A Study of the Characteristics of Legal English Words

By

Yao Minqinzi

Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements

For the Degree of Bachelor of Arts

Department of English

School of Languages and Cultures

Nanjing University of Information Science amp; Technology

May, 2017

Acknowledgement

First and foremost, I want to thank my supervisor Mr. Zhang Jinwei to offer me valuable suggestions during my research. He spent so much time reading my draft and gave me inspiring advice and directions. Without his patience, insightful criticism and professional guidance, I will never be able to fulfill this thesis.

I would also like to express my gratitude to all people who helped me during the whole writing experience, especially to my friends who gave me encouragement. Finally, my gratitude also goes to my families. They always assist, support and care for me when I have some problems in daily life,

A Study of the Characteristics of Legal English Words

Yao Minqinzi

Department of English

School of Languages and Cultures

Nanjing University of Information Science amp; Technology

Abstract: With the trend of globalization, the connection between common humans and nations become stronger and stronger. So, demands of compound talented person with both English and legal skills are needed to deal with different legal problems. In this condition, legal English is a key to every person who want to have a successful career. For the successful career in the legal area, we must start from learning legal English words. This thesis is focused on the characteristics of Legal English words as formal, meticulous, veracity and fuzziness. We will discuss why and how can legal English words have those characteristics based on the etymon and longtime development. The aim of this study is to help the legal worker, especially the students who study in English translation or in legal terms, to get a deeper understanding of legal English words. This thesis has limitations, but still has many significances to the practice to some extent.

Key words: legal English; legal etymon; legal lexical features

摘 要

随着全球化和人们与国家间联系的日益增多，出现了越来越多的法律关系并导致了法律英语复合型人才的大量需求。法律英语由此成为了成功法律生涯的重要基石。为了在法律领域实现成功的职业生涯，我们必须从法律英语词汇学起。本文集中阐述了法律英语的词汇特征如法律英语词汇的正式性，权威性，准确性和模糊性。研究基于法律英语的词源及长时间的发展，法律英语词汇是为何以及如何拥有这些特征的原因。本文的研究目的是为了帮助法律工作者，特别是学习英语翻译及法律相关专业的学生，对法律英语词汇有个更深入的了解。本文或许存在局限性，但在一定程度上对实践具有指导意义。

关键词: 法律英语；法律英语词源；法律英语的词汇特征

Contents

1. Introduction 1

1.1 Theoretical Significance 1

1.2 Practical Significance 2

2. Forensic Linguistic and Legal Language 3

2.1 Forensic linguistics 3

2.2 Legal language 3

3. Two Main Legal English Etymon 3

3.1 Loan Words 3

3.1.1 Latin Words and the Usage Nowadays 3

3.1.3 French Words and the Usage Nowadays 4

3.2 The Usage of Archaic Words 4

4. The Characteristics of Legal English Words 6

4.1 The Characteristics of Common Legal English Words 7

4.1.1 The Most Formal Words in English 7

4.1.2 The Necessity of being Meticulous 8

4.1.3 The Combination of Veracity and Fuzziness 9

4.2 The Characteristics of Legal English Terminology 11

4.2.1 Exclusive Terminology 12

4.2.2 Borrowed Terminology 12

5. Conclusion 13

References 14

1. Introduction

With the trend of globalization, the connection between common humans and nations become stronger and stronger. So, demands of compound talented person with both English and legal skills are needed to deal with different legal problems. In this condition, legal English is a key to every person who want to have a successful career.

However, the study in this area is far from enough. Researchers have devoted themselves so much and did make some progress. Still, we need to do more to help further the study. The core of this study is focused on the English words, especially those used in legal terms, and try to analyze those words from its ever-started use in the legal area and the transformation. The study will be divided into two parts: the etymon of the Legal English words and analysis. The first part is to focus on the etymon of the Legal English words. It relates to both the history of Legal English words and the developments of law application. The study of this part will build an overview of the whole study and help us get understanding of the legal English words, and it draws forth to the second part---analysis. Thus, we can classify the words from its characteristics to make some conclusions. The study is based on the funded research and author’s analysis, the point of the study can’t represent the newest study, but the author tries to open a further vision of the area and hopes it will work.

1.1 Theoretical Significance

With the development of the United States and the United Kingdom after the Second World War, unexpected expansion in all industries created a unified world which demands for an international language. Therefore, English got the irreplaceable state of world language. People all over the world followed this tendency and want to learn English. They are not just for communication or understanding, but for a deeper conception which they make a difference in their professional area by learning English. However, everyone has their own motivations. English for special purpose thus emerged as the times require (Hutchinson amp; Waters, 2002: 6)

As a branch of ESP, Legal English isn’t paid as much attention as Business English by people. What’s more, the domestic research in this area is so limited that many papers and articles remain at the stage of introducing the results of foreign countries’ researchers. Because of the demands of legitimate talents who are good at English and law at the same time, Legal English education needs more attentions and researches from our society. The study of Legal English will be of great theoretical significance in ESP and will fill the gap between the Legal English theoretical system and its current situation.

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