A glossary of terms used in human rights law' in Malta

Abstract

"If language were simply a nomenclature for a set of universal concepts, it would be easy to translate from one language to another ... but each language articulates or organises the world differently. Languages do not simply name existing categories, they articulate their own." (Culler, 1976:21-2) Since no two languages are identical, either in the meanings given to corresponding symbols or in the ways in which such symbols are arranged in phrases and sentences, it stands to reason that there can be no absolute correspondence between languages, (Nida, 1964). Hence there can be no fully exact translations. Indeed achieving equivalence in the target language is no easy task and this task becomes even harder when a translator is faced with specialised areas or registers. However, the existence of reference books dealing with technical fields and the availability of glossaries of technical words immensely help translators in their work. Unfortunately, such reference books and specialised glossaries are not readily available in Maltese. Indeed, the collation of such researched and specialised glossaries in Maltese would greatly contribute to the standardisation of the Maltese language and would ultimately help translators produce unambiguous and consistent translations in Maltese, especially when faced with technical terms for which there is no standard equivalent in Maltese.