Today’s post is especially for the French speakers among you. The juricourriels (literally translated ‘legal emails’) are an initiative of the Centre de ressources en français juridique at the Université de Saint-Boniface in Canada to encourage those in the legal sector to read, on a regular basis, a short text of a legal nature highlighting a term or expression, a legal concept, a mini-glossary (FR/EN), or a legal summary. They relate in particular to the Canadian legal context, but may well be of interest to all those working with French.
Monthly Archives: March 2013
Euro-English at the European Parliament
Thanks to Jeffrey Waggoner (@WagLegalEnglish) for the heads-up about this thought-provoking video on Euro-English at the European Parliament, from the Open University’s OpenLearn program (see this post).
Here are a few of the points the video covers:
- The ‘hegemony’ of English as lingua franca
- People choosing to speak a ‘primary’ language for more impact
- Language conveys values – choice of language is not neutral
- The added difficulty for interpreters of non-native speakers not saying what they mean but what they are able to say
- Is Euro-English a jargon or a new language?
- Maybe even native English speakers will have to learn Euro-English in order not to alienate listeners.
Monday smiles – Naming laws in Iceland
Today I welcome a tongue-in-cheek guest post from Kevin Underhill, of the great legal humor blog Lowering the Bar that I posted about here. Over to you, Kevin!
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The Reykjavik District Court has ruled that a 15-year-old Icelandic girl can legally use the first name “Blaer,” reversing a contrary decision by government officials. Iceland has strict naming laws that require, among other things, that names fit standard grammar and pronunciation rules and be gender-appropriate. According to the report, the relevant committee refused to approve Blaer Bjarkardottir’s first name because she is a girl and the panel viewed the name as “too masculine.”
Guest post – Reporting from the Justice Interpreting seminar
Today Marta Stelmaszak is reporting from the seminar “Justice Interpreting: the Need for Quality Standards” held in London on 23 February last (see here). Marta is a Polish translator and interpreter from the UK and is “devoted to constant development”, including through her involvement on the Management Committee of the Chartered Institute of Linguists and her great blog. Over to you, Marta!
Legal Chinese course (in Italian)
Italian speakers may be very interested to know that an introductory one-day course on legal Chinese will be held on 20 April 2013 in Milan, Italy, at the Centro Shaolin.
The course is intended both for legal professionals working internationally and translators.
Guest post – Differences between English and US law: choose your words carefully
Today’s guest post is by Scott J. Arrington, a partner in the law firm McDermott Will & Emery in the United States. He represents clients in connection with infrastructure development, acquisitions, dispositions and financings, with a focus on international projects in the oil and gas, petrochemical, power and mining industries.
Scott has a particuarly linguistic bent, since he speaks Mandarin Chinese and Spanish as well as English.
Monday smiles – Spots before the eyes
Hope you like this one to start your week off!
European Unified Patent Court agreement signed and sealed
According to a recent press release of the Council of the European Union, the agreement to establish a Unified Patent Court has now been signed.
From Words to Deeds: translation & the law 
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