Università Roma Tre

Syllabus
The course provides the basic language needed to allow students to understand main points on subjects that are familiar and to deal with communicative situations with a certain degree of ease. In addition, the course aims to enhance students’ ability to write simple related text on legal subjects which are of personal interest or relevant to the topics included in the syllabus. The course also aims to express, describe, give reasons and provide explanations on topics of interest, legal issues and current events including news broadcastings.
The course has as its principal objectives:
a) to identify and understand the meaning and semantic networks of key legal terminology and to develop the capacity to use it in discussing current issues on a variety of legal topics. Special attention is paid to stimulating the learning of legal vocabulary by means of modeling, feedback, recasts, questioning and cognitive structuring so as to consolidate already known terms (prior, encyclopedic knowledge) and newly acquired ones;
b) to gain familiarity with other legal systems; in particular, the common law legal systems and their primary and secondary sources of law in order to stimulate comparisons with students’ ‘home’ legal systems;
c) to develop textual analysis skills and critical thinking in English at sentential and supra-sentential levels so as to enhance critical reading skills by examining discipline-related basic common law and European law documents such as Treaty articles, directives, regulations, decisions, opinions and recommendations;
d) to identify and analyze the language of landmark case-law judgments: facts, legal issue(s), reasoning and decisions;
e) to improve basic advocacy skills by describing and arguing in favour of and/or against a position(s) taken by another colleague. This entails using English through active engagement in group (team-work) and class interaction to optimize the acquired knowledge, based on the various readings and arguments developed during the course.

Materials
The materials for the lessons and other resources are uploaded weekly before each lesson in the reserved site of the Faculty of Law (“didattica”) which may be accessed by students enrolled in the course. Additional materials will be handed out in class. Links and materials relevant to the topics discussed may be indicated throughout the course for further research by participants, or placed in the lecturer’s Internet site.


Texts and dictionaries recommended:
• Easwood, J. Oxford Grammar Practice. Oxford, UK: OUP.
• Murphy, R. English Grammar in Use. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.
• Krois-Linder, A. (2006). International Legal English. Cambridge: CUP.
• English Law Dictionary. Peter H. Collin (ed.), Middlesex, UK: Peter Collin Publishing.
• Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary of Law. Massachusetts, USA: Merriam Webster Inc.
• Black’s Law Dictionary. St. Paul, MN, USA: Thomson/West.
• Macmillan English Dictionary for Advanced Learners. Oxford, UK: Macmillan Education.

LEGAL ENGLISH
Lesson 1 Course Introduction
Lesson 2 The Language of Law Chapter 1 + 2, Sections 1.1-2.1.4. pages 5-58
Lesson 3 Legislation and the Legislature, The Queen in Parliament, Sections, 2, 2.24,2, pages 58-75
Lesson 4 Parliamentary Sovereignty, UK court system and Legislature, Civil and Common Law, Legislation + Judicial Procedure, Roles: Legislature + Courts, Sections 2..2.-2.4.2, pages 76-96
Lessons 5+ 6 Criminal law, Sections 4.1-4.7.2, pages 155-194
Lessons 7 + 8+ 9 Civil law/Tort Law, Law of Tort, Law of Torts, Sections 5.1-5.7.2, pages 196-279
Lessons 10 + 11 Language of Contract Law, UNCITRAL, UNIDROIT, Sections 6.1-6.5, pages 282-349
Lessons 12 + 13 The European Dimension, Treaties, The European Court of Justice BREXIT update, Sections 3.1-3.6.3, pages 97- 126
Lesson 14 The European Convention on Human Rights, Sections 3.4-3.6.3, pages 127 – 154
Lesson 15 New crimes: Cybercrime, IP, Copyright, WIPO, Brand Management, Fraud, Identity Theft, Confidentiality, Privacy, Sustainability and Trust
Lesson 16 Guest Speaker
Lesson 17 The US Judiciary, US Supreme Court
Lesson 18 Transparency, National Security, Big Brother is Watching, Mistake, Casualty
Lesson 19 Case study and role play
Lesson 20 Mock trial simulation and Review for Exam

LEGAL ENGLISH AND THE COMMON LAW, 4° edition, Alison Riley and Patricia Sours, published by Wolters Klumer/CEDAM, 2018