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Legal Style Markers and Their Translation in Written Pleadings Before the European Court of Human Rights

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Legal Style Markers and Their Translation in Written Pleadings Before the European Court of Human Rights UNIVERSITÀ DEGLI STUDI DI MILANO CORSO DI DOTTORATO IN STUDI LINGUISTICI, LETTERARI E INTERCULTURALI IN AMBITO EUROPEO ED EXTRAEUROPEO XXIX CICLO DIPARTIMENTO DI SCIENZE DELLA MEDIAZIONE LINGUISTICA E DI STUDI INTERCULTURALI LEGAL STYLE MARKERS AND THEIR TRANSLATION IN WRITTEN PLEADINGS BEFORE THE EUROPEAN COURT OF HUMAN RIGHTS L-LIN/12 Tesi di dottorato di JEKATERINA NIKITINA R10515-R39 Tutor: prof.ssa GIULIANA ELENA GARZONE Coordinatore del dottorato: prof.ssa GIULIANA ELENA GARZONE a.a. 2015/2016 ABSTRACT This corpus-based study investigates language use in the occluded genre of written pleadings before the European Court of Human Rights through the paradigms of legal phraseology and Translation Studies. The analysis is carried out on three subcorpora of authentic texts: (a) pleadings translated from Russian into English, (b) pleadings translated from Italian into English and (c) pleadings originally drafted in English. Legal language is intricate and formulaic, and frequently makes recourse to prefabricated patterns and routines. Legal phraseology is a major challenge for professional legal translators, and yet its translation has not received much scholarly attention until recently. Legal phraseological units are prefabricated patterns that form the matrix of legal texts and reveal interesting information about both the language and structure of the genre of written pleadings. Over the last thirty years, linguistic deviations occurring in the translation process have constituted one of the main areas within Translation Studies. It has been postulated that translated language has distinctive linguistic characteristics. Legal translation, in addition to linguistic factors, is conditioned by the tension between the legal systems involved, which can result in peculiar language dynamics in the translation of legal texts. This study draws inspiration from Toury’s (1995) and Chesterman’s (2004a) works to describe the different dynamics of translated language, applying a combination of translation norms and universals to identify and describe regularities in translated pleadings. This work is carried out using both linguistic and translational insights in order to demonstrate empirically how written pleadings can be characterised in terms of their phraseological content and how translated pleadings differ from non-translated pleadings. Distributional patterns of recurrent and anomalous legal phraseological units are compared across the corpora and analysed for typicality of frequencies and patterning as well as for quantity and quality of linguistic variation. The results contain a list of legal style markers typical of this genre, obtained in a translational and phraseological perspective. The list supplements the rather scant information about the language of written pleadings at the European Court of Human Rights. The analysis also provides confirmatory evidence of the differences between translated and non-translated texts, specifically, proving the co-existence of two opposite tendencies in translation: conventionalisation (translation of source text textemes with conventional repertoremes of the target environment) and discourse transfer (introduction of prefabricated patterns from the source language). The results may also be of some use and applicability for Russian-to-English and Italian-to-English translators, helping them avoid interference, use of unnatural or overly conservative patterns. Keywords: legal phraseology, legal translation, discourse transfer, interference, conventionalisation, written pleadings, ECtHR. i ABSTRACT Questo lavoro è una ricerca corpus-based che indaga l’utilizzo del linguaggio all’interno dell’occluded genre delle osservazioni scritte davanti alla Corte Europea dei Diritti dell’Uomo attraverso i paradigmi della fraseologia giuridica e della traduttologia. L’analisi è effettuata su tre sottocorpora di testi autentici: (a) le osservazioni tradotte dal russo all’inglese, (b) le osservazioni tradotte dall’italiano all’inglese e (c) le osservazioni originariamente redatte in lingua inglese. Il linguaggio giuridico è intricato e formulaico, facendo spesso ricorso a modelli e routine prefabbricati. La fraseologia giuridica costituisce una grande sfida per i traduttori giuridici professionali; tuttavia essa non ha ricevuto molta attenzione accademica dal punto di vista traduttivo e traduttologico fino a non molto tempo fa. I fraseologismi giuridici sono le strutture prefabbricate che costituiscono la matrice dei testi giuridici, rivelando informazioni interessanti sia per quanto concerne gli aspetti linguistici, sia sulle caratteristiche strutturali delle