The aim of the paper is to show and describe the current situation in the Latvian scientific language based on a case study of the problem about the place of a national language and its existence in science in modern globalised time, when the dominance of English as the lingua franca of science grows. More specifically, the paper analyses the November 2019 conceptual plans of the Latvian Ministry of Education and Science about a new concept of doctoral study programmes that would lean towards using English as the doctoral dissertation language in hopes for scientific excellence, and the public reaction and opinion on this concept. The descriptive method is used within the paper, including the contemporary literature review focused on the language of science globally, issues of multilingualism and glocalization, and the problems caused by these issues. Via empirical discourse content analysis, the authors looked at various documents, including Latvian law that governs the rights and rules of the Latvian language use in various contexts. They examined a wide array of mainly online content and diverse online community discourse related to the question of what language should be used (Latvian or English) within the doctoral dissertation process. For a comparison of the situation, the paper also provides a brief insight into the regulation of the language used in the development of dissertations in Lithuania. During the study, 21 different sources, that is, articles posted on various Latvian news media sites and 304 online user comments, predominantly anonymous, under these articles relating to the issue of language choice in doctoral dissertations were analysed. All the mentioned sources, to a greater or lesser extent, discussed the issue of what place Latvian has as a language of science and whether English should be the dominant language in doctoral studies, what implications the choice and usage of a language could have, and what far-reaching impact this might have on science, education, and society. The material revealed a breadth of opinions, depending on what group a person is more likely to represent, ranging from the Ministry stance to organisations and the general public. Some had a very pro-English stance, and some showed significant concern for the Latvian language. The main trend in online community user opinions could be condensed as such: there is a variety of language choices for a doctoral dissertation – a dissertation written in Latvian; a dissertation written in English; or leaving the language choice up to the doctoral student. This would ensure that the language choice fits the doctoral students’ goals and field of research. Making English mandatory would not likely lead to guarantee scientific excellence as what matters is the research content itself, not the language used. The national language in science is a current and important issue in Latvia, as there is a need for state language use in a scientific register, and this usage should be developed further. The Ministry document discussed is still a draft report, and it is not yet known what final decisions on the PhD process and dissertation language will be taken by policymakers in the future. This paper shows that language choice and use in science is not just a matter for scholars and PhD candidates, but an issue that can and does gain interest from various groups of society and gets discussed online in multiple ways, allowing people to express their opinion on policy and societal issues. Latvian is a scientific language, and it has a place within the international scientific discourse, and it should not be made to step aside for the dominant lingua franca.
Within the scientific discourse it is commonplace to write articles based on the IMRAD structure (Introduction, Methods, Results, and Discussion). This structure is typical for the natural sciences (STEM) but scientists in other disciplines are also often required to use it. This paper looks at scientific texts in Latvian published from 2008 to 2018. The basis for this research project is a corpus of 758 scientific articles from natural sciences, engineering and technology, social sciences, humanities and arts. The aim is to show in which disciplines IMRAD is a dominant structure for texts written in Latvian and what wording authors use. It could be concluded that in the structure of Latvian scientific texts have a significant variation in the use of IMRAD and there are different wording versions used, it aligns to previous research about scientific text structure in other languages and cultures. Not all Latvian scientific texts adhere to the IMRAD structure and there are deviations based on the discipline.
