Semi-automatic Term Extraction for the African Languages, with Special Reference to Northern Sotho *

Abstract: Worldwide, semi-automatically extracting terms from corpora is becoming the norm for the compilation of terminology lists, term banks or dictionaries for special purposes. If Africanlanguage terminologists are willing to take their rightful place in the new millennium, they must not only take cognisance of this trend but also be ready to implement the new technology. In this article it is advocated that the best way to do the latter two at this stage, is to opt for computationally straightforward alternatives (i.e. use 'raw corpora') and to make use of widely available software tools (e.g. WordSmith Tools). The main aim is therefore to discover whether or not the semiautomatic extraction of terminology from untagged and unmarked running text by means of basic corpus query software is feasible for the African languages. In order to answer this question a fullblown case study revolving around Northern Sotho linguistic texts is discussed in great detail. The computational results are compared throughout with the outcome of a manual excerption, and vice versa. Attention is given to the concepts 'recall' and 'precision'; different approaches are suggested for the treatment of single-word terms versus multi-word terms; and the various findings are summarised in a Linguistics Terminology lexicon presented as an Appendix. Keywords: TERMINOLOGY, TERMINOGRAPHY, MANUAL EXCERPTION, READING AND MARKING, SEMI-AUTOMATIC TERM EXTRACTION, RETRIEVAL, AFRICAN LANGUAGES, NORTHERN SOTHO (SEPEDI), RAW CORPORA, PRETORIA SEPEDI CORPUS (PSC), WORDSMITH TOOLS, WEIRDNESS RATIO, KEY WORD, LOG-LIKELIHOOD, RECALL, PRECISION, MOTHER TERM, SINGLE-WORD TERM, MULTI-WORD TERM, STEM, ROOT, KEY-WORD-IN-CONTEXT (KWIC), COLLOCATION, COLLOCATE, LEXICAL GAP, CLUSTER, LINGUISTICS TERMINOLOGY LEXICON Senaganwa: Go ntshwa ga mareo ka tiriso ya seripa sa semotshene malebanale maleme a Afrika, sedi ye kgolo e lego Sesotho sa Leboa (Sepedi). Gontshwa ga mareo ka tiriso ya seripa sa semotshene go tswa ka gare ga dikhophase go thomile go ba setlwaedi go hlangweng ga mananeo a mareo, dipanka tsa mareo goba dipukuntsu mererong yeo eitsego lefaseng ka bophara. Ge e le gore boramareo ba maleme a Afrika ba ikemiseditse go tseamadulo a bona mo mileneamong wo mofsa, ga ba swanela go hlokomela fela tsela ye, eupsa baswanetse gape ke go ikemisetsa go dirisa theknolotsi ye mphsa. Mo taodiswaneng ye go hlaloswagore mo nakong ye, tsela ye kaone ya go dira dilo tse pedi tse go boletswego ka tsona ke go kgethaditlhamolo tsa thwii tseo di dirisago khomphutha (se se ra gore tshomiso ya khophase) le gosomisa ditlabakelo tsa software (bj.k. WordSmith Tools) tseo di lego gona gohle. Ka fao maikemisetsoa magolo ke go humana ge e ka ba go ntshwa ga mareo ka seripa sa semotshene go tswa ka gare gakhophase yeo e se nago ditlaleletso tseo di tseneletsego ka masakaneng, tsa go hlahla, go kadiriswa malemeng a Afrika goba aowa. Gore re kgone go araba potsiso ye, go hlalositswe katsinkelo mohlala wa taba ya go nyakisiswa yeo e amanego le diteng tsa thutapolelo tsa Sesotho saLeboa. Dipoelo tseo di humanwego ka go dirisa khomphutha di bapetswa ka gohle le dipoelo tseodi humanwego ge go diriswa kgetho ya mantsu ka matsogo. Sedi e fiwa dikgopolo tsa kgakologelo(recall) le nepagalo (precision); mekgwa yeo e fapafapanego e a akanywa gore e kgone go hlathollamareo a lentsu le tee ge a bapetswa le mareo a mantsu a mantsi; gomme dikhumano tseo difapanego di akaretswa ka gare ga pukuntsu ya Mareo a Thutapolelo yeo e tsweletswago bjalo kaMamatletso. Mantsu a bohlokwa: MAREO, MONGWALO WA MAREO, KGETHO YA MANTSU KAMATSOGO, GO BALA LE GO SWAYA, GO NTSHWA GA MAREO KA SERIPA SA SEMOTSHENE,GO HWETSA GAPE, MALEME A AFRIKA, SESOTHO SA LEBOA (SEPEDI),DISEGONTSU (DIKHOPHASE), KHOPHASE YA SESOTHO SA LEBOA YA TSHWANE (KST),WORDSMITH TOOLS, WEIRDNESS RATIO, LENTSU LA BOHLOKWA, LOG-LIKELIHOOD,KGAKOLOGELO, NEPAGALO, LEREO LA MOTHEO, LEREO LA LENTSU LE TEE, LEREO LAMANTSU A MANTSI, KUTU, MODU, LENTSU LA BOHLOKWA KA GARE GA KAMANO(LBGK), PEAKANYO, BEAKANYA, TLHOKEGO YA LEREO, SEHLOPHA, PUKUNTSU YAMAREO A THUTAPOLELO