Predicaments of Legal Terminology Translation of EU-Georgia Association Agreement

Abstract

The paper examines terminology translation problems in the EU-Georgia Association Agreement using examples from a custom-built corpus at Batumi Shota Rustaveli State University. While experts recommend avoiding term variation for clarity (Strandvik 2012; DGT 2015; Bajčić & Martinović 2018; Kordić 2020), the study argues that variation in EU texts may not always cause inconsistency in Georgian. For example, English terms counterfeiting, forging, and false converge into one Georgian term, გაყალბება [gaq’albeba], without loss of accuracy. Similarly, circumvention and evasion both translate as სანქციებისგან თავის არიდება [sank̕c̕iebisgan t̕avis arideba], preserving meaning. This shows that quasi-synonymous variants in English can be rendered by one Georgian equivalent. The paper also stresses the need for pre-translational analysis and referencing of terminological resources to capture conceptual distinctions. Misuse of convergence and approximation as synonyms, or mistranslating Anti-Circumvention Mechanism as Anti-Counterfeiting Mechanism, demonstrate how neglecting contextual analysis can distort meaning.