English Translation of Legislative Terms in China:Present Scenario

Abstract

The legal terms employed by legal professionals in China’s mainland, Taiwan, Hongkong and Macao mainly derive from Japanese, English, French, German, Dutch, Russian and Portuguese legal terms. Although the currently used legal terms under the Four Chinese Jurisdictions show the trend of unification and integration, the differences or conflicts among them have never disappeared. Different types of problems have arisen when the English-Chinese glossaries of standardized bilingual legal terms had been published in China in recent years. Law dictionaries made during the first two decades of Republican China need to be rejuvenated to avoid people’s neglect of rich historical heritage. Translated legal terms are supposed to be professional, highly recognized and definite. Current achievements of the Chinese-English translation of legal terms of P. R. C. wait for update and revision and some guiding principles for translation of legal terms need to be established.