Legal translation, what is it?

The term legal translation refers to the translation of any text used in the legal system. Since documents used for legal purposes are usually required to be presented in the official language of the relevant jurisdiction, the term can cover a wide variety of texts. A wide variety of sources of information can also be subject to legal translation depending on what they have learned in the context of their treatment of procedural actions. Typically, legal translation services are provided only by specialists in this field, since incorrect translations, especially contracts, can have significant financial and legal consequences.

The means of regulating legal translators vary from country to country. In many countries, specific degrees in legal and business translation are required. Some states allow the use of public translators, while most states, provide that legal translators give legal vows and are centrally tested for knowledge to ensure skill and good practice. In addition, in some countries require that legal translations are notarized (certified) by an appropriate legal professional.

There are cases when the state does not strictly require accreditation for a person performing a translation intended for use in a legal context, it really depends on the case. In such countries, the absence of central regulation is biased by independent bodies that offer their own qualifications and membership as an accreditation tool that serves as a comparative quality test.

It is important that customers who hope to use a legal translator guarantee that candidates have a demonstrable legal and linguistic understanding of the languages ​​used both in the original document (source code) and in the translated material (target text). The possibilities of the proposed interpreter can be established, given their certification, their qualifications, and their relative experience in this field. If a legal translator does not have experience in working with any version of a legal document, he can make mistakes, which in turn will have consequences for customers.

Legal translations present specific problems to interpreters because of the relationship between the source code and specific legal and cultural agreements of the jurisdiction in which it occurred. Providing literal translations as such of the source code can lead to target texts that will not be able to convey the exact rights and obligations set forth by the source. This lack of comparability can have important legal ramifications that will lead to undesirable consequences. Therefore, the translator must consider many factors before taking the job. And also struggling with random linguistic gaps and structural differences, between input and output languages, the translator must consider culturally dependent textual changes. A legal translator needs to work, given the many standards of cultural and social equivalence, rather than providing a simple verbatim linguistic translation so as not to lose an important legal context and consequence from the source text. Thus, a legal translator will often support the functionality and meaning of the source text rather than focusing on the relative comparability of individual terms or words within the text.

Translation of frequently used legal terminology

Often legal professionals (many of whom are unfamiliar with the terminology typical of translation theory) will request a literal translation from a professional legal interpreter. This term usually implies full accuracy, it is not necessarily applicable to legal translation. A literal verbatim translation could lack the cultural and legal context of the target language and therefore could not convey the above rights and responsibilities set forth in the source text.

To achieve the relevant translations, the translator will often use a reputable bilingual legal dictionary. While the corresponding directories are numerous and there are now online legal dictionaries, it is important that the translator guarantees the veracity of these tools, since many have questionable quality, and this is of utmost importance in order to avoid mistakes in the translation process.

Legal translation, what is it? обновлено: November 2, 2017 автором: azurit