Article published In: Corpus-Based Research in Legal and Institutional Translation
Edited by Fernando Prieto Ramos
[Translation Spaces 8:1] 2019
► pp. 117–143
A corpus-based study of terminological variation in business incorporation documents from the United States and Peru
Published online: 26 June 2019
https://doi.org/10.1075/ts.00015.mon
https://doi.org/10.1075/ts.00015.mon
Abstract
This corpus-based terminological study explains terminological
variation in business incorporation documents. In United States (US) business
law, the geographic location, the variety of existing business entities and
their distinguishing features lead to different denominative variations, and
give rise to different degrees of equivalence. Consequently, asymmetries are
generated when such terminology is compared with the terminology used in
Spanish-speaking countries, particularly in Peru. Based on the typology of
causes of denominative variation proposed by Freixa Aymerich (. 2006. “Causes of Denominative Variation in Terminology. A Typology
Proposal.” Terminology 12(1): 51–77. , 52), this paper examines the
presence of dialectal and cognitive variations in US business law language as
compared to Peruvian business law language. Consequently, certain variants are
restricted to specific states or types of business organizations within the US
and are not used interchangeably. The results of this study may contribute to
the enrichment of legal translation studies in this subfield and offer
translators a systematic method to tackle equivalence issues in business
documents.
Article outline
- Introduction
- Theoretical background
- Business law translation studies
- Business comparative law studies
- Terminological variation studies
- Business law in the United States
- Business law in Peru
- Comparative legal analysis of corporations and companies in the United States and Peru
- Incorporation documents in the United States and Peru
- Corpus analysis methodology
- Corpus compilation
- Corpus quality and representativeness
- Corpus exploitation
- Results of denominative variation analysis
- Conclusions
References
References (48)
Alcaraz Varó, Enrique, Miguel A. Campos Pardillos, and Cynthia Miguélez Giambruno. 2002. El inglés jurídico norteamericano [US Legal English]. Barcelona: Editorial Ariel.
Bainbridge, Stephen, Iman Anabtawi, Sung Hui Kim, and James Park (eds). 2018. Can Delaware be Dethroned? Evaluating Delaware’s Dominance of Corporate
Law. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Barceló Martínez, Tanagua. 2009. “La aplicación de los conceptos de género,
macroestructura y convenciones textuales a la traducción de testamentos
franceses al español [The Use of Genre, Macrostructure and Textual
Conventions Concepts to the Translation of French Wills to
Spanish].” Entreculturas 11: 207–21. Accessed December 21,
2018. [URL]
Bestué Salinas, Carmen. 2013. Los contratos traducidos. La traducción de los contratos
de licencia de uso en programas de ordenador [Translated Contracts. Translating End-user License
Agreements]. Valencia: Tirant Lo Blanch.
. 2016. “La variación terminológica de los conceptos del
derecho de sociedades y sus estrategias de traducción [Terminological Variation in the Concepts of Company
Law and Strategies for Translation].” Revista de Llengua i Dret, Journal of Language and Law 651: 18–35.
Borja Albi, Anabel. 2000. El texto jurídico inglés y su traducción al
español [The Legal English Text and its Translation to
Spanish]. Barcelona: Ariel.
. 2007. Estrategias, materiales y recursos para la traducción
jurídica inglés-español [Strategies, Materials and Resources for Legal
Translation: English/Spanish]. Castelló de la Plana: Edelsa.
Cabré Castellví, Maria Teresa. 1993. La terminología. Teoría, metodología,
aplicaciones [Terminology: Theory, Methods and
Applications]. Translated from Catalan to Spanish by Carles Tebé Soriano. Barcelona: Editorial Antártida.
Campos Martín, Natalia. 2013. La traducción jurídica: los contratos. Estudio
traductológico y terminológico comparado [Legal Translation: Contracts. Comparative
Translation and Terminology Study]. Granada: Editorial Comares.
Cayron, Samantha. 2017. Manual de traducción jurada de documentos notariales en
materia de sucesiones entre los sistemas jurídicos francés y
español [Handbook on the Sworn Translation of Notarial
Documents in the Field of Inheritance Law: A Comparative Analysis of the
French and Spanish Legal Systems]. Granada: Editorial Comares.
Cruz Martínez, Soledad. 2001. “El inglés jurídico: Estudio contrastivo
inglés-español de términos jurídico-penales [Legal English: An English-Spanish Contrastive
Analysis of Criminal Legal Terms].” PhD dissertation, Universidad de Alicante.
Duro Moreno, Miguel. 1997. “La sociedad anónima en Estados Unidos o la angustia
del traductor en España [Business Corporations in the United States or the
anguish of the translator in Spain].” Trans 21: 9–19.
