Direct loan

Direct loans from English imply two processes in term integration in Serbian: importation and adaptation. According to Filipović (Reference Filipović and Radovanović1989: 50), importation takes place if the lending language elements are transferred into the receiving language, which applies to both free and bound morphemes. The smallest number of terms in the sample imported into Serbian belong to the class of verbs. In the sample, only two verbs are direct loans: Serbian (hereafter, Ser.) amandirati < English (hereafter, Eng.) amend [make minor changes to Treaties for accuracy] and Ser. reemitovati < Eng. re-emit [emit infrared radiation following absorption (EU ETS Action)]. Through the verb reemitovati, the prefix re- is imported into Serbian, which can be found in some already integrated loans such as redizajnirati (Eng. redesign).

With regard to adaptation, I have observed that there are few instances of terms that are unadapted at the level of orthography and/or phonology. Furthermore, I have noticed that these terms reveal a tendency to remain morphologically unadapted, since in the position of a premodifier they are not marked for case, gender and number as required by the noun they co-occur with. This is the case with the following terms:

1. 1. Compound cross-compliance [the requirement by which farmers should respect certain rules of animal and plant welfare to receive direct payments from EU funds], e.g. Ser. cross-compliance standardi.

2. 2. Acronym LGBTTIQ [Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transsexual, Transgender, Intersex, Queer], e.g. Ser. LGBTTIQ populacija.

3. 3. Nominalized phrasal verb opt-out [refusal within a Member State of the EU to relinquish its sovereignty in a specific policy], e.g. Ser. opt-out mogućnost.

When a borrowed term has introduced an English bound morpheme into Serbian simply by retaining its native form, the term is in the stage of compromise transmorphemization. Three terms in the sample are compromise replicas. The terms Ser. skrining < Eng. screening [assessment of a candidate country's level of alignment with EU legislation] and Ser. monitoring < Eng. monitoring [the observing of the implementation of a directive] are found in various subject areas. The term monitoring, for instance, has become a constituent of a number of nominal phrases with native co-constituents in the domains of waste management and environment, such as the complex terms Ser. monitoring podzemnih voda < Eng. groundwater monitoring (cf. Monitoring under the Water Framework Directive) and Ser. monitoring gasova staklene bašte < Eng. greenhouse gas monitoring (cf. EU Decision No 280/2004/EC). Another unit with the imported English suffix -ing is the term Ser. tvining < Eng. twinning [assistance in the process of administrative reform in candidate countries in Central and Eastern Europe]. This term is used in the phrases Ser. laki tvininig < Eng. light twinning [twinning which lasts up to 10 months and the value of which is up to 250,000 euros] and Ser. stalni tvining savetnik < Eng. Resident Twinning Advisor. Derivationally speaking, I have noticed that the terms with the imported suffix -ing represent nominal bases which do not tend to receive class-changing suffixes to derive adjectives; moreover, they do not receive class-maintaining suffixes for inflection and remain inflectionally unmarked in the position of a premodifier. This is the case with the term tvining when modifying the nouns projekat (Eng. project) and ugovor (Eng. contract), e.g. tvining projekti, koji se sprovode kroz tvining ugovore [ … ] (IPA rečnik pojmova, 2011).

The terms which have undergone complete morphological adaptation outnumber the unadapted loans. This stage of complete transmorphemization involves the replacement of an English suffix by the Serbian suffix of the same function and meaning. Adaptation, in such cases, involves substitution, which regulates the replacement of the giving language elements by the equivalent elements of the receiving language. The terms which are completely morphologically adapted are all abstract nouns; the native suffixes are nominal and of high productivity in the formation of abstract nouns. Two of the most productive suffixes are -ija and -ost, frequently used in the formation of nouns which denote intellectual, political or professional activities and principles. They are found in the following terms:

1. 1. Ser. readmisija < Eng. readmission [the return of people residing irregularly in a country to their country of origin or to a country of transit].

2. 2. Ser. implementacija < Eng. implementation [administering and executing EU legislation in member states].

3. 3. Ser. komunitarizacija < Eng. communitarization [the transfer of freedom of movement and mobility rights from the third pillar of the EU to the first].

