Technology and Tradition in Port Wine Making and Marketing Terminology

Abstract

This research project was inspired by the increasing importance wine trade has acquired on the economic scene worldwide. In particular, the most traded and renowned Portuguese wine is port, whose history dates back to the 17th century. In its producing country, this long tradition brought about a related special language very rich in popular influences. Research was therefore undertaken to verify whether port language is domain-specific as opposed to the more general Portuguese terminology of wine-making. As Italy and Portugal are both wineproducing countries, this research aimed also at comparing wine terminology in Italian and Portuguese, creating a term collection and finding possible translating solutions for port domain-specific terms. The starting point was a visit to the port production areas. Interviews with local wine makers and marketing technicians were carried out and recorded on tape to be analysed from a terminological viewpoint. The information gathered was used as teaching material during the 2004/2005 academic course of Portuguese-Italian Liaison Interpreting 2 in the third year of the degree in Translation and Interpreting at the University of Trieste in order to train future interpreters to handle domain-specific terminology.