In der wissenschaftlichen Fachkommunikation wird meistens vom wissenschaftlichen Artikel Gebrauch gemacht. Die lettischen wissenschaftlichen Artikel zeichnen sich bei unterschiedlichen wissenschaftlichen Fachrichtungen und auch bei ihren einzelnen Disziplinen durch verschiedene Textbausteine aus, die eventuell von Traditionen des Fachs oder der Fachgruppe, von den globalen Tendenzen in der Wissenschaft und den eventuellen Kontaktsprachen wie Englisch, Russisch und Deutsch abhängig sind. Die Untersuchungen des wissenschaftlichen Artikels in der lettischen Sprache sind kaum vollzogen worden. Aus diesem Grunde stellt der vorliegende Beitrag die linguistische Untersuchung der Textbausteine der lettischen geisteswissenschaftlichen Artikel anhand der korpuslinguistischen Verfahren dar. Zur Untersuchung der Makrostruktur der lettischen wissenschaftlichen Artikel in den Geisteswissenschaften wird der Teiltextkorpus des Forschungsprojektes „Lettische Wissenschaftssprache unter interlingualem Aspekt“ benutzt, der im Rahmen des Projektes 2018–2019 angelegt wurde. Beschrieben werden dabei die Kriterien für die Textauswahl und der erstellte Teiltextkorpus, der 251 Artikel aus den geisteswissenschaftlichen Teildisziplinen beinhaltet. Im Weiteren wird die makrostrukturelle Analyse der wissenschaftlichen Artikel aus den geisteswissenschaftlichen Fächergruppen wie Geschichte und Archäologie, Sprach- und Literaturwissenschaft sowie Philosophie, Ethik und Religion dargelegt. Aus der vorliegenden Untersuchung lässt sich schlussfolgern, dass die lettischen wissenschaftlichen Artikel der untersuchten geisteswissenschaftlichen Fächer vorwiegend grobe dreigliedrige Struktur mit der Einleitung, dem Hauptteil und dem Schluss aufweisen. Unter den geisteswissenschaftlichen Fächergruppen treten aber die Ähnlichkeiten und die Unterschiede des Textaufbaus hervor, die vom Fach und von der untersuchten Fragestellung, dem Thema oder dem Themaaspekt bedingt werden. Abschließend lässt sich der nicht so stark konventionalisierte Textaufbau der geisteswissenschaftlichen Artikel im Lettischen nachweisen.
Text cohesion can be achieved through grammatical and lexico-semantic means. Lexico-semantic means used in text cohesion can be defined as recurrence, as in Latin, the word recurrere means returning to a previous utterance or repeating it. Repetition of lexico-semantic means in the text can be named using a foreign word in the Latvian language, rekursija (recursion in English). In Latvian, the concept rekursija is related to phonology, defining it as ‘the final part of pronouncing a sound, in which speech organs deviate from the previously assumed state characteristic of a particular sound’ (translated from Latvian of the entry in Tēzaurs 2022). Recursion in English linguistics is often understood as the sequential use of grammatical structures, while in German text linguistics, the concept Rekurrenz is defined as the repetition of similar language means, elements, and forms in the text. The research goal is to identify types of cohesive devices used in scientific articles in the Latvian language. The research focuses on full or partial repetition of such cohesive devices as words and word collocations, substitution, etc. in the scientific texts in Latvian that have been included in the Corpus of Latvian Scientific Articles. The Corpus comprises 1401 texts published between 2008 and 2018 covering six scientific branch groups. A qualitative research method, content analysis, has been used. It can be concluded that scientific texts in Latvian contain exact repetitions, partial recurrence, ellipsis, and substitution as lexico-semantic cohesive devices. Research findings show the different density of recurrence means used in scientific articles in different scientific branches and how relatable the used recurrence means are to the article’s title and the indicated key words.
Zinātnes valoda ir valodas paveids, kas tiek izmantots pētniecības procesa un rezultāta aprakstam zinātniskā tekstā mutvārdos vai rakstveidā. Līdz 21. gadsimta sākumam latviešu zinātnes valoda skatīta un raksturota funkcionālo stilu kontekstā un vispārīgā veidā, nosaucot galvenās stila pazīmes un īsi raksturojot tam raksturīgo leksiku, bet nepievēršot detalizētu uzmanību zinātnes valodas lingvistiskajiem aspektiem. 21. gadsimta sākumā latviešu zinātnes valodas pētniecībai pievēršas vairāki valodnieki, tāpēc, skatot šo procesu attīstībā, nodalāmi trīs galvenie zinātnes valodas pētniecības virzieni: pētījumi par zinātniska teksta makrostruktūru vai atsevišķiem tās elementiem, pētījumi par zinātniska teksta mikrostruktūru un to veidojošajiem elementiem un pētījumi par latviešu zinātniskajiem tekstiem sastatījumā ar citām valodām.
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