Tag: Greek legal language
Reviewing a GR-EN/EN-GR legal glossary
By John O 'Shea on February 21, 2019 in Book Review, books on legal translation, English legal language and terminology, Greek legal language and terminology, Legal dictionaries, legal language, Legal terminology, Legal Translation, Μεταφράσεις νομικών κειμένων, Νομική μετάφραση
Ius et Translatum: English-Greek / Greek-English Legal Glossary – A review
Marta Chromá has written that "legal translation implies both a comparative study of different legal systems and an awareness of the problems created by the absence of equivalent concepts, legal institutions, terms and other linguistic units. As pointed out by Kischel … 'the question in legal translation is not which translation is right, but more modestly, which one is less wrong'"[1].Continue Reading..
Greek legal language Greek legal terminology Legal Dictionaries Legal language Legal translation νομικα μεταφ νομικές μεταφράσεις
Challenges in legal translation as seen by an international lawyer
By John O 'Shea on October 5, 2018 in books on legal translation, Dictionaries, English legal language and terminology, Greek legal language and terminology, Greek penal code, Hellenic Civil Code, Hellenic Code of Civil Procedure, Legal dictionaries, legal language, Legal linguistics, Legal Translation, translation of legal documents, Μεταφράσεις νομικών κειμένων, Νομική μετάφραση
Launching a new series of interviews with legal translators and experts in the field of legal translation, we have an interview with Eleni Nanaki, Attorney at Law LL.M – author and publisher of the bilingual legal glossaries in the ius et translatum series who talks to us about challenges in legal translation as seen by an international lawyer…Continue Reading..
Greek legal language Greek legal terminology Greek legal translation Hellenic Civil Code Hellenic Code of Civil Procedure Legal Dictionaries Legal translation translation of legal documents νομικές μεταφράσεις
Talks on legal translation and court interpreting
By John O 'Shea on October 4, 2018 in legal language, Legal Translation, translation of legal documents, Μεταφράσεις νομικών κειμένων, Νομική μετάφραση
A couple of interesting talks on legal translation and court interpreting are coming up in the next few days and weeks…Continue Reading..
Court Interpreting Greek legal language Hellenic Code of Civil Procedure Legal language Legal translation legal translators
CULTURAL INCONSISTENCIES IN LEGAL TRANSLATION
By John O 'Shea on April 20, 2016 in Greek language, Greek legal language and terminology, Hellenic Civil Code, Legal terminology, Legal Translation
A legal text always reflects a specific national legal system, in the sense that it is based on the laws, rules and regulations of that legal system. Any national legal system is, in turn, culture-based, since it is created in accordance with the needs of a specific culture and aims to ensure harmonious co-existence between the members of that culture. In this sense, law is an integral component of culture. Since no two cultures are identical, no national legal system can be identical to another, even if both of them belong to the same legal family. The logical consequence of this simple fact, and one that is of course anticipated by professional legal translators, is that difficulties and challenges are bound to come up while transferring a legal text's message from one national legal system to another, due to the differences and non-equivalences between the respective legal systems. These differences and inconsistencies are, of course, also reflected in the legal language, which is the means of expressing the national law.
The differences therefore between the source culture and the target culture create inconsistencies in legal texts. There are different kinds of inconsistencies, but in this post we are going to talk about what is perhaps the most common kind of inconsistency that can be found in legal texts, one that arises due to the non-existence of a culture's realia (institutions, concepts and systems) in another culture. This type of inconsistency is called factual inconsistency. I wonder if there is a professional legal translator who hasn't encountered terms, phrases or concepts in legal texts that refer to realia that exist in the source culture, while no equivalent realia exist in the target culture. An example of a factual inconsistency that I recently encountered while translating an English legal text into Greek is the term "fiduciary". This general term, that can be found in Common Law systems, refers to the person that somebody entrusted with the management of their affairs. The individual who acts as fiduciary is someone who undertakes to act for the benefit of and on behalf of the person who trusted them in relation to a particular affair. In bilingual English to Greek legal dictionaries the term fiduciary is usually translated as θεματοφύλακας (thematofylakas). The term θεματοφύλακας (thematofylakas) however refers to the contract of deposit under Article 822 of the Greek Civil Code, according to which "the depositary takes delivery from another person of a moveable thing with a view to keeping it subject to the undertaking of restitution upon demand". It doesn't take long for a professional legal translator, who is familiar with the Greek law of obligations, to realise not only that the term fiduciary cannot be translated as θεματοφύλακας (thematofylakas) in Greek, since a fiduciary relationship does not include only guarding a moveable thing, but also that there isn't really an equivalent term or concept in the Greek legal system with exactly the same meaning and an identical content.
The next question that logically comes up is how should a legal translator tackle these inconsistencies?
We will try and give an answer to this question in a future post. In the meantime, you can read more about inconsistencies in legal texts and the legal translator's approach in this article by Stefanos Vlachopoulos in Greek or in this one by Radegundis Stolze in English.
