Session

Within a natural language, as many legal languages exist as legal systems that use this natural language. Consequently, legal translation implies translation from one ‘source language legal system’ to a specific ‘target language legal system’. This has huge consequences on legal translation. Therefore, the course will first deal with legal translation and its relationship with comparative law.

We will deal with the search for an equivalent in the target language legal system for a term from the source language legal system. We will also discuss subsidiary solutions, e.g. neologisms. In legal translation, a neologism can be a word that does not exist in the target language legal system but exists in another legal system that uses the same natural language.

Another paramount topic is the protection of minority languages and the use of these languages in the judiciary as provided by Article 9 of the European Charter for Regional and Minority Languages. We will explain the systems of protection of languages under the Charter and discuss the difficulties in implementing the obligations set forth in Art. 9. Special attention will be given to protected languages that do not have an established legal vocabulary. In that case, it is key to develop a comprehensive legal vocabulary in the minority language to be able to fulfil certain obligations under the Charter.

The approach to developing a legal terminology in a minority language differs considerably depending on whether the minority language is used as a legal language in another jurisdiction (e.g. German) or is a unique language which is not a legal language in any jurisdiction (e.g. Ladin). However, there is also a category in between: if the language is as such unique (e.g. Papiamentu in the island Bonaire) but contains many terms used in or similar to languages used in the same or other jurisdictions (for Papiamentu: Dutch and Spanish).

It is of paramount importance to develop a bilingual legal dictionary between a minority language and the majority language of the jurisdiction involved. We will discuss the criteria that should be met by such dictionaries. Special attention will be given to the challenges and opportunities of on-line bilingual legal dictionaries.

The course is for legal and translation or interpreting professionals, scholars and students and anyone interested in minority language protection.