similar to lüse shipin in China,
however, provides a hint for translators when they translate
the Chinese term into English.
4. A corpus research of terms in the TL
During the translation process, the research of TL
corpora and the use of Internet search engines6
can provide important information for translators
about the usage of certain words and inspire tentative
translations into the TL. As for the two proposed
versions of lüse shipin--green food
and organic food, we also need to investigate
the British National Corpus, BNC7
and the Collins WordbanksOnline English Corpus
(abbreviated as Collins in this paper) 8
to find their respective usage. The results are as
follows:
Table 2 The Frequency of Organic Food and
Green Food
| |
organic food |
green food |
| BNC |
0.40 per MW (40) |
0.12 per MW (12) |
| Collins |
0.021 per MW
(12) |
0,007 per MW
(4) |
* NOTE: MW means million words.
From Table 2, it can be seen that the frequency
of organic food is almost three times as that
of green food, which suggests that organic
food is relatively common. This is closely connected
with the fact that the term organic farming
originates from Western countries. Next, we further
check the infrequent occurrences of green food,
and find that it often co-occurs with the word colouring(s)
and colour on the right, among which, BNC has
9 concordance lines of green food colouring(s)
and Collins has two concordance lines of green
food coloring and two concordance lines of green
food colour (powder). All the concordance lines
of green food are listed below:
1 through a near-famine when a plague of caterpillars
ate most of the green food. It was recorded
by a convict who was on the
2 the green tops remain, pastures, and indeed anywhere
where green food is evident. The Netting Operation
With your preparation and your
3 icing sugar 2 egg whites 2 tsps lemon juice Almond
essence Green food colouring Method 1 Beat
the icing sugar, egg white and
4 plants, SHE's cookery editor Clare Ferguson will
talk about Green food and show you how to make
it. Colin Shawyer of
5 icing sugar, 1 small egg white, Peppermint flavouring,
Green food colouring. 1 Sieve the icing sugar
into bowl 2.
6 for a few minutes. 4 Colour the desiccated coconut
with green food colouring for grass. Spread
a little royal icing, first coloured
7 To finish the dragonflies, paint the bodies with
brown and green food colourings, including
green heads and dark eyes. Cut out
8 more fondant, about the size of an egg, with
green food colouring and reserve, tightly wrapped,
for the space creatures
9 on the cake drum. 5 Colour the remaining fondant
with green food colouring and roll out to a
triangle, about 32•5cm (
10 on top of the cake. Brightly paint the towel using
blue and green food colourings and a fine paint
brush. Leave the fondant to
11 the toadstool roof. Colour the desiccated coconut
with a little green food colouring and scatter
on the cake drum around the toadstool,
12 yeah twenty P yeah, peppermint flavouring, artificial
cochineal, green food colouring cochineal,
er that comes from beetles I know,
(Source: BNC)
1 [/h] [p] 300ml 1/2pt) water · 450g (1lb) Tate &
Lyle granulated sugar 125g 1/4lb) liquid glucose ·
green food colour powder (available at sugarcraft
shops) mixed with a few drops of water. [p] Put the
water and sugar into a
2 5oz butter, 2oz sugar, 10oz digestive biscuits.
Green layer: 2fl oz lime juice, 7oz can sweet condensed
milk, 2 eggs, dash green food colour. Orange
layer: lime and orange juice to make 2fl oz, 7oz can
sweet condensed milk, 2 eggs, dash red food
3 it around the elf's neck. [p] Christmas Wreath
Cookies [p] 1 teaspoon vanilla [p] 3 cups corn flakes
cereal [p] green food coloring [p] red cinnamon
candies [p] frac12; cup butter [p] 30 large marshmallows
[p] a saucepan [p] waxed paper
4 to help you melt the vanilla, butter, and marshmallows
together in a pan on low heat. Once the mixture is
creamy, stir in green food coloring until it
is the shade you want. Remove the pan from the heat
and add cornflakes. Mix well. Wait for the
(Source: Collins)
From these concordance lines, we can be certain that
the first reaction of English speakers is that green
food is the green leafy food or food treated with
some kind of green food colouring, for green food,
in many cases collocates with colouring(s),
such as in concordance lines 2, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10,
11, 12, 13 from BNC, and all the concordance lines
from Collins. If we take green food as the
translation for lüse shipin, it may violate
the terminological principle that the term and the
concept should have the unique correspondence because
we intend to use green food to refer to some
unpolluted food adhering to the standards of lüse
shipin. Therefore, in translating such a term,
the translator must be very careful; otherwise the
translated term may not refer to the concept in the
SL and bring misunderstanding towards the TT readers.
5. The translator's linguistic choice in translating
lüse shipin
After the above careful analyses, the translator
can propose some translations for the terms in question.
This, of course, involves the consideration of different
registers, for different registers may require different
translation strategies. In our study, we attempt to
propose the following strategies for the translation
of lüse shipin:
(1) In non-academic discourse, we could use quotation
marks to deal with this term, that is, to use 'Green
Food' to indicate it is not a common phrase (not
leafy or artificially colored food). If a careful
reader encounters it, s/he may surf the Internet and
try to find more information about it from Chinese
governmental websites (English Version). Moreover,
if the space of the text permits, we could use an
explanation to provide foreign readers with an easier
understanding. For example, "Green food, similar
to organic food in western countries, has already
shown great potential in the market". Because
people in western countries are familiar with organic
food, the connection of lüse shipin with
organic food, a semi-term in their daily life, will
certainly help them get a rough idea about this concept.
