Legal English

 

Legal English has traditionally been the used by lawyers from English-speaking countries (particularly the U.S., UK, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Kenya, and South Africa) all which share common law traditions. However, due to the spread of English as the predominant language of international business and law, as well as its role as a legal language within the European Union and other international legal forums, legal English is now a global phenomenon. Moreover, the influence of the Internet and the fact that English is the most published language has made knowing English even more crucial.

 

Writing, speaking, and reading in a foreign language can be a struggle. Attorneys and academics writing in a foreign language often face great frustration over their inability or difficulty to communicate at the same level that they do in their mother tongues.  Drawing on my experience and knowledge, I can assist you in all stages of legal English: writing, reading, speaking, editing, publication, and presentation. Legal ESL classes provide lawyers, who are not native English speakers, with a better understanding of the use of English language for lawyers.

 

Our law firm offers a full range of English legal writing services:

 

Teaching legal English to ESL attorneys (at law schools, for law firms, individuals, or one-on-one). 

Teaching and preparing for oral presentations or meetings in English;

Light or in-depth editing of an academic legal article;

Production editing of legal journal;

Citation recommendation, citation editing, and teaching how to cite;

Assistance in finding and approaching an academic publisher;

Teaching academic legal writing in a classroom or one-on-one;

 

The correct development of sentence and paragraph structure is crucial. Legal concepts are usually complex enough without adding incoherent sentence structure, lack of transition between paragraphs, lack of topic sentences in paragraphs, jumbled use of introductory and summary paragraphs, etc. The audience's inability to follow the development of the attorney's or author’s idea will prevent comprehension. 

 

Quick Quide to Correct Sentence Structure

 

This short essay discusses a few important building blocks of writing: paragraph structure, outlining, and transition.

 

In my opinion, outlining is one of the most important stages of writing an article and should not be underestimated. It is an exceptional organizational tool for writing. An outline is not necessarily the same format that will be used for the table of contents; rather an outline organizes the article into smaller components and assists the author in creating the direction and flow of the article. If after writing the outline you realize that the concepts and ideas of the article are not explicit, rewrite the outline until the organization is clear and all of the concepts and ideas receive representation. An author who is sure of the direction of her article will be able to transform this clarity into clear writing. In order to know what to write in an article, you need to plan what to write. Read further on outlining.