On the materials of Essential Business Vocabulary Builder by Paul Emmerson Macmillan Education 2011 I researched one of the interviews with business people-an interview with an accountant. I have selected the following terms:
| term | amount | Generic/specific | Polylexemic/monolexemic | notes |
| 1. Business people | 1 | generic | polylexemic | Noun+noun |
| 2. accountant | 3 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 3. bookkeeper | 1 | generic | monolexemic | synonim |
| 4. company | 2 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 5. job | 1 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 6. sales | 2 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 7. purchase | 1 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 8. invoice | 1 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 9. receipt | 1 | generic | mololexemic | |
| 10. bill | 1 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 11. payment | 1 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 12. spreadsheet | 1 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 13. financial reports | 1 | generic | polylexemic | Adj+noun |
| 14. income statement | 2 | specific | polylexemic | Noun+noun |
| 15. balance sheet | 1 | specific | polylexemic | Noun+noun |
| 16. cash flow statement | 1 | specific | polylexemic | Noun+noun |
| 17. profit | 5 | generic | monolyxemic | |
| 18. loss | 2 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 19. revenue | 2 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 20. cost | 5 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 21. good | 2 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 22. gross profit | 2 | specific | polylexemic | Adj+noun |
| 23. direct costs | 1 | specific | polylexemic | Adj+noun |
| 24. raw materials | 1 | generic | polylexemic | noun+noun |
| 25. wage | 1 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 26. factory workers | 1 | generic | polylexemic | Noun+noun |
| 27. product | 1 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 28. indirect costs | 1 | specific | polylexemic | Adj+noun |
| 29. marketing | 1 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 30. administration | 1 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 31. operating profit | 1 | specific | polylexemic | Adj+noun |
| 32. amortization | 3 | specific | monolexemic | special |
| 33. depreciation | 2 | specific | monolexemic | special |
| 34. tax | 4 | generic | monolyxemic | |
| 35. asset | 1 | generic | monolyxemic | |
| 36. accounts | 1 | generic | monolyxemic | |
| 37. net profit | 4 | specific | polylexemic | Adj+noun translation |
| 38. final profit | 1 | specific | polylexemic | Adj+noun translation |
| 39. bottom line | 1 | specific | polylexemic | Adj+noun Phraseology, antonymes |
| 40. top line | 2 | specific | polylexemic | Adj+noun, phraseology, antonymes |
| 41. income | 1 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 42. growth | 1 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 43. dividend | 1 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 44. shareholder | 2 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 45. risk | 1 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 46. money | 1 | generic | monolexemic | |
| 47. future growth | 1 | specific | polylexemic | Adj+noun |
| 48. retained profit | 1 | specific | polylexemic | Adj+noun |
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The results are shown in the next table:
| Total number of terms | 48 | ||
| generic | 33 | ||
| specific | 15 | ||
| polylexemic | 17 | Adj+Noun | Noun+noun |
| 11 | 6 | ||
| monolyxemic | 31 | ||
| synonymes | 4 | ||
| antonymes | 2 | ||
| special | 2 | ||
| The most frequent terms | Profit and cost (5 times) | ||
Accurate statistics in the diagrams:
An accountant uses terms bottom line and top line. It is essential to consider them with more attention. These are phraseological units - a kind of metaphors. As shown above, the world of business is always changing and as a result, authentic discourse unfailingly offers and exemplifies a considerable amount of business usage that transcends the confines of textbooks and dictionaries.
There is one other layer of authentic usage that succeeds in evading lexicographic presentation and treatment. Business dictionaries largely ignore idioms and metaphors that are frequently used in business discourse and add a touch of expressivity to spoken and written communication. An accountant said: The top line is revenue, and the bottom line is net profit. You might hear someone say: top line growth last year was 4%, but we improved the bottom line by 10%. . These terms are not listed in Business Dictionaries, however, they both mirror the intrinsic diversity of business vocabulary and, more widely, business usage. Moreover, they relates to economic discourse in this case. The gap between language and speech is there, making one think of the difference between variation in functional use and the inevitable limitations of lexicographic presentation.
Business dictionaries, as is standard practice, select the more recurrent concepts and business terms. Expressive, idiomatic and evaluative synonyms are purposefully left out and mostly relegated to General English dictionaries. Business English dictionaries are thus shown to leave out a lot of idioms and metaphors used in authentic business discourse. They also tend to disregard unusual word-combinations that result from the linguistic creativity of a business journalist or business writer.
It is essential to say that the participant of this interview is an accountant. In this way he uses a lot of business terminology which relates precisely to his occupation. For instance:
Profit - the amount by which the price received for goods is greater than the costs; the difference between business income and expenses.
