Rethinking the legal translation classroom: a course for legal translation professionals

Abstract

Over the last two decades the translation profession has undergone a significant transformation that has led to increasing volume, often requiring a high level of subject matter expertise. As the demand for legal translation continues to grow, specialisation and task complexity are particularly relevant to translation professionals in the legal domain. Since many changes in the translation profession have occurred over a short span of time, the traditional curriculum needs to be adjusted so as to incorporate additional competences into the course content. This article proposes a graduate course on legal translation that is motivated by four main factors: (a) refining learning outcomes for the legal translation classroom since they differ significantly from general translation curriculum; (b) implementing a task-based methodology; (c) incorporating professional skills that are essential in the current industry; and (d) including a process and product-based approach for portfolio assessment. Furthermore, expert mentoring and a professional legal translation workshop are combined into the curriculum as key enhancements for the new course. The proposed learning outcomes for this course have been piloted with a graduate class at the University of Louisville, and the assessment of some of the learning outcomes is discussed. Preliminary data has been gathered from student portfolios and from a questionnaire completed by the students.

Keywords:

• curriculum
• task-based learning
• translation workshop
• learning outcomes
• legal translation

Notes

1. See the definition of ‘legal translator’ in Pym et al. (2013, 15). Preliminary training is offered to ‘legal translators’ who in the future may become ‘sworn translators’ or ‘certified interpreters’.

2. It may be noted that the students signed a consent form to grant permission for their comments to be published

¹ Text available online at: http://opinions.kycourts.net/coa/2010-CA-001366.pdf

² Source text available online at: http://opinions.kycourts.net/coa/2005-CA-002349.pdf