This strategy is suitable for the public.
(2) In more academic discourse, we should be more
accurate, and use notes to supply more information
about this term, such as "The requirements for the
Chinese 'Green Food' of Standard AA are stricter than
those for organic food."
(3) As for the brand of those products, we think
that Grefod, due to its succinctness, could
be a good choice. However, it needs the support from
the related departments of the Chinese Government
by providing necessary information about Grefod.
Meanwhile, they should also publicize this expression
for people in other countries. Then, the foods containing
the mark "Grefod" will be gradually accepted
by foreigners. Another advantage lies in that it is
easy for TL readers to associate with the expression,
"Green Food" because of their similar pronunciations.
We had originally thought of using capital letters
and translate the semi-term as GREEN Food to
provide English speakers with a visual clue, thus
making them realize that it is not an ordinary phrase.
However, Ms. Harman suggests that capitalization means
shouting in English and is considered impolite in
some contexts. Thus, this way is not suitable to be
adopted.
Conclusion
In this paper, an integrated approach to the translation
of terms has been explained by using the English translation
of lüse shipin as an example. When translating
terms, a translator must acquire some basic knowledge
about terminology, such as (1) how terms are formed
by tracing its real-world referent; and (2) be aware
of the fact that concept and term have a unique correspondence
in domain-specific texts. Then the translator should
resort to the corpus-based research (whether using corpora
or the web as reference) to check the usage of SL terms
and possible TL terms in their own linguistic environment.
Only after careful analyses and thinking can the translator
propose the appropriate translations for those terms
which have not been confirmed by authoritative institutions.
With the increase in the volume of translation, more
and more translators are facing the task of translating
in specific domains. "... it is well known that the
search for interlingual equivalents is a time-consuming
activity, occupying in some cases up to 60 per cent
of total translator time"(Nkwenti-Azeh, 2004: 249).
Hence, we look forward to more cooperation between countries,
and establishment of more universally recognized term
banks to promote the exchange in the international community.
Notes:
1
According to their scope of use, Liu Yongquan
(2000) classified terms into three types: the most technical
ones are the pure terms, such as plasma; the
moderately technical ones are the general terms, such
as pressure; while the semi-terms refer to those
that are used in ordinary speech, and form part of the
general vocabulary. (Our own translation from Terms
in Encyclopedia of China, Vol. Languages)
2
We choose the definition from the online encyclopedia
Wikipedia because in many other more widely known
encyclopedias (so far as we can find), organic food
is under the entry of organic farming, and in
some of which organic food is not even mentioned
as a fixed expression. For example, in Encyclopædia
Britannica (retrieved from Encyclopædia Britannica
2006 Ultimate Reference Suite DVD), there is no occurrence
of the term organic food in the entry organic
farming and no entry for organic food. We
can only infer that organic food is the product of organic
farming. However, it suggests the close relationship
between organic food and organic farming.
3
The Modern Chinese Corpus managed by the Center for
Studies of Chinese Language and Linguistics, Beijing
University has 157 files, 23 folders and 229,700,435
bytes (219MB), with approximately 115 million characters.
It can be accessed online: http://ccl.pku.edu.cn:8080/ccl_corpus/jsearch/index.jsp?dir=xiandai.
4
The Modern Chinese Corpus managed by the Institute of
Applied Linguistics, Ministry of Education provides
online access to a corpus of about 20 million characters
for research: http://219.238.40.213:8080/CpsQrySv.srf.
5
18 concordance lines are found in IALME, but two lines
are exempted from the total number because they are
part of a name for an institution. The two concordance
lines are quoted as follows:

They should be segmented and tagged as

ni is a tag and stands for the name of institutions.
In the two concordances (15 & 17), the institution
is Chinese Green Food Development Center. Nonetheless,
this does not affect the trend of usage indicated by
the corpus.
6
In treating the results of search engines, the translator
should be critical about the collocations and frequencies
of those results since not all the materials in the
Internet are authoritative.
7
The British National Corpus managed by Oxford University
Computing Services on behalf of the BNC Consortium has
100 million words (90 million words of written texts
and 10 million words of speech) and can be available
online: http://www.natcorp.ox.ac.uk/.
8
The Collins WordbanksOnline English Corpus has
560 million words of written and spoken English materials
and can be available online: http://www.collins.co.uk/Corpus/CorpusSearch.aspx.
Acknowledgement
I am deeply indebted to my supervisor, Professor Ke Ping at Nanjing University for his careful and patient guidance. My gratitude also extends to Nicky Harman in Imperial College London, who carefully read the draft of this article and provided some insightful views concerning the translation of the Chinese semi-term lüse shipin from a native speaker's point of view. However, all the mistakes in the paper are my own.
References
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Corpora used:
Data cited in this paper have been extracted from (1) the Modern Chinese Corpus managed by the Center for Studies of Chinese Language and Linguistics, Beijing University; (2) the Modern Chinese Corpus managed by the Institute of Applied Linguistics, Ministry of Education, China; (3) the British National Corpus Online service managed by Oxford University Computing Services on behalf of the BNC Consortium; and (4) the Collins WordbanksOnline English Corpus. All rights in the texts cited are reserved.
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