As many translators question the future in view of the rise of machine learning, and in the legal domain in particular due to concerns about quality, confidentiality, and reliability of translations, I noted with interest a presentation about legal analytics, and how big data and machine learning is being applied to the tasks that lawyers undertake.
Category Archives: Articles
Article – Japanese legal translation
An excellent short article has just been published in The Linguist, entitled “The law of Japan”, written by Gwen Clayton and looking at “the perks and pitfalls of translating Japanese legal documents into English.
July-August 2014 digest
For those who have been away in the last few weeks, here’s a digest of some key posts from July and August.
You can also browse the blog by using the category list in the left-hand sidebar, or the monthly archives, or with the search box at the top right.
From WikiLeaks to MT-leaks?
On Sunday I had a “Duh” moment when I saw an article entitled “Free machine translation can leak data“, published in TCWorld, a magazine for international information management. I think I can safely say that this doesn’t take any legal translator by surprise (!), nor indeed any other reader of this blog.
Research journal issue on crime fiction (open access)
The latest issue of The Journal of Specialised Translation is now available, including articles on crime fiction in translation, video interviews with crime fiction writers and translators, and reviews.
The journal is well-regarded and aims to create a forum for translators and researchers in specialised translation, to disseminate information, exchange ideas and to provide a dedicated publication outlet. Its issues are open access.
Toubon continued…Advertising language in France
Following last Friday’s post on Chinese moves to protect their language (Echoes of Toubon in China), I came across an interesting article by DLA Piper LLP on advertising in France.
Echoes of Toubon in China
Having been in France during the furore surrounding the “loi Toubon“, enacted in 1994¹ and prohibiting the use of foreign language terms where French equivalents existed , I was fascinated to see a recent BBC News article about controversy in China.
The Unified Patent Court – an oxymoron?
Following Helen Smith’s post reporting from the Oxford unitary patent conference, I was interested to see this article by Franklin Dehousse, Professor (in abeyance) at the University of Liège and judge at the Court of Justice of the European Union (General Court) – The Unified Court on Patents: The New Oxymoron of European Law. The article forms part of the Egmont Papers, published by the Egmont Institute.
Lawyers, designers and access to text
I recently stumbled upon what I feel is a groundbreaking paper by Jay A. Mitchell from Stanford Law School, Putting some product into work-product: corporate lawyers learning from designers.
Google’s T&Cs harder to read than Beowulf
Following on from past posts about readability – Translating through the fog; and The Writer’s Diet test; as well as a great guest post on Lessons in powerful writing (from a lawyer…) – last week I came across some new text analysis software in an article about a browser plug-in called Literatin, which provides a Simple Measure of Gobbledygook (SMOG) score.
Researchers from the University of Nottingham have calculated that the updated version of Google’s latest terms and conditions is harder to read than Beowulf or War and Peace. 😉
From Words to Deeds: translation & the law 
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