Legal Translation
By nature, legal translation is a delicate process that only professional translators commissioned by the court should handle the process. Laws are culturally subjective and require expertise in understanding passages of documents that are legal in nature.
In the international law, legal translation follows the following general rules:
1. Legal system of the source language must suit the culture of the language format and reflective of the legal language
2. The translation should be read by someone who is well-versed with the other legal system where the translation was prepared
3. Proper documentation of the translation is required such as certificate of accuracy, witness statement, court orders, immigration documents, labels and other related documents.
Since legal translation is culture-based, the process is lexis dependent and must be structure base on the linguistics standards which is generally accepted to produce formal and legal equivalence of the target language.
Some examples of legal translations are contracts, international court decisions and proceedings, safety precaution instructions, flight transactions, import/export laws, international transactions, etc.
