Foreign cultures and languages have fascinated Sr. Carola Maria Tremmel since her childhood. After finishing high school, she traveled to Argentina for six months as part of the “Aus(lands)zeit” project of the Schoenstatt Sisters of Mary and got to know the Schoenstatt Movement there. Shortly afterwards, in 2007, she joined the community of the Sisters of Mary. In addition, she studied translation and with her thesis won the 2021 sponsorship prize of the German association Deutscher Terminologie-Tag, which promotes terminology work. For more than five years she has been working on the development of a terminology database for the Schoenstatt Movement.

Here is what Sister Carola Maria said about her work in an interview conducted by the Communications Department in Schoenstatt Argentina.

What is the project you are presenting to us today?

The new Terminology Portal is a platform that invites you to discover the vocabulary of the International Schoenstatt Movement in various languages and to contribute to the continuous development of a common database with Schoenstatt terms. If enough volunteers come forward to work collaboratively in different languages, this portal can be created in German, English, French, Italian, Malayalam, Polish, Portuguese, Romanian, Spanish, Tamil, Czech, Hungarian and Vietnamese.

How did this idea come about?

While conducting a survey in my own community in 2019, I realized that translators hardly exchange information with each other and that Schoenstatt’s core concepts are translated differently in the same language.

Although vocabulary lists for typical Schoenstatt concepts already existed, they were generally not updated or followed up. This meant that the conceptual equivalents developed during the translations could not be reused.

Faced with this scenario I asked myself: Couldn’t we collaborate more effectively, learning and benefiting from each other?

At the same time, during my studies I discovered that this practice already exists in industrial companies. There, coordinated teamwork is used to create a multilingual entry for a terminology database, which is then useful for international interlinked companies when translating specialized texts. In my final thesis, I elaborated a model for developing such a process in my own community, based on selected methods. In this way, I wanted my dream of worldwide collaboration to become a reality.

Who is the target group?

Primarily to all those who are interested in our Schoenstatt spirituality and who read or write texts in one or more languages.

It is also aimed at those who wish to contribute to the creation of this database. Knowledge of the German language is an advantage to join as a collaborator because this is the mother tongue of the founder Fr. Joseph Kentenich and his wording has marked the original Schoenstatt terminology.

What is the main objective?

The development of this common terminology database is intended to contribute to improve and strengthen the growing international communication of our Schoenstatt Family worldwide in the future.

This process promotes worldwide teamwork and fosters a fruitful exchange on the use of language. For example, terminology already developed could be stored in the database and made available to users. This would avoid duplicate work and reduce the time required for translation.

In addition, this portal could encourage a more consistent use of terminology, improve the quality of communication and benefit wide circles of target audiences.

Ultimately, the new Terminology Portal aims to contribute to Father Kentenich’s message being authentically received, understood and transmitted in diverse cultural and linguistic areas.

How to access?

You will be able to access the portal with a personal user account through the website https://schoenstatt-terminologie.kalcium.cloud/login. Interested parties can contact me via the e-mail address below to receive more information or to request a personal account.

I would be happy to have many members of the international Schoenstatt Family to help us further develop the database and hope that many will find it useful.

Contact information:

Translation: Maribel Acaron