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Most of mathematical texts I read are in English, which is not my native language. When I learn a new concept, I often don't know how to translate it to Polish. Sometimes, although rarely, it's the other way around. Can I ask here what a translation of a term is? If so, how should I do this? I think a question entitled "How do you say group-bound semigroup in Polish" would be definitely much too specific.

I thought it could be possible to try to create some CW questions like "Dictionary of Measure Theory Terms" or "Dictionary of Ring Theory", which people could edit to add terms in different languages (with usage notes if necessary). They could be split into parts when they get too large.

Do you think it's a good idea? If not, how would you go about it?

EDIT. I just thought that if we created such "questions", the "answers" could be used to ask actual questions about some particular terms.

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  • $\begingroup$ Since we recently had two questions related to this topic, I thought that creating languages might be a good idea - meta.SO has such tag. $\endgroup$
    – Martin Sleziak
    Jun 28, 2012 at 14:47
  • $\begingroup$ I tried to search whether we already have some posts which are of this type or at least related. I found these: What resources are there for learning Russian math terminology? and When does variété mean manifold?. $\endgroup$
    – Martin Sleziak
    Jun 28, 2012 at 14:55
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    $\begingroup$ I have to ask, how do you call Polish groups/spaces/etc. in Polish? :-) $\endgroup$
    – Asaf Karagila Mod
    Jun 28, 2012 at 17:00
  • $\begingroup$ @AsafKaragila The same as in English, "grupy/przestrzenie polskie". :-) $\endgroup$
    – user23211
    Jun 28, 2012 at 17:04
  • $\begingroup$ Another question related to translating mathematical term: Translation from French. $\endgroup$
    – Martin Sleziak
    Jun 29, 2012 at 12:59
  • $\begingroup$ @ymar You've suggested that we build some kind of collaboratively edited dictionary for mathematics here. Perhaps before doing so, we could ask whether there already are some dictionaries which can be edited by users and which are (preferably) specialized on science. I think this would be an appropriate question to ask on the main site. (Maybe even something which is not devoted exclusively to science topics would be reasonable.) $\endgroup$
    – Martin Sleziak
    Jul 1, 2012 at 4:39
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    $\begingroup$ I don't think developing math dictionaries here would be a good idea, since to some extent I think it would be reinventing the wheel as far as the major mathematical languages are concerned. I agree with Martin that it would be better to list scientific (if not specifically mathematical) dictionaries that are already published or available online. Personally I find it pretty convenient to look up the English wikipedia page on a topic and then just scroll the left margin to another foreign language to find out the name for that term in that language, but there is not always such a page. $\endgroup$
    – KCd
    Jul 5, 2012 at 1:59
  • $\begingroup$ @KCd That's the problem. I also use the Wikipedia option quite a lot but it often doesn't work. I haven't found anything close to complete on the web as English-Polish translation goes. I rarely have to look up terms in other languages, but when I do, I often have trouble too. $\endgroup$
    – user23211
    Jul 5, 2012 at 15:41
  • $\begingroup$ @MartinSleziak I see that you have asked this question. I'll add a link. $\endgroup$
    – user23211
    Jul 5, 2012 at 15:44

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