Article published in:
Corpus-Based Research in Legal and Institutional TranslationEdited by Fernando Prieto Ramos
[Translation Spaces 8:1] 2019
► pp. 144–166
Procuração/power of attorney
A corpus-based translation-oriented analysis
Tereza Passos e Sousa Marques Afonso | University of Minho
Maria do Céu Henriques de Bastos | University of Vigo
This paper presents a contrastive legal and corpus-based linguistic and terminological analysis to translate a
common legal instrument on a global scale, the power of attorney in English or procuração in Portuguese. This
usually takes the shape of a written document, granted before a notary public as required by law, allowing one person to appoint
another person to act on his/her behalf. Civil law and common law systems differ considerably with respect to requirements,
formalities and range of powers permitted. In cross-border transactions, a translation is required to certify the authority given
to third parties who do not speak the language. Bearing this in mind, a comparable corpus of authentic Portuguese and British
texts (from England and Wales, and Northern Ireland) pertaining to this legal genre (12 procurações and 24 PoA)
is analysed to identify its characteristics at functional, situational, thematic, lexical and grammatical levels.
Keywords: legal translation, corpus linguistics, legal terminology, terminology, power of attorney, Portuguese, English
Published online: 26 June 2019
https://doi.org/10.1075/ts.00016.afo
https://doi.org/10.1075/ts.00016.afo
Corpora
Corpora
The British English 2006 Corpus (BE06)
Compiled by Paul Baker. Accessed June 5, 2018. http://www.helsinki.fi/varieng/CoRD/corpora/BE06/
The CETEMPúblico Corpus
Provided by Linguateca (2000). Accessed June 5, 2018. http://www.linguateca.pt/CETEMPublico/
References
Afonso, Tereza Passos e Sousa Marques
Andrade, Manuel Domingues de
Anthony, Laurence
[ p. 163 ]
2017 “AntFile Converter.” Accessed April 16, 2018. http://www.laurenceanthony.net/software/antfileconverter/
Arndt, Tamara, Silvia Cerrella Bauer, Mark Childress, Klaus Fleischmann, Beate Früh, Regine Hellerich, Maryline Hernandez, et al.
Barbosa, Neyara
2017 “Fraseologismos Bilíngues Em Documentação De Tradução Juramentada [Bilingual Phraseology in Certified Translation].” Master’s Thesis, University of Brasilia. Accessed February 3, 2019. http://repositorio.unb.br/handle/10482/24521
Barreto Menezes Cordeiro, António
Bastos, Maria do Céu
Bauer, Silvia Cerrella
2017 “Making the Case for Terminology Management [SDL Webminar].” Accessed June 15, 2018. http://www.sdl.com/video/making-the-business-case-for-terminology-management/116604/
Biel, Łucja
2008 “Legal Terminology in Translation Practice: Dictionaries, Googling or Discussion Forums?” SKASE. Journal of Translation and Interpretation 3 (1): 22–38. Accessed April 16, 2018. http://www.skase.sk/Volumes/JTI03/pdf_doc/BielLucja.pdf
Borja Albi, Anabel
2005 “¿Es posible traducir realidades jurídicas? Restricciones y prioridades en la traducción de documentos de sucesiones británicos al español [Is it Possible to Translate Legal Realities? Restrictions and Priorities in the Translation of British Probate Documents into Spanish].” La traducción y la interpretación en las relaciones jurídicas internacionales, edited by Anabel Borja Albi, Esther Monzó Nebot, and Laura Santamaría i Guinot, 65–89. Castelló de la Plana: Publicacions de la Universitat Jaume I.
Borja Albi, Anabel, and Amparo Hurtado Albir
Ciapuscio, Guiomar
Ciapuscio, Guiomar, and Inés Kuguel
2002 “Hacia una tipología del discurso especializado: aspectos teóricos y aplicados [Towards a Typology of Specialized Discourse: Theoretical and Applied Aspects].” Entre la terminología, el texto y la traducción, edited by Joaquín García Palacios, and María Teresa Fuentes, 37–73. Salamanca: Almar. Accessed February 3, 2019. https://goo.gl/BwdD85
De Groot, Gerard-René
De Groot, Gerard-René, and Conrad J. P. van Laer
[ p. 164 ]
2006 “The Dubious Quality of Legal Dictionaries.” International Journal of Legal Information 34 (1): 65–86. Accessed November 14, 2018. http://scholarship.law.cornell.edu/ijli/vol34/iss1/6/
Elena, Pilar
2008 “La organización textual aplicada a la didáctica de la traducción. [Textual Organization Applied to Translation Didactics]”. Quaderns, Revista de Traducció 15: 153–167. https://goo.gl/wybaPp
Engberg, Jan
Fiola, Marco A.
