Legal language and lexical ambiguity Cover Image

Le langage du droit et l’ambiguïté lexicale
Legal language and lexical ambiguity

Author(s): Ksenia Gałuskina
Subject(s): Language and Literature Studies
Published by: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Śląskiego
Keywords: Legal language; language for special purposes; legal terminology; lexical ambiguity; polysemy; disambiguation; translation.

Summary/Abstract: This paper focuses on an analysis of lexical ambiguity observed in legal language. The first part of the article explains the definition of legal language and characterizes the vocabulary typical of legal language. The second part aims to situate the lexical ambiguity issues against a background of language for special purposes, or, more specifically, legal language. The semantic relations of synonymy, homonymy and different aspects of polysemy are described in the context of legal language. In the conclusive part of this paper the problem of disambiguation of legal terms is highlighted and then it is shown how it affects the translation of such terms.

  • Issue Year: 2009
  • Issue No: 21
  • Page Range: 29-40
  • Page Count: 12
  • Language: French