Breu resum de principis bàsics sobre traducció jurídica [A Brief Summary of Basic Principles for Legal Translation]

This article studies the basic principles on legal translation deriving from a functionalist approach. There are two principles in conflict, the principle of loyalty or functional equivalence (equivalence to the legal effects of the document) and the principle of adaptation and naturalness in the receiving culture. It is necessary to attain the utmost adaptation to the conventions of the receiving culture but at the same time preserving such loyalty to the original document. On the other hand, in order to translate functions in terms of legal effects, it is necessary to resort to the basic human motivation and needs that led to the conclusion of the document. Sometimes, it is not made explicit in the text, but it operates as a prior and true element that inspires and disciplines the reading of the text by the translator. This reference and control of the translator’s activity allows him to apply translation principles to serve the utmost loyalty in terms of legal effectiveness: a parallel translation that relies on drawing a parallelism between the essential structure of legal discourse in both legal cultures; the simplification of the original in order to get, also, to such essence and the respect to cultural, untranslatable traits, etc.