In January 2025, UIC’s terminology activities resumed after a few months’ break. On 7 May 2025, the UIC Terminology Group came together with great enthusiasm for its annual meeting, with the members reviewing the work accomplished and outlining the strategy for the future.

This restart also offers an opportunity to provide a refresher about a few principles of terminology, as well as insight into the related activities within UIC.

What is terminology?
The word terminology is polysemous, which means it has multiple meanings. On one hand, it refers to a set of specialised words (called terms) specific to a particular field, whether this is art, engineering, medicine, law, or any other area of expertise. On the other hand, terminology is also a branch of applied linguistics focused on studying concepts (essentially trying to answer the question “What is it?”) and determining which terms should be used to talk about these concepts with specialised language.

In some ways, general and specialised language are contrasting. The former is what we use in daily life, where speakers have the freedom to shape it as they wish by picking up new slang, changing meanings, or inventing new words. Specialised language, though, is used within a specific group of people and aims to ensure precise, unambiguous communication in a given field. This type of language follows specific rules to ensure clear understanding. For example, it is important to first organise the concepts in question based on their different relationships and dependencies, and only then identify the most appropriate terms to label them.

That said, the boundaries between general and specialised language are not always sharply defined, and this is completely normal as language is always evolving. In fact, this fluidity is a sign of a healthy, adaptive language, capable of expressing new ideas and concepts. Think of the relationship between the two like a chocolate chip biscuit, where the chocolate chips represent the terms, but they are still embedded in the dough (the general language), whose syntax and vocabulary are necessary to form sentences in specialised language. As a result of this close connection, some words shift from general language to specialised fields and vice versa. For this reason, do not be surprised if you hear someone in physics talking about “colour force”. While they might be chatting about their last colour analysis session, they are more likely discussing a property of quarks in particle physics.

To make sure communication works smoothly in any specific field, we need help from two sides: experts from the field, who provide the in-depth knowledge, and linguists (or terminologists) who help organise that knowledge into clear, structured language. While it’s possible for experts to work without a terminologist, they may struggle with clarity and understanding, as they might use different terms for the same concept and lose time clarifying what they mean. On the other hand, a terminologist working independently may lack the detailed understanding of the field. Why choose one when you can have both?

Terminology activities at UIC
UIC contributes to harmonising railway practices to meet its members’ operational needs. Using the right terminology in technical reference documents is therefore paramount for ensuring that experts communicate clearly and understand each other effectively across multiple languages, especially on topics with critical safety implications.

Multilingual railway terminology is available on the UIC terminology database, RailLexic Online (RLO). The tool has railway terms and useful information, such as the fields they are used in, certain definitions, and even geographical variants. Plus, RLO is available in 24 languages, with plans to add even more.

The UIC terminologist supports IRS working groups in managing terms and definitions effectively. Best practice is to involve the terminologist from the very beginning of the drafting process to ensure the correct terminology is used from the start, and consistency is maintained throughout the document. When the terminology is clear and consistent, the proofreading process is also more streamlined.

If you have any terminology-related questions along the way, please do not hesitate to contact the terminologist at raillexic at uic.org.