Greek legal language Greek legal terminology Greek legal translation Legal language Legal translation
Experts talk about legal translation (10)
By John O 'Shea on November 11, 2015 in Legal terminology, Legal Translation, Legal Translation Quotes
It would seem therefore that legal translation is, at best, an approximation. Indeed, many lawyers acknowledge that this is so and that equal meaning and exact translations between legal texts are illusions that cannot be achieved in practice. Thus, many claim that the task of the legal translator is 'to make the foreign legal text accessible for recipients with a different (legal) background'. However, that claim only works with regard to texts that do not have force of law in the target language.
Karen McAuliffe: Translating Ambiguity,The Journal of Comparative Law, Vol 9(2)
Greek legal language Greek legal translation
E-GOVERNMENT GLOSSARY
By John O 'Shea on October 29, 2015 in Dictionaries, English legal language and terminology, Greek legal language and terminology, Legal dictionaries, Legal Translation
The University of the Aegean's Department of Information & Communication Systems Engineering has recently released a GR-EN / EN-GR glossary of e-Government terms.
To view it click here: http://icsdweb.aegean.gr/project/lexiko/
Greek legal language Legal Dictionaries
EU General Court judgment in joined cases T-124/13
By John O 'Shea on September 29, 2015 in EU law
EU court ruling removes special treatment for specific more widely-spoken European languages
Last week (24/9/2015) the General Court of the European Union handed down its Judgment in Cases T-124/13 Italy v Commission and T-191/13 Spain v Commission.
This ruling annuls 3 competition notices to recruit personnel published by the European Personnel Selection Office (EPSO) which required candidates for the EU jobs it was advertising to choose English, French or German as their second language and as the language of communication with EPSO.
Candidates needed to have 1 official EU language plus 'satisfactory knowledge' of a second language to be chosen by each candidate from English, French or German'. That second language would be used in communications with EPSO and in the selection procedure itself. EPSO asserted that these restrictions on the number of languages were justified to promote greater efficiency in day-to-day work, otherwise with an excessive range of EU languages effective functioning of the EU institutions would be impaired.
Italy and Spain, whose languages didn't receive 'preferential' treatment complained to the General Court. They essentially argued that the EPSO notices discriminated against them, infringed the EU's language regime contained in Regulation No 1 of 1958 and disregarded the principle of proportionality. Italy argued that European citizens have the right to address the EU Institutions using any one of the official languages, and that they have the right to receive answers from the Institutions in the same language. Spain added that in practice, that restriction on languages provided all candidates whose first language is one of the three languages mentioned above with a competitive advantage.
The General Court's judgment has now annulled the 3 notices. The court argued that even if the Institutions can adopt details rules governing the language regime in their internal rules, the Institutions concerned by the contested notices did not use that option. Competition notices cannot be regarded as internal rules. The notices fell within the scope of Regulation No 1 and infringe it because they limit correspondence with EPSO to the three languages mentioned. That is sufficient in itself to justify the 3 notices being annulled, without there being any need to examine whether they give rise to unlawful discrimination on grounds of language.
Candidates are entitled to choose the language in which to draft the application form from any of the official languages and that correspondence from EPSO must also be written in the language chosen by candidates.
The General Court also said in relation to the use of a small number of languages for the competition itself constitutes discrimination on grounds of language. It is clear that such a requirement favours certain potential candidates since they can participate in the competition and be recruited as EU officials, whereas the others who do not have such knowledge are excluded.
According to the General Court, the claim that English, French or German remain the most widely used languages is a vague statement not supported by any specific evidence. In its view the obligation for candidates to choose English, French or German as a second language is not objectively justified or proportionate to the objective pursued by the Commission, namely to recruit officials and agents who are immediately operational.
… an interesting judgment that seems to confirm the existing EU principle that all official languages within the Union are of equal importance, no matter how few speakers they have.
The judgment is not yet available in Greek or English.
Source: http://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/2015-09/cp150107en.pdf
Greek legal language
Legal Translation: Continuities or discontinuities in Greek legal language
By John O 'Shea on March 24, 2015 in Greek language, Greek legal language and terminology, Legal linguistics, Legal Translation
Continuities or discontinuities in Greek legal language 1974-2014
In the field of Greek-English legal translation, the legal translator often has to deal with older, purist Greek texts. In legal translation, the translator must be keenly aware of the shift from purist to demotic Greek.Continue Reading..
Greek language Greek legal language Greek legal terminology
Legal terminology and Ottoman land law
By John O 'Shea on March 11, 2015 in Greek language, Greek legal language and terminology, Legal terminology, Legal Translation
The last two posts have raised the issue of Ottoman land-holdings in Greece and the relevant Greek legal terminology involved which GR-EN legal translators may not be aware about because of the Turkish roots of the words.
Greek legal language Greek legal terminology Greek legal translation
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