Many Languages for a Single Voice: The Heteroglossia of EU Private Law, and the Evolving Legal Cultures of Europe in Barbara Pasa and Lucia Morra (eds.),Translating the DCFR and drafting the CESL A pragmatic perspective , Sellier, 2014, 71-86 (original) (raw)

The Role of EU Legal English in Shaping EU Legal Culture

International Journal of Language & Law (JLL), 2018

There is no denying that a change in the languages and cultures of European law is taking place. Indeed, many scholars speak of a hybridization of legal languages in the EU under the influence of EU legislation (e.g. Koskinen, 2000; Mori, 2011) and the emergence of a new European legal culture due to the Europeanisation of law (Graziadei, 2015). Exploring the interfaces of law, language and culture in the EU, this paper places emphasis on the role of English as a lingua franca in the EU in conceptualizing a common EU legal culture. The alleged neutrality of English and the importance of neutral terminology in EU legal drafting are examined against the backdrop of autonomous concepts of multilingual EU law. Arguing that the relationship of EU and national legal culture should not be framed in terms of opposites, but rest on the ideas of integration and synthesis, the author draws an analogy between the concepts of EU legal culture – construed as “law in action” – and EU citizenship, underlining the important role of the Court of Justice of the EU in shaping EU law and developing autonomous concepts.

EU Legal Culture and Translation, a special issue of The International Journal of Language & Law

This article introduces the special issue of JLL on EU legal culture and translation. The introduction gives an overview of the papers comprised in the special issue and provides the theoretical background to set the scene for the discussion in the papers. The special issue is a follow-up on the panel organised at the Language and Law in a World of Media, Globalisation and Social Conflicts conference at the University of Freiburg. We argue that the EU legal culture is a perfect case in point for the study of the intersection between law and language. Due to the extreme degree of mediation and filtering of law through the EU's official languages, the EU legal culture emerges through translation as a hybrid supranational pan-European construct with mutual dependencies on national legal cultures. The contributions to the special issues address various aspects of the law and language intersection in the EU context: the role of English as the EU's lingua franca, the impact of national legal cultures on legal translation, strategic ambiguity and its interpretation by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), the impact of EU integration on legal languages, and finally, framing and ideology in EU legal translation. Overall, by approaching the EU legal culture from various perspectives, this special issue refines our understanding of how the EU legal culture is affected by multilingual translation.

Law, Language and Multilingualism in Europe: The Call for a New Legal Culture

This paper explores how the culture of the community of lawyers involved in the application of European law in the Member States is changing as a result of efforts to cope with the multilingual dimension of EU law. It is now published in Susan Sarcevic (ed.) Language and Culture in EU Law: Multidisciplinary Perspectives, Ashgate 2015

EU Legal Culture and Translation

This article introduces the special issue of JLL on EU legal culture and translation. The introduction gives an overview of the papers comprised in the special issue and provides the theoretical background to set the scene for the discussion in the papers. The special issue is a follow up on the panel organised at the Language and Law in a World of Media, Globalisation and Social Conflicts conference at the University of Freiburg. We argue that the EU legal culture is a perfect case in point for the study of the intersection between law and language. Due to the extreme degree of mediation and filtering of law through the EU's official languages, the EU legal culture emerges through translation as a hybrid supranational pan-European construct with mutual dependencies on national legal cultures. The contributions to the special issues address various aspects of the law and language intersection in the EU context: the role of English as the EU's lingua franca, the impact of national legal cultures on legal translation, strategic ambiguity and its interpretation by the Court of Justice of the European Union (CJEU), the impact of EU integration on legal languages, and finally, framing and ideology in EU legal translation. Overall, by approaching the EU legal culture from various perspectives, this special issue refines our understanding of how the EU legal culture is affected by multilingual translation.

Law and Language in the European Union

Global Jurist Topics, 2003

In this paper I would like to elaborate on the interaction between law and language. The use of the different (legal) languages of the European Union Member States is one of the most practical and most difficult problems in the process of European integration. In February 2003 the Commission launched an Action Plan on European Contract Law. On of the official aims will be the preparation of a common frame of reference, providing a pan-European terminology and rules. Still not solved is the question, if this common frame of reference will be accessible in all Member State languages or only in some selected languages. This article will reflect the need of a better and more coherent legal language use on a European Union level and describe the linguistic instruments offered by national States and the European Union itself. Heutger: Law and Language in the European Union 3 (en) http://europa.eu.int/comm/consumers/policy/developments/contract\_law/com\_2003\_68\_en.pdf. This Action Plan was result of the process of consultation and discussion about the way in which problems resulting from divergences between national contract laws in the EU should be dealt with at the European level. This initiative dates back to July 2001 when the commission launched a communication on European Contract law.

Multilingual Legal Discourse at the Court of Justice of the European Union

Comparative Legilinguistics, 2020

The European Union is an organisation that uses multiple languages, and its law is no exception. Dealing with over twenty authentic language versions of EU legislation appears to represent an additional challenge in the interpretation of the provisions of the common legal order. Unlike most other works, this article does not focus on the process of interpretation conducted by an adjudicating panel or an Advocate General, but rather on the statements of the parties involved in a dispute, or on the national courts that request a preliminary ruling when referring to multilingualism. This work is divided into two separate parts. Firstly, the author focuses on cases whereby a national court or a party invokes the multilingual character of EU law. The second part is dedicated to the issue of multilingualism in EU case law. Unlike EU law, the judgments of the Court of Justice, as well as the Advocate Generals’ opinions, are authentic in certain languages only. However, research has proven ...

The text and context of EU directives: implications for translators 1

Contrastive studies of statutory legislation are very scarce worldwide. Research in legal language has mainly concentrated on adjectival law leading to linguistic insights regarding powerful versus powerless speech, fragmented versus narrative testimony, the effect on jurors of simultaneous and overlapping speech, the use of leading, suggestive or improper questions in the courtroom, etc. Language of the substantive law has so far received considerably less attention from linguists, although there is a general tendency in academic endeavours towards interdisciplinary studies. Linguistic analyses of substantive law have elucidated issues such as how to make existing or future statutes clearer, without loss of content (i.e. document design) or how law students can be taught to process legislation. The present article analyses the specific functional, linguistic and communicative characteristics of the legal genre from an applied linguist's perspective in the context of European legal texts, as representing a unique set of features and conditions. It looks at the linguistic situation in Europe and the language policy in the EU with special emphasis on the translation regime of EU institutions. The participants in the communication and the special role of the translator in the law making process in the EU are discussed. Resumen Los estudios contrastivos sobre legislación parlamentaria a nivel transnacional son muy escasos. Hasta ahora, el interés investigador se ha centrado en cuestiones de derecho adjetivo, como el estudio del discurso de poder, las deposiciones testimoniales fragmentadas y las narrativas, la influencia sobre el