A last-minute stop-press announcement… This Friday, 27 June 2014, from 11 am to 5 pm, the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies in London, England, is holding a symposium entitled Law and Language: Legislative Drafting and Translation. 

The draft programme is as follows:

1st Theme: Multilingual Legal Systems

Challenges and benefits for legal systems which operate in more than one language

11:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m. (each speaker: 20-minute talk +10 minutes for questions)

Chair: Hayley Rogers, Office of Parliamentary Counsel

Speakers
Professor Thomas Glyn Watkin , University of Cardiff Bilingual Legislation: Ambiguity, Awareness and Attitudes

Andrè Michelle Labelle, International Court of Justice
 What ever happened to legislative translation in Canada?

1:00 – 2:00 p.m. Lunch

2nd Theme: Translation and EU Texts

The EU institutions function in 24 languages but to some extent English serves as a lingua franca. Is EU English a separate variety of English?

2:00 – 3:30 p.m. (each speaker: 20-minute talk +10 minutes for questions)

Chair: Jonathan Teasdale, Sir William Dale Fellow, Institute of Advanced Legal Studies

Speakers
William Robinson Associate Research Fellow, Institute of Advanced Legal Studies The lingua franca of the EU

Ingemar Strandvik, European Commission Translation Directorate-General Translation quality at the European Commission

Manuela Guggeis, Legal Service of the Council of the European Union Legal linguistic quality of EU legislation

3rd Theme: Legal Translation and Language

Linguistic and textual features of special-purpose texts and their function in specialized translation

3:45 – 4:45 p.m. (each speaker: 20-minute talk +10 minutes for questions)

Chair: Jules Winterton, Director of the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies

Speakers
Professor Maurizio Gotti, University of Bergamo Linguistic features of legal texts: translation issues

Professor Silvia Ferreri, University of Turin (Topic: To be confirmed)

Concluding remarks

4:45 – 5:00 p.m.
 Speakers: Helen Xanthaki, Academic Director- Sir William Dale Centre
Giulia Adriana Pennisi, University of Palermo

For further details and registration, please click here.