The latest programme in the BBC radio series ‘Law in Action’ can be heard here till the next programme on Friday June 11th) has a section on whether Britain should have what is called a Good Samaritan law or good citizen law.

It’s difficult to draft such a law. One of the questions is ‘Who is the passer-by?’ The good Samaritan story has been called on before, in the case of Donoghue v. Stevenson in the early 1930s, extending the law of tort, when Lord Atkin (‘the Denning of his day’ passes through my mind) asked, ‘Who, then, in law is my neighbour? The answer seems to be – persons who are so closely and directly affected by my act that I ought reasonably to have them in contemplation as being so affected when I am directing my mind to the acts or omissions which are called in question.’

Here’s the case, also known as the snail in the ginger beer case.

Here’s a new approach to the good Samaritan parable, told in answer to a lawyer’s question, of course. You can watch a film of the parable, but it seems to have been transplanted to the American mid-west, and I don’t recommend it. Here’s the text from the King James Bible, Luke 10:25-10:37.

It looks to me as if Good Samaritan statutes cover more than this in the U.S.A. They may penalize those who don’t give assistance, but they may give immunity to those who do (because it is so risky for a doctor to stop to help someone for fear of medical negligence claims).

Following earlier entries on March 8th and March 24th, here is another article by Geoffrey Perrin uploaded as a PDF file.

This first appeared in German Teaching in June 1989, but the terms are still encountered constantly by translators.

Download file

The terms discussed are Abdruck, Ablichtung, Abschrift, Abzug, Ausdruck, Ausfertigung, Auszug, Doppel, Durchschrift/Durchschlag, Exemplar, Mehrfertigung, Reinschrift and Überstück (Kopie and Fotokopie are mentioned as the colloquial terms for Ablichtung, but I saw recently the term was unfamiliar to one of the German commenters at law blog).

Perrin concludes that there is no overall term for copy. Wiedergabe is rather papierdeutsch, and Kopie has not quite assumed the role.

One thing that seems to be missing is a mention of the legal use of Ausfertigung, which I would translate as office copy, the term I’ve encountered most often myself, or official copy, and which is a second original. And of course, fewer people were using computers in 1989 so carbon copies were more common, and probably no-one had dreamt of such a thing as a blind carbon copy.

It’s rather late to mention the Erlangen Kirchweih, because this is the last day. I did mention it elsewhere. However, here are some Kitzmann beer mats, picked up in a visit to Erlangen a few weeks ago.

Beim Übersetzerportal (Nachrichten) berichtet Richard Schneider von einer Untersuchung von Prof. Dr. Dieter Stein an der Uni Düsseldorf über englischsprachige Webauftritte deutscher Banken. (Usprünglich im Handelsblatt vom 3. Juni berichtet; über www.englisch-dolmetschen.de Artikel auch anderswoonline verfügbar.)

Prof. Dr. Dieter Stein, of Düsseldorf University, has investigated the English used in the websites of German banks. His conclusions, as reported by Richard Schneider of the Übersetzerportal from an article in Handelsblatt, are convincing, although he is German, but presumably he had native speakers in his team. Points criticized include obviously word-for-word renderings of the German and sentences that are too long and heavy and full of slightly outdated formal expressions. This is a great danger, since German texts tend to be a bit more formal than English ones, and translators may want, mistakenly, to preserve the style, or the client may insist on it. Richard Schneider comments on the problems of translating into a foreign language – especially this kind of text, I would add.

I agree with Richard Schneider that it’s probably a mistake on Professor Stein’s part to assume these texts were translated by secretaries.

The article can be found elsewhere online.

WestLB:

bq. Three mutually strengthening pillars underpin the business model pursued by WestLB which is an international commercial bank as well as a competence center for the savings banks and mid-sized companies. WestLB is hence a financial partner for major corporate clients and financial institutions, mid-sized corporates, banks and insurance companies, public-sector clients and savings banks.

Hypo-Vereinsbank:

bq. What distinguishes the HVB Group and what should you know in any case about us? Here we arranged the substantial facts, so that you can make yourself a picture of the HVB Group. Do you miss something? Please contact us.

Tanja Barbian, a conference interpreter and memberof the AIIC, has started a promising – and elegant – weblog at www.englisch-dolmetschen.de. It may possibly be called Plain English – Language Matters or Interpreter BLOGLINES, but I’m not sure. She regards the blog as an experiment and calls it ‘an interpreter’s more or less public notepad’. Some entries are in German and some in English.

Die Sueddeutsche Zeitung bringt einen Briefwechsel zwischen zwei Deutschen im Jahr 2020:

bq. Odyssee im Sprachraum
Deutschland im Jahr 2020: Jeder schreibt, wie er will. Da ergreift ein Minister die Initiative und erfindet die Rechtschreibreform. Ein Briefwechsel.

Von Christopher Schmidt und Axel Rühle.

bq. Lieber Herr P.,
wie Sie viel leicht wissen, hat sich die Neue Bundes Regierung vor genommen, in ganz Deutsch Land eine ein heitliche Rechtschreibung ein zu führen. Ich weiß, dass das für Außen Stehende vermessen klingen muss. Dennoch habe ich als amtierender Kult Minister gern die schwere Auf Gabe über nommen, dieses Projekt durch zu ziehen. …

bq. Mein Vater erzählte uns, damals habe eine „Kommission“ die deutsche Sprache „in den Mangel genommen“, wie er es aus drückte. Kurz darauf seien schreckliche Video Bilder von zerfetzten Komposita und gedemütigten Verben um die Welt gegangen.

The Sueddeutsche Zeitung presents correspondence of the year 2020 between a minister and an agency, trying to introduce a spelling reform after years of anarchy (in German).