Legal Translation and Bilingual Law Drafting in Hong Kong presents a systematic account from a cross-disciplinary perspective of the activities of legal translation and bilingual law drafting in the bilingual international city of Hong Kong and its interaction with Mainland China and Taiwan in the use of legal terminology. The study mainly examines the challenges posed to English-Chinese translation in the past three decades by elaborate drafting and terminological equivalence, and offers educational and research solutions. Its primary goals are to create legal Chinese that naturally accommodates common law concepts and statutes from the English legal system and to reconcile Chinese legal terms from the different legal systems adopted by Hong Kong, Mainland China and Taiwan. The new directions in legal translation and bilingual law drafting in Hong Kong will have implications for other Chinese regions and for the world. The book is intended for scholars, researchers, teachers and students of legal translation and legal linguistics, legal translators, lawyers and legal practitioners who are engaged in translation, as well as all persons who are interested in legal language and legal translation.
Legal Translation and Bilingual Law Drafting in Hong Kong presents a systematic account from a cross-disciplinary perspective of the activities of legal translation and bilingual law drafting in the bilingual international city of Hong Kong and its interaction with Mainland China and Taiwan in the use of legal terminology. The study mainly examines the challenges posed to English-Chinese translation in the past three decades by elaborate drafting and terminological equivalence, and offers educational and research solutions. Its primary goals are to create legal Chinese that naturally accommodates common law concepts and statutes from the English legal system and to reconcile Chinese legal terms from the different legal systems adopted by Hong Kong, Mainland China and Taiwan. The new directions in legal translation and bilingual law drafting in Hong Kong will have implications for other Chinese regions and for the world. The book is intended for scholars, researchers, teachers and students of legal translation and legal linguistics, legal translators, lawyers and legal practitioners who are engaged in translation, as well as all persons who are interested in legal language and legal translation.
This dissertation, "Access to Justice in a Bilingual Legal System: a Case Study of Unrepresented Litigants in Hong Kong" by Wai-lung, Yeung, 楊威龍, was obtained from The University of Hong Kong (Pokfulam, Hong Kong) and is being sold pursuant to Creative Commons: Attribution 3.0 Hong Kong License. The content of this dissertation has not been altered in any way. We have altered the formatting in order to facilitate the ease of printing and reading of the dissertation. All rights not granted by the above license are retained by the author. Abstract: This research investigates unrepresented litigants' (lay people who represent themselves in litigations) access to justice in the common law in Hong Kong. In particular, it examines the potential sources of miscommunication in their contact with the law and legal professionals. Hong Kong is the only common law jurisdiction that operates in both Chinese and English with equal status. During most of the British colonial days, English was used as the only legal language in the common law. It was not until 1987 when Chinese was made co-official and all legislation was subsequently translated into Chinese just before the handover to China in 1997. The bilingual policy in law potentially extends access to the legal system for the majority of the population whose first language is Chinese. One less obvious impact of legal bilingualism is the growing trend of unrepresented litigants (lay people who represent themselves in litigations) in court. The judiciary in Hong Kong has noted a considerable increase in unrepresented litigants in civil proceedings in recent years (Judiciary Administration, 2003). Since unrepresented litigants are usually unfamiliar with law and legal procedures, they demand a significant amount of judicial time and resources, posing challenges to the courts (Judiciary Administration, 2003). Existing literature suggests that legal professionals generally regard these lay people as the root of communication problems in trials (Kelly and Cameron 2002; 2003). Yet this view has failed to address the end-users' perspective on the issue. Thus, this research takes a bottom-up approach to give voice to unrepresented litigants in response to questions that arise from the context: (1) to what extent is the Chinese legal language accessible to lay people, and (2) what are the communication problems lay people face in their litigations? By employing mixed methods, this research demonstrates that miscommunication may tie to unrepresented litigants' understanding of legal language, legal procedure and ideology of law. A linguistic and empirical study on official legal materials shows how some features of the Chinese legal language may be difficult for lay people to understand, such as the use of odd collocation, unusual words, and confusing parts of speech. Plain language with language-specific strategies may help improve the comprehensibility of the materials. Courtroom observations suggest that lay people may approach law differently from their legal counterparts. Indeed, an ethnographic study with an informant reveals how the lay strategies (i.e. lexical inferencing, literal interpretation and selective reading of texts) of decoding legal language may be misleading, and that lay people may have difficulties constructing their personal stories as legal problems. The ethnography supplemented by a survey with unrepresented litigants further highlights how legal professionals' use of language (e.g. jargon and complicated sentence structure) may limit lay people's understanding of legal discourse. Language accommodation by lawyers and judges may be useful for aiding communication. Based on the findings, this research presents implications for (1) communication by showing how legal-lay communication may be improved, and (2) law by outlining the reality of legal bilingualism in common law jurisdictions. Subjects: Pro se representati
This dissertation, "The Introduction of a Bilingual Legal System in Hong Kong: Cross-cultural and Cross-linguistic Views on Transferability and Translatability" by Chung, Alan, Tse, 謝聰, was obtained from The University of Hong Kong (Pokfulam, Hong Kong) and is being sold pursuant to Creative Commons: Attribution 3.0 Hong Kong License. The content of this dissertation has not been altered in any way. We have altered the formatting in order to facilitate the ease of printing and reading of the dissertation. All rights not granted by the above license are retained by the author. DOI: 10.5353/th_b3123619 Subjects: Common law - China - Hong Kong - Translating Law - China - Hong Kong - Language Bilingualism - China - Hong Kong
Hong Kong is one of the very few places in the world where the common law can be practiced in a language other than English. Introduced into the courtroom over a decade ago, Cantonese has significantly altered the everyday working of the common law in China's most Westernized city. In The Common Law in Two Voices, Ng explores how English and Cantonese respectively reinforce and undermine the practice of legal formalism. This first-ever ethnographic study of Hong Kong's unique legal system in the midst of social and political transition, this book provides important insights into the social nature of language and the work of institutions. Ng contends that the dilemma of legal bilingualism in Hong Kong is emblematic of the inherent tensions of postcolonial Hong Kong. Through the legal dramas presented in the book, readers will get a fresh look at the former British colony that is now searching for its identity within a powerful China.
The future of the Common Law judicial system in Hong Kong depends on the perceptions of it by Hong Kong's Chinese population, judicial developments prior to July 1, 1997, when Hong Kong passes from British to Chinese control, and the Basic Law. These critical issues are addressed in this book.
This book takes you into a common-law courtroom which is in no way similar to any other courtroom where common law is practised. This uniqueness is characterised, in particular, by the use of English as the trial language in a predominantly Cantonese-speaking society and by the presence of other bilinguals in court, thus presenting specific challenges for the interpreters who work in it, and at times rendering the interpretation service superfluous. This study, inter alia, problematises judges’ intervention in the court proceedings, Chinese witnesses testifying in English, as well as English-language trials heard by Chinese jurors. It demonstrates how the use of chuchotage proves to be inadequate and inappropriate in the Hong Kong courtroom, where interpreting in an English-language trial is arguably provided to cater for the need of the linguistic majority. This book is useful to interpreters, language educators, legal professionals, forensic linguists and policy makers alike.