osservazioni scritte. Negli ultimi trent’anni, fra le principali direzioni di ricerca gli studi traduttologici hanno posto lo studio della deviazione linguistica che emerge durante il processo della traduzione. È stato postulato che il linguaggio tradotto possiede delle peculiarità linguistiche distintive. La traduzione giuridica, oltre ai fattori linguistici, è condizionata anche dalla tensione tra i sistemi giuridici, che può portare all’insorgere di dinamiche linguistiche peculiari dei testi tradotti. Questo studio è ispirato ai lavori di Toury (1995) e Chesterman (2004a) per la descrizione delle diverse dinamiche della lingua tradotta e applica una combinazione di strumenti analitici basati sui concetti di norme traduttive e di universali traduttivi per descrivere le regolarità osservabili nel genere delle osservazioni tradotte. Questo lavoro è stato sviluppato utilizzando un’impostazione linguistica e traduttologica al fine di dimostrare, in modo empirico, come le osservazioni scritte possano essere caratterizzate dal contenuto fraseologico e come quelle tradotte si differenzino da quelle non tradotte. La distribuzione di fraseologismi ricorrenti e anomali viene confrontata fra i tre corpora e analizzata in base alla tipicità delle frequenze e del patterning, nonché con riferimento alla quantità e alla qualità della variazione linguistica. I risultati contengono un elenco di marche dello stile giuridico tipiche di questo genere contribuendo ad ovviare la carenza di studi sul linguaggio delle osservazioni scritte presso la Corte Europea dei Diritti dell’Uomo attraverso la lente fraseologica e traduttologica. L’analisi fornisce anche conferma delle differenze fra i testi tradotti e non tradotti, in particolare dimostrando la coesistenza di due opposte tendenze nella traduzione: la convenzionalizzazione (traduzione dei testemi di partenza con i repertoremi convenzionali dell’ambiente di arrivo) e il trasferimento discorsivo (introduzione di modelli prefabbricati dalla lingua di partenza). I risultati possono avere una valenza applicativa anche per i traduttori dal russo e dall’italiano all’inglese, aiutandoli a evitare l’interferenza linguistica e l’utilizzo di strutture innaturali o troppo conservative. Parole chiave: fraseologia giuridica, traduzione giuridica, convenzionalizzazione, trasferimento discorsivo, interferenza, osservazioni scritte, CEDU. ii TABLE OF CONTENTS ABSTRACT (in English) .............................................................................................................. i ABSTRACT (in Italian) ................................................................................................................ ii TABLE OF CONTENTS .............................................................................................................. iii LIST OF TABLES ........................................................................................................................ vii LIST OF FIGURES ...................................................................................................................... x 1. INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................................. 1 1.1. Background ...................................................................................................................... 1 1.2. Research questions, goals and enabling objectives ......................................................... 2 1.3. Outline of chapters ........................................................................................................... 3 2. LEGAL LANGUAGE ........................................................................................................... 5 2.1. Legal language ................................................................................................................. 5 2.2. Contrastive overview of typical traits of legal language ................................................. 8 2.2.1. Salient traits of legal English ................................................................................ 8 2.2.2. Salient traits of legal Russian ............................................................................... 10 2.2.3. Salient traits of legal Italian .................................................................................. 12 2.2.4. Comparison of legal English, legal Russian and legal Italian .............................. 14 2.3. Legal style markers .......................................................................................................... 16 2.3.1. Complex prepositions ........................................................................................... 16 2.3.2. Adverbials ............................................................................................................ 17 2.3.3. Nominalisation ....................................................................................................
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