I translate contracts, agreements and legal decisions on a regular basis for various clients from the private and public sectors. As part of my university studies in translation, I completed a three-month internship with the department for legal translation of the Quebec government. Later on in my career, I took a legal translation course (German-to-English) at City University London to upgrade my skills. Over the years, I’ve also engaged in extensive legal studies on my own, both at the practical and the more theoretical, philosophical level. Together, this has amounted to and accumulation of some 342 bookmarked websites in all matters “law,” spanning three languages and legal traditions.

Good legal translation requires an understanding of the underlying importance of established protocol, commonly referred to as “legalese,” combined with the confidence to rephrase when that is called for. In general, conciseness is key. Cathleen Poehler Translations offers all that!