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Article published In:
Babel
Vol. 67:3 (2021) ► pp.355–383

A translatological and forensic-linguistic study of the English translation of the German Civil Code

| China University of Political Science and Law

Since its promulgation in 1896, the German Civil Code, one of the most influential civil codes in the world, has been translated into English several times. Thanks to the Code’s jurisprudential quality, both its English translation and the translating process are of high value and offer various starting points for profound research. However, so far, there have been hardly any substantial studies of the Code’s English translation, neither from the comparative legal or forensic linguistic perspective nor from other angles. This paper attempts to make a substantive, interdisciplinary – i.e., forensic linguistic – content-related, and jurisprudential study of the Code’s English translation to address this research lacuna. To that end, it focuses on two aspects of the statute law’s provisions, i.e., respectively from the lexical and syntactic perspective.

Keywords: German Civil Code in English, civil law terminology, word-formation rules, sections, covert and overt conditional structure
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.BGB terminology and English translation
    • 2.1Terms composed of simple words
      • 2.1.1Group 1 of simple word terms
      • 2.1.2Group 2 of simple word terms
      • 2.1.3Group 3 of simple word terms
    • 2.2Terms composed of compound words
      • 2.2.1Group 1 of compound word terms
      • 2.2.2Group 2 of compound word terms
      • 2.2.3Group 3 of compound word terms
      • 2.2.4Group 4 of compound word terms
      • 2.2.5Group 5 of compound word terms
      • 2.2.6Group 6 of compound word terms
      • 2.2.7Compound word terms in exceptional formation
  • 3.Interim summary
  • 4.BGB-provisions in conditional structure and the English translation
    • 4.1BGB-provisions in covert conditional structure
    • 4.2BGB-provisions in overt conditional structure
  • 5.Concluding remarks
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 26 May 2021
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/babel.00225.wan
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