The standardized translation of academic terms provides a basis for sharing and exchanging academic knowledge. One of the important functions performed by National Academy for Educational Research is to support the promotion and development of the unified and standardized translation of academic terms. However, since there has been a persistent shortage of systematic tools used to organize academic disciplines in terms of knowledge content, classification of academic terms has been criticized for a lack of validated reference standards. For this reason duplicate translations of the same term occur, and certain fields of study have been ignored or excluded from the present knowledge systems. Therefore, in order to enhance the effectiveness of translation of academic terms, this study aims to construct a preliminary classification structure for all academic disciplines.
Considering the overall comprehensiveness of the proposed classification structure, both the bottom-up and top-down approaches are employed in this study. To begin with, the researcher selected classification scheme which seems to fit for the purpose of the study in light of the current understanding of the established classification schemes for categorizing all academic disciplines. Next, analyses were conducted to compare various extant knowledge classification schemes and different education-related statistics found in a range of resources. Afterwards, on the basis of existing categories of NAER's committees and by means of collecting existing subject classification structures to induce and analyze the content for structure, in order to generate the classification structure. According to the output of the above process, questionnaires designed to survey experts' opinions about established classification structure were conducted to ensure the completeness and comprehensiveness of the categories. And then the established classification structure is verified for its applicability by feeding academic terms into it. Through this process, it is proven that the classification structure is helpful in the domain of academic terms translation.
The classification structure this paper has put forward not only can be used as a basis for categorizing academic terms that have been translated and forming of the primary reference for glossaries and dictionaries of terminology, but it will also contribute to the prioritization of translations done in different subject fields. Furthermore, such a classification framework can be used as a guideline for terminology experts to follow, in cases such as reorganizing the existing terminology translation and review committees or setting up new ones. It can also be a guideline for the recruitment of qualified committee members. It is hoped that a wider application of this classification framework will facilitate cross-strait exchanges of academic terminology translations and provide a communication platform for professionals of all fields.