CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION
I.
Background
Legal English or
often called as legalese is a language used in legal writing mainly legal
documents and instruments. It uses in legal writing in genaral like papers,
research’s reports, and books in the field of law.
This language is
diffult to be understood not only by lay people, namely they have no backgroun
in the field of law but also by the people preoccupaid themselves in the study
of law and professionals in law, namely the studens, the academics, the lawyers,
the judges, the prosecutors and the other legal enforcements.
The words,
phrases, and sentences are the factors causing difficulties in understanding
the legal English. The lawyers in their
writing often: use the words with diffrent meaning with their normal meaning;[1]
use the words that unfamiliar with the
ordinary peoples;[2]
use the idoms instead of the single or simple words;[3]
use the double words while one word is enough.[4] They use phrases which sometimes depart from
grammer norms in general,[5]
and long phrases. Below, I give some examples on the long phrases cited from
some legal instruments and books in the field of law.
1. The
jurisdictional issue resurfaces occasionally in antitrust disputes, sometimes
dressed in different legal terms.[6]
2. My
aim is not so much to report the details as to give the reader a few simple
explanations of the relationship between the Sherman Act and its historical
roots, reasons for the enactment of the antitrust laws, and the policy issues
recurring in antitrust cases.
As the phrases,
the lawyers use sentences that sometimes depart from the normal grammar, and
the longsentences. Some long sentences cited from legal instruments and books
in the law field are presented as examples below.
1. The
fundamental features of many of these fundraising regulation laws are a series
of definitions, registration or similar requirements for charitable
organizations, annual reporting requirements for charitable organizations,
exemption of certain charitable organizations from all or a portion of the
statutory requirements, registration and reporting requirements for
professional fundraisers, registration and reporting requirements for
professional solicitors, requirements with respect to the conduct of charitable
sales promotions, record-keeping and public information requirements,
requirements regarding the contents of contracts involving fundraising
charitable organizations, disclosure requirements, a range of prohibited acts,
registered agent requirements, rules pertaining to reciprocal agreements,
investigatory and injunctive authority vested in enforcement officials, civil
and criminal penalties, and other sanctions.[7]
This
sentence is a simple in nature
consisting of one hundred and one words. Besides of the numbers of its
words, the use of conjoin phrases in its subject, verb and object cause this sentence to be a very long
sentence. This sentence may be analysed
as follows
a. subject,
conjoin phrase “The fundamental features of many of these fundraising
regulation laws”;
b. predicat,
verb “are”;
c. objec,
conjoin phrases “a series of definitions, registration or similar requirements
for charitable organizations, annual reporting requirements for charitable
organizations, exemption of certain charitable organizations from all or a
portion of the statutory requirements, registration and reporting requirements
for professional fundraisers, registration and reporting requirements for
professional solicitors, requirements with respect to the conduct of charitable
sales promotions, record-keeping and public information requirements,
requirements regarding the contents of contracts involving fundraising
charitable organizations, disclosure requirements, a range of prohibited acts,
registered agent requirements, rules pertaining to reciprocal agreements, investigatory
and injunctive authority vested in enforcement officials, civil and criminal
penalties, and other sanctions.”
2. The
investment treaty regime thus summons the image of a mosaic of applicable laws,
unlike the position in classical international regimes where public
international law might be destined to play an exclusive role, and questions of
municipal law might be treated as questions of fact.[8]
The
conjunction “unlike” combines “The
investment treaty regime thus summons the image of a mosaic of applicable laws”
with “the position in classical international regimes where public
international law might be destined to play an exclusive role, and questions of
municipal law might be treated as questions of fact” to be a complex sentence;
while coordinating conjunction “and” combines the sentnces “the position in
classical international regimes where public international law might be
destined to play an exclusive role” with “questions of municipal law might be treated
as questions of fact” to be compoun sentence. The combination of complex
sentence and compund sentence cause this sentence to be a long sentence.
