Just a brief note on a big topic. Language Log takes up the topic of the rule of law, mentioning that President Bush often omits the direct article. So here are some unrelated notes on the term.

German political speeches often contain the term der Rechtsstaat, which the interpreter will render using variations on the rule of law or constitutional.

The term the rule of law is particularly associated with (although not coined by) A.V.Dicey. It is the third of the definitions given by the OED:

bq. rule of law: (a) with a and pl. : a valid legal proposition; (b) with the : a doctrine, deriving from theories of natural law, that in order to control the exercise of arbitrary power, the latter must be subordinated to impartial and well-defined principles of law; (c) with the : spec. in English law, the concept that the day-to-day exercise of executive power must conform to general principles as administered by the ordinary courts.

Here’s a definition of Rechtsstaat from Alpmann Brockhaus (their software is so much better than Creifelds’):

bq. Rechtsstaat: ein Staat, in dem die Ausübung der Staatsgewalt durch Recht und Gesetz geregelt und begrenzt wird und dessen Ziel die Gewährleistung von Gerechtigkeit im staatlichen und staatlich beeinflussten Bereich ist.
Obwohl das Rechtsstaatsprinzip anders als Demokratie, Republik, Sozialstaat und Bundesstaat in Art.20 GG nicht ausdrücklich erwähnt wird, wird es allgemein den in Art.20 Abs.1 GG genannten Staatsformmerkmalen hinzugerechnet.
© Alpmann Brockhaus Fachlexikon Recht, 2004 [CD-ROM].

The two are quite a good match, but interpreters can run into difficulties when the speaker suddenly contrasts the Rechtsstaat with the Unrechtsstaat, usually referring to Germany in the Third Reich. The play on words doesn’t seem possible to preserve.

Good article on forensic linguistics in the Washington Times, with input from well-known forensic linguists (via Forensic Linguistics list).

Inter alia, Ted Kaczynski, the Unabomber, was pinned down because he wrote, ‘You can’t eat your cake and have it too’, a less common form than ‘You can’t have your cake and eat it too’, but more correct and used in middle English.

bq. Matters can be as simple as knowing that a fourth-grade dropout is unlikely to write a purported written confession to police containing the words “this perpetrator then approached my vehicle,” and as complicated as recognizing the existence of individual dialects and geographical disparities in certain words or phrases that aren’t always in the dictionary. Thus, a strip of land beside a street curb may be known variously as a “tree box,” a “county strip” or a “devil strip.”

The law firm Warwick & Seltz base most of their advertising on pizza law, including a revolutionary free live webcam consultation, and TV ads (see videoclips). Via Legalesed.

Meanwhile, here are shrinkwrap licence terms for cold pizza (via Trademark Blog).

Handakte WebLAWg berichtet (mit Podcast), dass die Mensa der Uni Bremen zur Mensa des Jahres 2005 gewählt wurde.

The students’ canteen at Bremen University has just been voted the best in Germany for the year 2005. Here’s this week’s menu (in German – I like the tomatisierte Kidneybohnen).

Apparently an interpreter working for a company (Lesley Howard Languages) hired by CNN made a slip on Saturday, saying Iran has the right to build nuclear weapons, instead of saying that Iran has the right to nuclear energy, and that “a nation that has civilization does not need nuclear weapons.” (CNN.com report – thanks to Patrick).

bq. The translation company, Lesley Howard Languages, apologized to CNN.
“Obviously, we’re taking it very, very seriously. We will never use him again,” owner Lesley Howard said, referring to the interpreter.
She said the same interpreter, who like other interpreters is contracted for individual projects, has done good work in the past, including for CNN.

For those not in the know: Lesley is the usual spelling for a woman’s name, and Leslie for a man (as in the case of Leslie Howard who played Ashley Wilkes in Gone with the Wind, and Henry Higgins in Pygmalion). Of course, not all parents know that.

Meanwhile, in Iraq, the military version of The Way to Amarillo (videoclip).

Hot off the press comes this report of last November: the Crime Writers Association awarded the Golden Dagger to Silence of the Grave, by Arnaldur Indridason (German Todeshauch – see krimiblog.de). It was translated into English by Bernard Scudder. But in future, translations will not be allowed. (This has nothing to do with the new sponsor, Duncan Lawrie Private Bank, after whom the prize is being renamed the Duncan Lawrie Dagger):

Books in translation present a particular problem. Are we rewarding the original writer or the translator? The problems of catching idiom and ‘voice’ in one language and reproducing this in another are formidable. The role of the translator is more creative than that of simply transcribing from one language into another. We are therefore actively seeking a sponsor for an award that will recognise the contribution of the translator and hope to make an announcement as soon as possible.
The Duncan Lawrie Dagger is the world’s premier award for new crime fiction. Last year there were over two hundred entries for its predecessor, the Gold Dagger. The introduction of the new Duncan Lawrie Dagger will almost certainly increase the entry again.
The decision to exclude translations is in no way jingoistic: this Dagger is open to anyone writing crime fiction anywhere in the world, as long as the book is written in English and published in the UK.

Guardian article of November.