4. 4. Ser. supsidijarnost < Eng. subsidiarity [the principle that the EC should act only when an objective can be achieved at the supranational level, and that the means employed should be proportional to the objective].

The term Eng. committology [the committee system which oversees acts implemented by the EC] > Ser. komitologija was originally a neo-classical compound. Serbian has imported and adapted both the English component committee and the combining form of Latin origin -logy.

Generally speaking, I believe that besides fostering the innovation of specialized vocabularies in Serbian direct loans contribute to the semiotic principle of conciseness (cf. UNESCO 2005; ISO 704:2009[E]), and I presume that some other competing native terms would be longer and paraphrastic to achieve clarity.

Loan translation

Loan translation is found with compound terms and terminological phrases and it preserves the semiotic principles of transparency and preference for native language (cf. UNESCO 2005; ISO 704:2009(E)). It is applied to English compound terms and terminological phrases, all of which have a noun as the nucleus. The determinant components are adjectives or nouns, which are not necessarily translated word-for-word since structural correspondence may not meet the requirements imposed on the equivalent by the rules of Serbian morphosyntax.

In the sample, Eng. focal point [a person responsible for the recruitment and proposal of their country's candidates for selection as Short-Term and Long-Term Observers to EU Election Observation Missions] is a compound of the ‘adjective + noun’ structure. The translation Ser. fokalna tačka has retained the structure and the content of the English compound. In the phrase, the adjective is in the function of adjectival attribute and describes the entity denoted by the noun with reference to its importance. The adjective Ser. fokalan is restricted to the domain of medical sciences and is used to describe a disease or condition which occurs in a particular site in the body. As for the noun Ser. tačka, none of its seven senses implies personified meaning, as it denotes or connotes only objects, abstractions or geographical entities. Consequently, within the vocabulary of Serbian, this loan translation induces a semantic shift, since the meaning of the noun is extended to mean person, as well as a shift in usage which applies to the adjective.

The rest of the English compound terms have the structure ‘noun + noun’. The Serbian translations are predominantly phrases with the structure ‘adjective + noun’, except in the case of the term Ser. kapacitet apsorpcije < Eng. absorption capacity [an ability to implement additional aid without pronounced inefficiency of public spending and without induced adverse effects]. In Serbian, this is a phrase containing the so-called ‘case attribute’, i.e. a noun inflected for case, which is genitive of possession in this instance. The prevalence of translations in which nominal modifiers are translated by adjectival modifiers is in line with the nature of pre-modification in Serbian nominal phrases, which is exclusively adjectival. The principle is followed in the translation of the following terms:

1. 1. Eng. action plan [a strategy proposed by an EU country or EU candidate in meeting the obligations under a Directive] > Ser. akcioni plan.

2. 2. Eng. integration capacity [the capacity of the EU to integrate new members] > Ser. integracioni kapacitet.

3. 3. Eng. cohesion policy [the EU's strategy to promote and support the ‘overall harmonious development’ of its Member States and regions] > Ser. koheziona politika.

4. 4. Eng. cohesion fund [the fund which provides support for the poorer regions of Europe to stabilize their economies, promote growth, employment and sustainable development] > Ser. kohezioni fond.

Regarding the semantics of the loan translations, I noticed that, within the vocabulary of Serbian, the adjectives have acquired meanings restricted to the specific domain of EU integration, which differ considerably from their denotative meanings and other specialized meanings they may have. Namely, the adjective akcioni in its general meaning describes any process in which action is taken, while its specialized meaning is restricted to the mechanics term akcioni radijus (Eng. radius of action). The noun kohezija, which is the base of the adjective kohezioni, in its specialized meaning is used in chemistry and physics to denote the intermolecular force that holds together alike molecules in a substance. Interestingly, it is the primary meaning of the noun. In the domain discussed here, the meaning it has acquired through translation denotes the removal of disparities across the EU. This specialized meaning is the result of semantic narrowing of the figurative meaning [the action or fact of forming a united whole].