Doczekalska, Agnieszka. 2013. “Comparative Law and Legal Translation in the search for
functional equivalents – intertwined or separate domains?” Comparative Legilinguistics. International Journal for Legal
Communication 161: 63–75.
Fernández Silva, Sabela. 2011. “Variación terminológica y cognición: Factores
cognitivos en la denominación del concepto especializado [Terminological Variation and Cognition: Cognitive
Factors in the Denomination of Specialized Concepts].” PhD dissertation, Institut Universitari de Lingüística Aplicada. Universitat Pompeu Fabra.
Freixa Aymerich, Judit. 2002. “La variació terminològica: anàlisi de la variació
denominativa en textos de diferent grau d’especialització de l’àrea de medi
ambient [Terminological Variation: Analysis of Denominative
Variation in Texts with Different Levels of Specialization from the Field of
the Environment].” PhD dissertation, Institut Universitari de Lingüística Aplicada, Universitat Pompeu Fabra.
. 2006. “Causes of Denominative Variation in Terminology. A Typology
Proposal.” Terminology 12(1): 51–77.
. 2013. “Otra vez sobre las causas de la variación
denominativa [Once Again About Causes of Denominative
Variation].” Debate Terminológico 91: 38–46. Accessed December 20,
2018. [URL]
. 2014. “La variación denominativa en terminología: tipos y
causas [Denominative Variation in Terminology: Types and
Causes].” As ciências do léxico: lexicologia, lexicografia e terminología, edited by Aparecida Isquerdo, and Giselle Mantovani (org.) 71: 311–329. Campo Grande: Editora Universidade Federal de Mato Grosso do Sul.
Freixa Aymerich, Judit, and Maria A. Montané March. 2006. “Variación denominativa y biunivocidad en el
lenguaje de las matemáticas [Denominative Variation and Bi-univocity in the
Language of Mathematics].” Revista española de lingüística 361: 157–188. Accessed December 20,
2018. [URL]
Gémar, Jean-Claude. 1995. Traduire ou l’art d’interpréter. Langue, droit et
société : éléments de jurilinguistique [Translating or the Art of Interpreting. Language,
Law and Society: Elements of Jurilinguistics]. Québec: Presses de l’Université du Québec.
Gil Sanromán, Ingrid. 2012. “La traducción en el derecho de sociedades español e
inglés: estudio descriptivo, comparado y terminológico. Análisis de
escrituras de constitución, estatutos sociales y documentos de transferencia
internacional de sede social [The Translation of Spanish and British Company Law: A
Descriptive, Comparative and Terminological Study. The Analysis of the
Memorandum of Association, Articles of Association and Documents for the
International Change of Location of the Registered Office].” PhD dissertation, Universidad de Granada.
Haynsworth, Harry. 2004. “The Unified Business Organizations Code: The Next
Generation.” Delaware Journal of Corporate Law 29 (1): 83–127. Accessed December 21,
2018. [URL]
Kostina, Irina. 2010. “La variación conceptual de los términos en el
discurso especializado [Conceptual Variation in Specialized Discourse
Terms].” PhD dissertation, Instituto Universitario de Lingüística Aplicada. Universidad Pompeu Fabra.
Lassaque, Luisa. 2006. La traducción de los contratos:
inglés-castellano/castellano-inglés: elementos teóricos y traducciones
comentadas [The Translation of Contracts:
English-Spanish/Spanish-English: Theory, Translations and
Comments]. 1st edition [ebook] Buenos Aires: author. Accessed December 21,
2018. [URL]
Lorente Casafont, Mercè, Judit Freixa Aymerich, and Anna Joan Casademont. 2006 “Análisis de la sinonimia en algunos verbos
jurídicos [Analysis of Synonymy in Certain Legal
Verbs].” Terminología, conocimientos, sociedad y poder: X Simposio Iberoamericano
de Terminologia (RITERM), edited by Lucia Fabbri, 1–2. Montevideo: RITERM, Intendencia Municipal de Montevideo.
Mayoral Asensio, Roberto. 1991. “La traducción jurada de documentos académicos
norteamericanos [Sworn translation of Academic Documents from the
United States].” Sendebar 21: 45–57. Accessed December 23,
2018. [URL]
Meyer, Ingrid, and Kristen Mackintosh. 1996. “The Corpus from a Terminographer’s Viewpoint.” International Journal of Corpus Linguistics. 1 (2): 257–285.
Monteagudo Medina, Mary Ann. 2015. “Variación diatópica en pactos sociales: un análisis
contrastivo de corporations y limited liability companies en Perú y EE.
