Legal design, plain language and legal translation: a challenging matter for legal translators.

ABSTRACT

Translators, in general, but even more so legal translators, are trained to transpose content from a source language to a target language in full respect of all the formal characteristics of the written text, not always to the benefit of communicative clarity.

The advent of legal design has imposed a new paradigm of user-centric thinking in line with one of the DGT’s top missions and the recently published ISO 24495-1:2023 on plain language: to adopt clear and transparent communication.

This scenario encourages legal practitioners to abandon ‘legal jargon’ in favour of a shared language and translators of today and tomorrow to acquire all the necessary skills to guarantee this objective that places the user at the centre of communication.

Biography

Catia Lattanzi

‘Catia Lattanzi is a conference interpreter and lecturer in simultaneous interpreting. In 2020, she was elected president of the Italian Association of Legal Interpreters and Translators (AssITIG, Associazione italiana traduttori e interpreti giudiziari).

In March 2023 she was elected as member of EULITA’s ExCom (European Legal Interpreters and Translators).

Registered with the Chamber of Commerce of Milano-MonzaBrianza-Lodi in the category translators and interpreters, she is very committed to training and deontology.’