Legal translation hub to be launched

Legal Translation hub

Institute of Modern Languages Research
and
Institute of Advanced Legal Studies

An array of activities in the next few days will launch the Legal
Translation hub – a cross-institute initiative by the Institute of
Advanced Legal Studies (IALS) in collaboration with the Institute of
Modern Languages Research at the School of Advanced Study.
The hub will host regular events such as seminars and discussion panels,
and an annual Legal Translation Day. A unique LLM in Legal Translation
is launching in October 2017, and a dedicated library section has been
established within the IALS library.
The hub engages with practice – both legal translators and lawyers – and
with professional bodies and institutions. Additionally, it undertakes
outreach projects.
The inaugural events include three talks at the Russell Square
headquarters of the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies on 3 February:

* Machine translation and national
security (3 February, 2–3 pm):
Dr Henry Liu, president of the International Federation of Translators,
based in New Zealand and a leading interpreter in English, Chinese and
French, will discuss issues that have implications for UK’s
international reputation and domestic security. He believes British
citizens are being placed at unnecessary risk by a lack of
accountability and absence of quality control in intelligence gathering
operations.
* A practical workshop: using Corpus Linguistics for
Law (3 February, 3.30–5.30pm):
Dr Gianluca Pontrandolfo, a Trieste-based practising legal translator
and academic, will use examples to explain how new technologies can be
used to gain insights into the language of legal texts. Dr Pontrandolfo
worked on the English translation of The Italian Code of Criminal
Procedure and is also the author of a groundbreaking work on compound
terms in criminal law.
* EU legal translation: past, present and
future? (3 February,
5.30–7.30pm): Professor Łucja Biel, from the Institute of Applied
Linguistics, University of Warsaw, Poland and leader of several
international language projects will provide a practically oriented
overview of major challenges and quality parameters in institutional
legal translation in EU institutions.

The launch programme concludes on 6 February at the Québec Government
Office, 12.30–2.30pm, with Louis
Beaudoin, an eminent jurilinguist from Canada, who will explain Québec’s
unique ‘co-drafting’ model to an international audience of legal
translation practitioners, representatives of leading law firms based in
London, researchers and members of the public.

See also at IALS.

Journeymen in Nuremberg

This is a late report from my visit to Germany last October. These are two journeymen. The system apparently exists in France too. I think they’re fully trained, but they then spent three years travelling, never less than 50 km from home, not allowed to drive or use public transport, have mobiles or iPads. Here’s part of a story from the Guardian:

Blacksmith Julian Coode was returning to work after a short tea break. It was a late winter afternoon and the light had faded outside his workshop in Littlebourne, Kent. He and his assistant had been discussing plans for some railings they were commissioned to make, and the forge, unusually, was quiet.

As the men returned to their craft benches, the door flew open. A young man stepped inside wearing a top hat, long black jacket, a white shirt under black corduroy dungarees with large mother-of-pearl buttons, a long twisted cane and a single earring from which hung a tiny key.

He informed his host that he was a Swiss-German blacksmith, named Sebastian Reichlin, and that he had come to stay.

Fortunately for them both, Coode had trained in German-speaking Europe and was familiar with some of the region’s more bizarre customs. He was looking at a travelling journeyman, a craftsman who had served his apprenticeship and was now following tradition by arriving unannounced, to learn from an acknowledged master and to share his hospitality.

Coode, who has four children, says: “I had to phone my wife and ask her to make up a bed in our living room.”

I have rarely seen them. It was good luck that these two walked into my photo when I was taking pictures of people with umbrellas in Nuremberg.

More at BuzzFeed and elsewhere:
German Craftsmen Still Go On Hardcore Medieval Pilgrimages