The qualities needed for a legal translator
A professional
translator who specializes in legal and legal translation does so because he
likes the law and its issues. It must also combine the qualities that will
enable it to carry out good legal translations:
·
Know how to
search for and choose the appropriate legal terms that correspond precisely to
those used in the source text.
·
If the exact
term does not exist in the target language, be able to transcribe the author's
intention.
·
Never neglect
the details, which can be of paramount importance in a legal text such as a
contract. Understand that the way you express yourself in a legal
framework may be different from a natural language.
·
And of
course, have some knowledge of the legal and regulatory systems in place in
both countries.
Added to this are the qualities common to translators in
general, including rigour and the ability to improve
productivity.
Several types of legal translations
Clients who delegate their legal translation to a translation
agency do so for sometimes very different
purposes. The texts to be transcribed are therefore varied.
The translator is
expected to know the different types of documents and to translate them
independently. Without being a professional lawyer, the translator must
nevertheless know how to produce a document that will be legally recognized if
necessary.
Each type of
document - contract, terms and conditions, statutes, etc. - has its own lexicon
that must be identified. Some of these documents can only receive a valid
translation if it is made by a sworn translator, such as official acts.
Sometimes a client
may ask the translator to provide a certificate, without it being a sworn
translation. This is sometimes the case for translations of report
cards. It is up to the translator to decide whether he agrees to provide
this certificate, the best of course to discuss it beforehand.
Different legal environments
One of the biggest challenges
of legal translationis transposing a text from one legal system
to another. In a European context, this difficulty will not be the most
difficult. The legal frameworks of Member States are relatively similar,
and languages sometimes very close. The crops are also neighbouring.
The level of requirement
increases by one notch for the translation of a text between aCommon Law jurisdiction and a
continental law. Forciori, legal translation to or from Chinese can be even more
challenging. However, situations where these difficulties will actually
arise are only specific cases
