ECTS credits ECTS credits: 4.5
ECTS Hours Rules/Memories Student's work ECTS: 74.25 Hours of tutorials: 2.25 Expository Class: 18 Interactive Classroom: 18 Total: 112.5
Use languages Spanish, Galician, English
Type: Ordinary Degree Subject RD 1393/2007 - 822/2021
Departments: English and German Philology
Areas: English Philology
Center Faculty of Law
Call: Second Semester
Teaching: With teaching
Enrolment: Enrollable
Aims: This course aims to:
a) enable students to understand how legal English works by introducing its basic linguistic and legal features.
b) enable students to anlyse, understand, and translate legal English texts.
Objectives: Knowledge and understanding:
By the end of the course, students are expected to gain enough knowledge and understanding of the linguistic structures of legal English.
Students are also expected to gain sufficient practical skills both to parse and translate legal English texts and to carry out grammatical, textual and
legal analyses.
Units:
1) Company law
- Corporation tax
- ADR procedures
2) Company directors and company secretaries
- Qualifications and duties
3) Insolvency and winding up
- Procedures
4) Mergers and acquisitions
- Dealing disclosure requirements
5) Anti-competitive law
- Information gathering, hearings, and remedies
- Competition inquiry
6) Tort law
- Client briefing notes
- Personal injury claims
7) Negligence
- Negligence rules
- Claims and remedies
8) Contracts
- Basic principles
- Formation
9) Form of contract
- Void, voidable and unenforceable
10) Commercial contract
- Structure
11) Terms of a contract
- Implied terms
- Express terms
12) Clauses of a contract
- Exclusion, limitation clauses
- Standard clauses
13) Privity of contract
- Discharge
- Remedies
14) Sale of goods
- Standard terms
- Incorporating terms
15) Licensing agreements
- Exclusion and limitation clauses
16) Commercial leases
- Interest in property
- Terms
- Leasehold interest
17) Commercial conveyancing
- Buying and selling property
- Sale by auction
18) Employment law
- Contract terms
- Tribunals
19) Intellectual property
- Copyright
- Patent
20) Trade marks and domain names
- Remedies
21) Information technology law
- Cybercrime
- Data protection
22) Environmental law
Bibliografía básica
G. D. Brown and S. Rice, professional English in Use, Cambridge University Press, 2007.
- Barnard, D., The civil Court in Action, Butterworths, Londres, 1985.
- Barnard, D., The Criminal Court in Action, Butterworths, 1988.
- Meador, D. J., American Courts, West Publishing Co., St. Paul, Minn., 1991.
- Solan, L. M., The Language of Judges, The University of Chicago Press, Chicago, 1993.
Dicionarios:
- Dicionarios electrónicos on line (cf. Servizos da UE). Presentaranse na clase
- Iglesias Rábade, L., Dictionary of Legal English (PDF)
A) Cognitive (Knowledge):
- Knowledge of the basic legal English terminology
- Management of techniques and methods of linguistic analysis.
- Management of translation techniques of legal English texts.
- Knowledge of the legalese used by practicing lawyers
- Knowledge of the variety of legal text types and registers
B) Procedural / Instrumental (Know how):
- Ability to perform linguistic analyses and commentaries on legal contexts.
- Explanatory power of the texts through translation.
C) Attitude (behave):
- Activate the fascination for legal English.
The classes will combine a theoretical presentation and practical analysis of texts.
Students will have to choose between two assessment systems: either a final exam or continuous assessment.
Students who select the final exam option will have to sit an exam, which will represent 100% of their final mark, on a set date.
Students joining the continuous assessment system must attend 80% of classes, though absences for the other 20% can be permitted for medical
or family reasons. They are also required complete a series of exercises over the duration of the course: two writing exercises (20% + 20%), a
listening + reading + vocabulary exercise (30%) and a speaking exercise (30%). Their final score will be the combined mark of all these exercises.
Students joining the continuous assessment system do NOT have to sit a final exam.
IMPORTANT
-Lessons will be conducted in English. The correct use of the English language will be taken into account for assessment purposes.
-Inadequate academic conduct (plagiarism, cheating, etc.) will be penalized. Note the following about plagiarism: In the event of fraudulent
performance of exercises or tests, art. 16 of the Regulations for the assessment of students academic performance:
“A fraudulent performance during an exercise or test will mean a fail grade in the corresponding call, regardless of disciplinary process that may be
followed against the offending student. Plagiarised work or work carried out by using information obtained from accessible sources open to the
public, among others, without due re-elaboration or reinterpretation with quotes from the authors and the sources, are considered fraudulent."
Study time and individual work: 75 hours
- Requirement: upper-intermediate level of English
- Attendance and active participation in every task at hand.
Students who are unable to attend 80% of the classes for justified medical or family reasons, or those who are officially exempt from attending
lectures, are required to contact the subject´s coordinator to agree an alternative study plan although they will still be required to choose between
either the continuous assessment system or sitting the final exam.
Martin Fernandez Fernandez
Coordinador/a- Department
- English and German Philology
- Area
- English Philology
- m.fernandez.fernandez [at] usc.es
- Category
- Professor: Intern Assistant LOSU
Carmen Gloria Cernadas Lema
- Department
- English and German Philology
- Area
- English Philology
- carmengloria.cernadas.lema [at] usc.es
- Category
- Xunta Pre-doctoral Contract
Luis Ahmed Sanchez Arrocha
- Department
- English and German Philology
- Area
- English Philology
- luisahmed.sanchez [at] usc.es
- Category
- Professor: Reader
| Wednesday | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| 12:30-14:00 | Grupo /CLE_01 | English | Classroom 2 |
| Thursday | |||
| 13:00-14:30 | Grupo /CLE_01 | English | Classroom 2 |
| 05.21.2025 10:00-12:00 | Grupo /CLE_01 | Assembly Hall |
| 07.07.2025 18:00-20:00 | Grupo /CLE_01 | Classroom 5 |