2012 “Translator Education: For a Praxeological Approach.” Rivista Internazionale di Tecnica della Traduzione 14: 1–12. Accessed February 3, 2019. https://www.openstarts.units.it/handle/10077/9773
Gémar, Jean-Claude
2015 “De la traduction juridique à la jurilinguistique : la quête de l’équivalence [From Legal Translation to Jurilinguistics: The Quest for Equivalence].” META 60 (3): 476–93. Accessed June 16, 2018. http://www.erudit.org/revue/meta/2015/v60/n3/1036139ar.html?vue=resume&mode=restriction
Gornostay, Tatiana, Signe Rirdance, Andrejs Vasiļjevs, and Roberts Rozis
2010 “Bridging the Gap – EuroTermBank Terminology Delivered to Users’ Environment.” 14th Annual Conference of the European Association for Machine Translation, edited by François Yvon, and Viggo Hansen. Accessed June 12, 2018. http://www.mt-archive.info/EAMT-2010-TOC.htm
Heinemann, Wolfgang, and Dieter Viehweger
Heylen, Kris, and Frieda Steurs
Holl, Iris
2012 “Análisis de una sentencia de divorcio alemana” [Analysis of a German Divorce Decree]. Puente entre dos mundos: últimas tendencias en la investigación traductológica alemán-español, edited by Silvia Roiss and Belén Santana, 190–200. Salamanca: Ediciones de la Universidad de Salamanca. Accessed November 12, 2018. https://goo.gl/7E5efV
Holl, Iris, and Pilar Elena
Lextek
n.d. “Lektek – Onix Text Retrieval Toolkit.” Accessed June 5, 2018. http://www.lextek.com/manuals/onix/stopwords1.html
Linguateca
[ p. 165 ]
2006 “Listas de Palavras Frequentes Em Português [Stopword List in Portuguese].” Accessed June 5, 2018. http://www.linguateca.pt/chave/stopwords/
Monzó Nebot, Esther
2005 “Cómo traducir derecho sin ser jurista: nuevas fuentes y métodos documentales para la traducción jurídica. [How to Translate the Law without being a Jurist: New Sources and Documentary Methods for Legal Translation].” La Biblioteca de Babel: Documentarse para traducir, edited by Dora Sales Salvador, 123–146. Granada: Comares.
Moraes, Naomi
2007 “Uma Análise Qualitativa de Marcadores Culturais em Dois Corpora Paralelos de Traduções Jurídicas de Direito Privado de Português para Inglês e de Inglês para Português [A Qualitative Analysis of the Translation of Referential (Extra-linguistic) and Stylistic Cultural Markers in two Parallel Corpora of Portuguese-English and English-Portuguese Translations of Private Law Documents].” PhD Thesis, University of Brasilia. 

Mota, Helena
2013 “Algumas notas sobre a lei aplicável à representação voluntária no contrato internacional. Uma perspectiva comparada luso-espanhola [Notes on the Law Applicable to Agency. A Portuguese and Spanish Law Comparative View].” Revista Electrónica de Direito, 1, Porto. Accessed January 20, 2019. https://www.cije.up.pt/en/download-file/1169&usg=AOvVaw0Cq0pkJxOcdnhiiiGAZfrc
Prieto Ramos, Fernando
2009 “Interdisciplinariedad y ubicación macrotextual en traducción jurídica [Interdisciplinarity and Macro-contextualization in Legal Translation].” Translation Journal 13 (4). Accessed January 22, 2018. https://archive-ouverte.unige.ch/unige:5078
2011 “Developing legal translation competence: An integrative process-oriented approach.” Comparative Legilinguistics – International Journal for Legal Communication 5: 7–21. Accessed January 22, 2018. https://archive-ouverte.unige.ch/unige:16166
Rodriguez, Bruna
SDL
2017 “SDL Multiterm 2017.” Accessed July 17, 2017. https://www.sdl.com/software-and-services/translation-software/terminology-management/sdl-multiterm/
Šarčević, Susan
[ p. 166 ]
1988 “Terminological Incongruency in Legal Dictionaries for Translation.” BudaLEX’88 Proceedings. Papers from the 3rd International EURALEX Congress, edited by Tamás Magay, and Judith Zigány, 439–46. Budapest. Accessed November 16, 2017. http://euralex.org/wp-content/themes/euralex/proceedings/Euralex1988/057_SusanSarcevic(Rijeka)-TerminologicalIncongruencyinLegalDictionariesforTranslation.pdf
2000 “Legal Translation and Translation Theory: A Receiver-Oriented Approach.” La traduction juridique: Histoire, théorie(s) et pratique / Legal Translation: History, Theory/ies, Practice. (Proceedings, Geneva 17–19 February 2000), 329–347. Bern/Geneva: ASTTI/ETI.. Accessed on February 3, 2019. http://www.tradulex.com/Actes2000/sarcevic.pdf