I classified other English complex terms in the sample into terminological phrases due to the fact that the semantic cohesiveness between their components is not as compact as between the components of the compounds previously discussed. I found that the determinant components in nominal terminological phrases are descriptors rather than classifiers since they describe a feature and do not assign the entity to a class, nor do they have category-specific meanings. In the phrase Ser. pristupna zemlja < Eng. acceding country [a country which has signed the treaty of accession and is expected to become a full member state on the date set out in the treaty], the English participial form is translated by a descriptive adjective with the suffix -(a)n, which is highly productive in the formation of descriptive adjectives. This particular adjective stems from the verb pristupati (Eng. accede), which in the domain of EU integration denotes becoming a member of the EU.

In Serbian, phrases in which both constituents are nouns are quite rare. Nominal attributes in such phrases have a qualifying function and take the position of a post-modifier, for instance Ser. zemlja kandidat < Eng. candidate country [a country which applies for the process of the integration in the EU and to which such status is granted by the European Council]. The English phrase in which both constituents are nouns, Eng. conditionality policy [the policy by which the EU influences aspiring member states to make the necessary reforms to create domestic policy and institutions that are stable and strong enough for membership], is translated as Ser. politika uslovljenog podsticaja, which may be considered descriptive since it has relied on the definition of the English term. In a few cases, I have observed that the translation foregrounds the function of the entity denoted by the main noun, as in the term Ser. odbor za uži izbor < Eng. shortlist panel [in the IPA programme, a committee appointed by a Contracting Authority to select the consortia, companies or persons best fitting pre-established criteria]. Finally, very many phrases are of the ‘adjective + noun’ structure, which is also retained in the translation, adjectives being the most common descriptive elements in nominal phrases in Serbian, e.g. Ser. preferencijalni sporazum < Eng. preferential agreement [an agreement which comprises a variety of arrangements that favour member parties over non-members].

Literal translation from English in some terms has resulted in the semantic extension of the Serbian equivalent. There are a few phenomena observed in the semantic changes triggered by literal translation. First, since in this sample I am investigating EU-related terms, a newly acquired sense is considered to be domain-related. Second, a newly developed sense does not replace the established sense(s), but only brings about the extension of the application range.

Third, another process which literal translation may set off is terminologization, in which common words become terms (cf. UNESCO, 2005), for instance Ser. izuzeci < Eng. exceptions [deviations or derogations from normally established EU procedures] and Ser. uticaj < Eng. impact [the criterion against which EU financed programmes are evaluated and which refers to the consequences of the programme beyond the immediate effects]. Terminologization involves the development of the sense which, unlike the general sense, has additional semantic features and a restricted context of usage.

Fourth, the sense acquired introduces a new domain of usage. This is illustrated by the following terms from the sample:

1. 1. Ser. komplementarnost < Eng. complementarity [the EU principle that assistance under EU funds shall complement other financial instruments of the EC and national actions]; the Serbian word in its specialized meanings has been used to denote the possibility of colours making white or black when combined, and in geometry to denote the sum of two angles which is 90°.

2. 2. Ser. konvergencija < Eng. convergence [the objective of encouraging the economies of the Member States to develop in the same way]; the term in Serbian is used in mathematics to denote a) the tendency of two lines/planes to meet at a point and b) property of infinite series and functions of approaching a limit more and more closely as an argument (variable) of the function increases or decreases or as the number of terms of the series increases.

3. 3. Ser. koncentracija < Eng. concentration [the formal principle underlying Structural Funds management; this states that EU support should be sufficiently focused to achieve results and make an impact]; in chemistry, the Serbian word denotes the relative amount of a given substance contained within a solution or in a particular volume of space.

At this point I find it appropriate to introduce the notion of ‘autonomous meaning’ of EU terms. This notion has not been discussed in the linguistics, but primarily has been focused on in the civil and legal sciences. It is used to refer to the conception of EU terminology as independent not only from the common vocabulary or other specialized terminology in European languages, but also from the meaning that corresponding terminology may have in domestic law (cf. Brems, Reference Brems2001; Twigg–Flesner, Reference Twigg–Flesner2010). The sample has demonstrated that autonomy of meaning is an underlying characteristic of EU terminology. The autonomy is preserved in the Serbian language both in term importation, since no semantic adaptation whatsoever is evident in the terms imported, and in term translation, in which Serbian equivalents acquire a usage restricted to the domain of EU activities, institutions and legislation.