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Part of
Handbook of Terminology: Volume 3. Legal Terminology
Edited by Łucja Biel and Hendrik J. Kockaert
[Handbook of Terminology 3] 2023
► pp. 271–288

Terminological variation and conceptual divergence in EU Law

| University of Rijeka

Both terminological variation and conceptual divergence can undermine the uniform application and interpretation of EU law. However, even if terminological convergence is upheld, conceptual divergence can nevertheless be manifested in varying interpretations of EU concepts at the level of the Member States. Highlighting the distinction between terminological variation and conceptual divergence, the present chapter puts the focus of attention on the European standard of the right of withdrawal. By means of a corpus-informed and legal analysis of the terms used for the latter concept in several EU languages attempt is made to explain the multiple dimensions of EU terms, namely the phenomena of term variation and meaning modulations. It is proposed to expand the context of studying variants in EU law in regard to conceptual divergence and legal design.

Keywords: EU terminology, term variants, conceptual divergence, lexical semantics, EU law
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.EU terms
    • 2.1The institutional context of EU terms
      • 2.1.1The impact of EU English on EU law-making and translation
    • 2.2The curious case of EU synonymy and polysemy
  • 3.Right of withdrawal: A European standard couched in both national and neutral terms
    • 3.1Diachronic analysis of terms
    • 3.2A corpus-informed analysis of English, German and Croatian terms
    • 3.3Conceptual divergence: Possibly divergent interpretations of right of withdrawal in different languages
  • 4.Conclusions and directions for future research
  • Notes
  • References
  • Appendix
Available under the Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives (CC BY-ND) 4.0 license.

For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at [email protected].

Published online: 1 December 2023
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/hot.3.ter11
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