3. With the development of the law relating to non-self-governing
territories and the principle of selfdetermination, certain rebel movements – now
usually referred to as national liberation movements (NLMs) – may be in the
process of acquiring the status of a subject of international law, though, with the notable exception of
Palestine, most of the peoples represented by NLMs have now obtained statehood
for their territories.[9]
64 words
This sentence is a complex sentence cotaining 64 words. Since it
mixes some phrases mainly in its subject and object, it is a long sentence.
This sentence may be analysed as follows:
- the fisrt subject “certain rebel movements” modifay by phrases “With
the development of the law relating to non-self-governing territories and the
principle of selfdetermination” and “now usually referred to as national
liberation movements (NLMs)”.
- the firs predicate is “may be”;
- the first object mixes some phrases “in the process,” “of
acquiring,” “the status.” “of a subject”, and “of international law”,
- though is a subordinating conjunction, mixing the firs sentence “With
the development of the law relating to non-self-governing territories and the
principle of selfdetermination, certain rebel movements – now usually referred
to as national liberation movements (NLMs) – may be in the process of acquiring
the status of a subject of international law” and “with the notable exception
of Palestine, most of the peoples represented by NLMs have now obtained
statehood for their territories.”
- the second subject “most of the peoples represented by NLMs” is
modified by phrase “with the notable exception of Palestine”;
- the secon predicate is a phrase “have now obtained”; and
- the third object a word “statehood” modified by phrase “for their
territories”.
II.
The substancies of this Guidance
To help the
readers to understand this Guidance easily, I try to present the materials of its materials as
follows: (1) introduction; (2) legal
English, its charasteristic, and plain language; (3) understanding legal
English in words; (4) understanding
legal English in phrases; (5) understanding legal English in clauses; (5)
understanding legal English in Sentences; (6) analysing sentences; and (7) conclusions.
In the firs
place, introduction discusses: the
impotance of legal English for the students, academics, and professional in the
field of law; the dificulties in understanding legal English; and the soultions
offered ti these dificulties. The second, legal English, its charasteristic,
and plain language discuss discuss: the notion of legal English; its
characteristic including in words, phrases, and sentences. The third,
understanding legal English in words discuss various words used by the lawyers
in legal documents, instrument and writings in general, namely: the words
having the meaning different from their
normal meaning; the words they selected might
be haved different meaning from them used in the daily life; and the words created
by lawyers in facing various issues in legal issues. Fourth, understanding
legal English in phrases discusses: the
phrases used in legal English; the departing of legal English phrases from the
grammer norms; and the factors causing
the lawyers use long phrases. Fifth, understanding
legal English in clauses discuss: the kinds of clauses; and the use of clauses
by lawyer in their writing. Sixth, understanding legal English in Sentences
discuss: the kinds of sentence; and the factors causing long sentnces in legal writing. The seven,
conclusions discuss th conclusion might be drown based on the description from
chapter one to six, and recommendation to solve various
difficulties in legal English.
[1]For-examples they use word “sentence” which in its normal
meaning “kalimat” in the other meaning, namely “punishment” translated in
Indonesia Legal language as “hukuman”.
[2]
They use the phrase “prior to” for the word “before”; phrase “subsequent to”
for the word “after”.
[4]For-examples:
they use
[5]In normal grammer adjective
precedes noun in a noun phrase, and it
modify noun, for-example “new house”,
here new modify house (noun). In legal English we find phrase departing from this
provisoin, for-exmample “attorney
general”, here attourney (noun)
modify general (adejctive); and attorney
(noun) precedes general (adjective).
[6]Keyth Hilton,
Antitrust Law Economic Theory and Common Law Evolution, Cambridge
University Press, p. 30
[7]Bruce R. Hopkins, The
Law of Fundraising, Fourth Edition, 2009 by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., p.
28.
Cambridge,
New York, Melbourne, Madrid, Cape Town, Singapore,
São
Paulo, Delhi, Dubai, Tokyo, 2009, p.
40.
[9] Anthony Aus, Handbook of International Law, Cambridge University
Press The Edinburgh Building, Cambridge CB2 2RU, UK, 2005,p. 14.
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