Proofreading the work of others

Yes, I know that proofreading and editing (two different kinds of work but often grouped together) legal texts is tedious and many times not worth the effort. It is much harder to know how long it will take you to proofread a document than to translate. It all depends on how many mistakes there are and whether or not you have to check it against the original source language document. It can also be boring when you have to check for properly formatted numbers, and it can grate on your nerves when you see horrendous mistranslations that make you want to scream like sentence for sentencia or Secretary for Secretario (del Juzgado).

Though I deny none of this, I think that if you are not too busy with translation work, it is good to squeeze in some proofreading from time to time. Even if the translation is terrible, you will find out how much you really know. You will always see terms and phrases you would have translated differently. On occasion, you will learn new strategies for translating a certain concept or expression. That is when you should immediately copy both source and target snippets into your terminology database.

As for the business angle, though it is good to specialize, it is also of great use to develop as many skills as you can so that you will be ready for almost any task sent your way.

Off Topic: I had a good laugh!

The other day I was working away, thinking about finishing the task at hand so I could relax. It was a document with lots of numbers and accounting. All of a sudden, I came across the heading ORGASMOS PUBLICOS. I stared at the words for a minute and then just started laughing. These are things that make translating priceless!

Legal Fiction

I am always skeptical about terms whose English translation looks too obvious. From experience, I have learned that a translator can never be too careful about double checking a translation against a reliable source.

So I was surprised to learn that the term ficción legal is indeed legal fiction. Indeed, there is nothing fictional at all about this concept, except of course the fabrication that gives legal fiction its name. The Oxford Concise Dictionary defines it as: an assumption of the truth of something, though unproven or unfounded, for legal purposes.

A few weeks later after I came across this term in a translation, I heard a lecture on it by Professor David Liebermann at UC Berkley by way of a podcast. Professor Lieberman gave the institution of adoption as an example of legal fiction. The law says that a person is the child of a couple, when biologically this is not so. Nevertheless, the adopted child is legally kin, hence the use of the word fiction.