UU. [Diatopic Variation in Articles of Incorporation and
Articles of Organization: Contrastive Analysis of Corporations and Limited
Liability Companies in Peru and the US].” Presented at the FIT XII International Forum: Challenges, New Roles and Ethics on legal
Translation and Interpreting. Lima.
Monzó Nebot, Esther. 2003. “La traducción jurídica a través de los géneros: el
transgénero y la socialización del traductor en los procesos de
enseñanza/aprendizaje [Genre-based Legal Translation: Transgender and the
Socialization of the Translator in the Learning Process].” Discursos. Revista de Tradução 21: 21–36. Accessed October 23, 2018. [URL]
Posada Tamayo, Juan A. 2008. “Una visión desde el derecho comparado y el análisis
económico del derecho de la estructura societaria en
Latinoamérica [A Comparative Law and Economic Analysis of Law View
of Legal Structures in Latin America].” Estudios de Derecho 1461: 111–145.
Prieto Ramos, Fernando. 2014a. “International and Supranational Law in Translation: From
Multilingual Lawmaking to Adjudication.” The Translator 20 (3): 313–331.
. 2018. “Institutional Translation: Surveying the Landscape at
International Organizations.” Institutional Translation for International Governance: Enhancing
Quality in Multilingual Legal Communication, edited by Fernando Prieto Ramos, 1–8. London: Bloomsbury.
San Ginés Aguilar, Pedro. 1996. Introducción a la traducción jurídica y jurada
(inglés-español) [Introduction to Legal and Sworn Translation
(English-Spanish)]. Granada: Comares.
Schneeman, Angela. 2013. Law of Corporations and Other Business Organizations. New York: Delmar Cengage Learning.
Seghezzi, Natalia. 2011. “Variación terminológica y canal de comunicación. Estudio contrastivo de textos especializados escritos y orales sobre lingüística [Terminological Variation and the Communication Channel. Contrastive Study of Written and Oral Specialized Texts on Linguistics].” PhD dissertation, Institut Universitari de Lingüística Aplicada. Universitat Pompeu Fabra.
Sinclair, John. 1996. Preliminary Recommendations on Corpus Typology. EAG-TCWG-CTYP/P. Pisa: EAGLES.
Suárez de la Torre, Mercedes. 2004. “Análisis contrastivo de la variación denominativa
en textos especializados: del texto original al texto meta [Contrastive Analysis of Denominative Variation in
Specialized Texts: From the Source Text to the Target Text].” PhD dissertation, Institut Universitari de Lingüística Aplicada. Universitat Pompeu Fabra.
Tabares Plasencia, Encarnación, and José Batista Rodríguez. 2005. “Notas sobre fraseología jurídica comparada
español-alemán [Notes on German-Spanish Compared Legal
Phraseology].” Fraseología contrastiva, edited by Ramón Almela, Estanislao Ramón, and Gerd Wotjak, 345–356. Murcia: Universidad de Murcia.
Tabares Plasencia, Encarnación, and Vessela Ivanova. 2009. “La variación topolectal en terminología.
Implicaciones para la traducción jurídica español↔alemán [Topolectal Variation in Terminology. Implications for
Spanish↔German Legal Translation].” Panorama actual del estudio y la enseñanza de discursos
especializados, edited by María José Varela Salinas, 67–93. Bern: Peter Lang.
Tramhel, Jeannette. 2017. “La sociedad por acciones simplificada: una nueva
estructura para hacer negocios en las Américas [The Simplified Joint Stock Corporation: A New
Structure for Doing Business in the Americas].” Agenda Internacional, 24 (35): 137–170. Accessed December 22,
2018. [URL]
Trujillo, Rafael. 1922. Las sociedades anónimas ante la legislación
comparada [Stock Corporation on Comparative
Legislation]. Bogotá: Casa Editorial Minerva.
Vargas-Sierra, Chelo. 2006. “Diseño de un corpus especializado con fines
terminográficos: el Corpus de la Piedra Natural [Designing a Specialized Corpus for Terminographic
Purposes: A Natural Stone Corpus].” Debate Terminológico 21. Accessed January 15, 2018. [URL]
Zurbano López, Mónica. 2012. “Reflexiones en torno a la variación terminológica y
su importancia para el traductor jurídico [Reflections on Terminological Variation and its
Importance for the Legal Translator].” Presented at
Octavo Simposio de Traducción, Terminología, e Interpretación. La
Habana
. Accessed October 23, 2018. [URL]
Cited by (2)
Cited by two other publications
Biel, Łucja
2023. Variation of legal terms in monolingual and multilingual contexts. In Handbook of Terminology [Handbook of Terminology, 3], ► pp. 90 ff.
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 6 december 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.