This term composes 10% from general amount of terms. The accountant used it 5 times. Moreover, he also used it in specific terms: gross profit, net profit, final profit, operating profit and retained profit. That means this term is really significant and indispensable for him as for accountant. There is comprehension of his job through this term (he can not tell about his work without it).
Analogically with the term cost.
Costthe expenditure on goods and services required to carry out the operations of an organization. This term is also used 5 times and constitutes 10% of general amount of terms. It is also used in specific terms like indirect costs and direct costs.
Tax an amount of money taken by central or local government from peoples income or company profits and used for public spending. This term is used 4 times and constitutes 8%.
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An important point is that even terms which were not used too frequently relates to bookkeeping and economic area in general (invoice, bill, receipt, money, dividends, income, cash flow statement, and other terms).
It goes without saying that in this interview I found specialized terminology. For example:
Depreciation when the value of something goes down; the gradual loss of value of fixed assets.
The definition of this term is in the Dictionary of General Business English terminology by T.B.Nazarova. But as for the term amortization (which is one of the most frequent term, it is used 3 times and constitutes 6%), there is no any definition in the Dictionary of General Business English terminology because this is special term.
There is also in-text translation in the interview: The amount that is left is the net profit. Its like the final profit. The accountant explained to journalist the meaning of the specific term.
The terms accountant and bookkeeper, as well as the terms amortizations and depreciation are synonymes for non-accountants. But for professionals these are definitely different concepts:
A bookkeeper records all the financial transactions in the company its a job that is done internally. You take the paperwork from sales and purchases that means invoices, receipts, bills and payments and enter the information in the correct place in a spreadsheet. In the old days it was a book.
The accountant is an external person who takes this information, checks it. And then uses to create the financial reports.
They are very similar in everyday language you can use either word. Only accountants need to know the difference!
The accountant also used many different adjectives (sometimes together with metaphors) to express his thoughts more accurately: The opposite situation is also very common high top line growth but only a small net profit .
Conclusion.
Summing up the research, the term acts as a carrier of collective professional and scientific knowledge that optimizes cognitive and transformative activity of people. The term is a typical cognitive-information structure that accumulates special knowledge necessary in the process of professional and scientific activity, which is carried out by a community of specialists who speak the same language.The terminological nomination has a cognitive-informational character, since the formation of the term is conditioned by the linguistic consciousness of people creating an information world of special knowledge necessary for the development of cognitive and transformative activity.Mediated by thinking and inextricably linked with the basic principles of the language nomination, the terminology nomination depends on the cognitive ability of people, is due to the linguistic expression of the results of cognition and the interaction of external and internal linguistic factors. Specificity terminological nomination is to create naming a special kind - the terms needed in the process of professional and scientific communication.
Business English vocabulary is far from homogeneous. In fact, it is increasingly diverse. This inherent diversity was analyzed into 4stratas: General English words, General Business English words, General Business English terms and specialized terminology. Business vocabulary is a dynamic and rapidly developing system.a term may gradually acquire an additional evaluative element of meaning known as connotation.
Inherent diversity of business vocabulary is only partially reflected and reproduced in dictionaries, glossaries and textbooks. Linguistic change and lexical innovation outpace dictionary-makers and flourish in different kinds of written and spoken business discourse. At any given point in time, numerous new words and a range of new meanings will be functioning on their own, encountered by readers of books and magazines, puzzled over and marveled at by radio listeners and TV watchers, but unobserved and unidentified by teams of lexicographers. In other words, authentic discourse unfailingly offers and exemplifies a considerable amount of business usage that transcends the confines of textbooks and dictionaries. The comprehension of the job occurs through terms, especially through special terms.
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It should be noted, however, that none of the classifications,dictionaries or glossaries, even really exhaustive, can reflect and present the whole of business vocabulary.
Bibliography.
Beresford C. Business Communication. Practical Written English For the Modern Business World. BBC English by Radio& Television, 1988
Dictionary of Finance and Investment Terms. Barrons, 1998..
Emmerson Paul Essential Business Vocabulary Builder. Pre-intermediate to Intermediate. The words&phrases you need to succeed Macmillan, 2011
Nazarova T.B. Linguistic and Literary Semiotics//Applies Semiotics. University of Toronto. 1996. No.1.
Nazarova T.B. Business English. An introductory Course for Advanced Students of Language and Literature.Second Edition. Moscow: Dialog MSU, 2000
NazarovaT.B. Dictionary of General Business English Terminology Moscow Ast.Astrel, 2006
Nazarova T.B. Vocabulary Acquisitions as Ongoing Improvement. Moscow: VysshayaShkola, 2000
NazarovaT.B.Business English. A course of Lectures and Practical Assignments Moscow Ast.AstrelTranzitkniga, 2008
Volodina M.N. Cognitive-informative nature of the term (on the basis of mass nedia technology). M.: Moscow University Press, 2000.
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