{"id":2146,"date":"2015-09-11T16:33:08","date_gmt":"2015-09-11T05:33:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/commercialmediationsydney.com.au\/?p=2146"},"modified":"2022-07-15T11:41:55","modified_gmt":"2022-07-15T00:41:55","slug":"the-final-skill-you-need-to-acquire-before-starting-to-practise-law-simultaneous-translation","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/commercialmediationsydney.com.au\/2015\/the-final-skill-you-need-to-acquire-before-starting-to-practise-law-simultaneous-translation\/","title":{"rendered":"The final skill you need to acquire before starting to practise law: Simultaneous translation"},"content":{"rendered":"
Originally published at New Lawyer Language<\/a>.<\/em><\/div>\n
Dear New Lawyer,<\/div>\n
Re: The final skill you need to acquire before starting to practise law: Simultaneous translation<\/div>\n
Congratulations on finally becoming a lawyer. \u00a0It was hard work, took a long time, and cost a lot, but at last you are ready to strut your stuff as a lawyer.<\/div>\n
But, first, a cautionary word. \u00a0The word is \u201cEnglish\u201d. \u00a0Most Australian lawyers think they speak English. \u00a0They are wrong. \u00a0As a result of reading lots of court cases, law textbooks and law journals and of spending most of your waking hours with other lawyers, gradually \u2013 without realising it \u2013 you have come to speak a dialect of English that is peculiar to lawyers.<\/div>\n
There is nothing wrong with this. \u00a0Most professions have their own dialect, which is impenetrable to non-members (have you ever spoken to a surgeon, or a software engineer, about what they do?). \u00a0Dialects like this come into existence because they serve a useful purpose: They facilitate efficient communication among those who speak the dialect. Thus, when a lawyer says to a judge, \u201cWith the utmost respect, the proposition that has just fallen from your Honour \u2026\u201d, this is much quicker than saying, \u201cWhat Your Honour has just said is such a howler that even someone starting Torts 101 would know that it is grotesquely wrong.\u201d<\/div>\n
There is, however, a problem with the dialect spoken by lawyers. \u00a0The problem stems from the fact that the dialect is largely made up of words that also form part of the English language. \u00a0This is not true of other professional dialects. \u00a0For example, the words \u201cendarterectomy\u201d, \u201cfundoplication\u201d and \u201cintussusception\u201d come trippingly off the tongue of a surgeon. \u00a0 By contrast, while the lawyer\u2019s dialect does contain a few words that are not part of the English language, such as \u201chereinbefore\u201d and \u201cthereinafter\u201d, it largely is made up of English words.<\/div>\n
Here lies the problem: Because lawyers communicate in words that form part of the English language, they assume that non-lawyers \u2013 their clients, for example \u2013 understand what they are saying. \u00a0This assumption is unfounded and usually is incorrect. \u00a0Empirical research and commonsense both indicate that lawyers usually are not understood by their clients, nor by the general public as a whole.<\/div>\n
What does this mean for new lawyers? \u00a0What it means is that, before you can effectively practise law, there is one remaining skill that you must acquire. \u00a0This skill is just as important as knowing the Rule in Shelley\u2019s case, or being able to distinguish a dictum from a ratio decidendi. \u00a0You must be capable of simultaneous translation, like an interpreter at the United Nations. \u00a0While speaking in your dialect to other lawyers, you must simultaneously be able to translate what has been said into English for the benefit of non-lawyers present, such as your clients.<\/div>\n
If you lack this skill, one of two things will happen:<\/div>\n
    \n
  1. The non-lawyer will not understood what has been said by the lawyers; or<\/li>\n
  2. The non-lawyer will understand what has been said to mean something completely different (i.e., the non- lawyer will completely misunderstand what has been said by the lawyers).<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n
    You\u2019re thinking, I know, that the potential for misunderstanding is small. \u00a0Having given the matter the consideration which appears to be appropriate, having due regard to all the relevant contemporaneous circumstances, it is my respectful submission that I must beg to differ. (I bet you didn\u2019t notice that the previous sentence is not comprehensible to non-lawyers and thus requires translation into English.)<\/div>\n
    To demonstrate why you need to engage in simultaneous translation, here is a table of common phrases in lawyer dialect, together with the corresponding misunderstanding of each phrase by non-lawyers.<\/div>\n
    \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n
    Phrase in lawyer dialect<\/strong><\/th>\nMeaning to a speaker of English<\/strong><\/th>\n<\/tr>\n<\/thead>\n
    \u201cI beg to differ.\u201d<\/td>\n\u201cPlease, can we have something different for dinner tonight?\u201d<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
    \u201cMake an expedition application\u201d<\/td>\n\u201cApply to join the expedition [to the North Pole]\u201d<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
    \u201cApprehension of bias\u201d<\/td>\n\u201cThey caught the crook.\u201d<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
    \u201cReasonable prospects of success\u201d<\/td>\n\u201cGood chance of finding [gold, silver, etc]”<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
    \u201cYou cannot approbate and reprobate.\u201d<\/td>\n\u201cDon\u2019t ask me to approve of that no-hoper.\u201d<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
    [In cross-examination] \u201cMadam, I put this proposition to you \u2026\u201d<\/td>\n\u201cI want to have sex with you.\u201d<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n
    \u201cI am submitting there is binding authority for this proposition \u2026\u201d<\/td>\n\u201cI want to have kinky sex with you.\u201d<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    Originally published at New Lawyer Language. Dear New Lawyer, Re: The final skill you need to acquire before starting to practise law: Simultaneous translation Congratulations on finally becoming a lawyer. \u00a0It was hard work, took a long time, and cost a lot, but at last you are ready to strut your stuff as a lawyer. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2147,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,39],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/commercialmediationsydney.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2146"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/commercialmediationsydney.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/commercialmediationsydney.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commercialmediationsydney.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commercialmediationsydney.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2146"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/commercialmediationsydney.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2146\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2177,"href":"https:\/\/commercialmediationsydney.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2146\/revisions\/2177"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commercialmediationsydney.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2147"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/commercialmediationsydney.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2146"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commercialmediationsydney.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2146"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/commercialmediationsydney.com.au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2146"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}