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Technical terminology is the specialized vocabulary
Vocabulary

A person's vocabulary is the set of words they are familiar with in a language. A vocabulary usually grows and evolves with age, and serves as a useful and fundamental tool for communication and learning....
 of a field, the nomenclature. These terms have specific definitions within the field, which is not necessarily the same as their meaning in common use. Jargon
Jargon

Jargon is terminology which has been especially defined in relationship to a specific activity, profession, or group. In other words, the term covers the language used by people who work in a particular area or who have a common interest....
 is similar, but more informal in definition and use, while legal terms of art or words of art have meanings that are strictly defined by law.

An industry term is a type of technical terminology that has a particular meaning within a specific industry.






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Technical terminology is the specialized vocabulary
Vocabulary

A person's vocabulary is the set of words they are familiar with in a language. A vocabulary usually grows and evolves with age, and serves as a useful and fundamental tool for communication and learning....
 of a field, the nomenclature. These terms have specific definitions within the field, which is not necessarily the same as their meaning in common use. Jargon
Jargon

Jargon is terminology which has been especially defined in relationship to a specific activity, profession, or group. In other words, the term covers the language used by people who work in a particular area or who have a common interest....
 is similar, but more informal in definition and use, while legal terms of art or words of art have meanings that are strictly defined by law.

An industry term is a type of technical terminology that has a particular meaning within a specific industry. The phrase industry term implies that a word or phrase is a typical one within a particular industry or business and people within the industry or business will be familiar with and use the term.

Technical terminology exists in a continuum of formality. Precise technical terms and their definitions are formally recognised, documented, and taught by educators in the field. Other terms are more colloquial, coined and used by practitioners in the field, and are similar to slang
Slang

Slang is the use of highly informal words and expressions that are not considered standard in the speaker's dialect or language....
. The boundaries between formal and slang jargon, as in general English, are quite fluid, with terms sliding in and out of recognition. This is especially true in the rapidly developing world of computers and networking. For instance, the term firewall
Firewall (networking)

A firewall is an integrated collection of security measures designed to prevent unauthorized electronic access to a networked computer system....
 (in the sense of a device used to filter network traffic) was at first technical slang. As these devices became more important and the term became widely understood, the word was adopted as formal terminology.

Technical terminology evolves due to the need for experts in a field to communicate with precision and brevity, but often has the effect of excluding those who are unfamiliar with the particular specialized language of the group. This can cause difficulties as, for example, when a patient is unable to follow the discussions of medical practitioners, and thus cannot understand his own condition and treatment. Differences in jargon also cause difficulties where professionals in related fields use different terms for the same phenomena. For instance, substantial amounts of duplicated research occur in cognitive psychology
Cognitive psychology

Cognitive psychology is a branch of psychology that investigates internal mental processes such as problem solving, memory, and language.The school of thought arising from this approach is known as cognitivism which is interested in how people mentally represent information processing....
 and human-computer interaction partly because of such difficulties.

The term jargon can, and often does, have pejorative connotations, particularly when aimed at "business culture". The marketing
Marketing

Marketing is defined by the American Marketing Association as the activity, set of institutions, and processes for creating, communicating, delivering, and exchanging offerings that have value for customers, clients, partners, and society at large....
 and public relations
Public relations

Public relations is the practice of managing the flow of information between an organization and its publics. Public relations - often referred to as PR - gains an organization or individual exposure to their audiences using topics of public interest and news items that do not require direct payment....
 industries in particular have expanded the lexicon of jargon that marks the global business
Business

A business is a legally recognized organization designed to provide good s and/or Service to consumers. Businesses are predominant in capitalism economies, most being privately owned and formed to earn profit that will increase the wealth of its owners....
 environment.

Examples of technical terminology

  • Nautical terms
  • Scientific jargon
  • International Scientific Vocabulary
    International Scientific Vocabulary

    International Scientific Vocabulary is a form of vocabulary comprising scientific and specialized words whose language of origin may or may not be certain, but which are in current use in several modern languages....
  • Medical terminology
    Medical terminology

    Medical terminology is a vocabulary for accurately describing the human body and associated components, conditions, processes and process in a science-based manner....


See also

  • Argot
    Argot

    Argot is a secret language used by various groups?including, but not limited to, thieves and other criminals?to prevent outsiders from understanding their conversations....
  • Legal writing
    Legal writing

    Legal writing is a type of technical writing used by legislators, lawyers, judges, and others in law to express legal analysis and legal rights and duties....
  • Buzzword
    Buzzword

    A buzzword is a vague idiom, usually a neologism, that is common to managerial, technical, administrative, and political work environments. Although meant to impress the listener with the speaker's pretense to knowledge, buzzwords render sentences opaque, difficult to understand and question, because the buzzword does not mean what it denomi...
  • Colloquialism
    Colloquialism

    A colloquialism is an expression not used in formal Speech communication, writing or paralinguistics. Colloquialisms are also sometimes referred to collectively as "colloquial language"....
  • Critical vocabulary
    Critical vocabulary

    Critical VocabularyA critical vocabulary is a formal terminology related to one or more branches of critical theory. Although it may be considered a type of jargon, it is predominantly used by academic and is not slang....
  • Shibboleth
    Shibboleth

    Shibboleth is any distinguishing practice which is indicative of one's social or regional origin.It usually refers to features of language, and particularly to a word whose pronunciation identifies its speaker as being a member or not a member of a particular group....
  • Variety (linguistics)
    Variety (linguistics)

    In sociolinguistics, a variety, also called a lect, is a language or dialect considered as a variety or development of another language or dialect....
  • Register (linguistics)
    Register (linguistics)

    In linguistics, a register is a subset of a language used for a particular purpose or in a particular social setting. For example, an English language speaker may adhere more closely to prescription and description, pronounce words ending in -ing with a velar nasal and refrain from using the word "ain't" when speaking in a formal setting, bu...
  • three letter acronym (TLA)
  • Wiktionary:jargon
  • Lexigraf
    Lexigraf

    Lexigraf is a multilingual lexicography project developed at the Aristotle University Thessaloniki Greece between 1997-2004.Current lexicographical projects require sophisticated IT infrastructure to be completed - both in hardware capacity and software....


See also

  • Eurodicautom
    Eurodicautom

    Eurodicautom was the pioneering terminology database of the European Commission, created in 1975, initially for use by translators and other Commission staff....
     a free multilingual terminology database