Traditionally, legal documents such as contracts are verbally drafted by lawyers for other lawyers to read. However, it is highly desirable that the clients also understand their contents. The verbal format may be problematic if the parties do not have a common language or if they are unable to understand the legal jargon. For this reason, advocates of legal design have suggested that the contents of conventional legal documents could be presented in visual format. This paper aims to introduce one example of legal design, the comic contract, in which the verbal and visual modes interact. It discusses the process of transforming traditional legal documents into comics, which can be considered a kind of intersemiotic translation, and asks whether this format in fact improves the intelligibility and accessibility of legal documents.
Les documents juridiques sont traditionnellement rédigés sous forme verbale et formulés spécialement pour et par des avocats dans le dessein de protéger leurs clients en cas de litige. Cela dit, les parties signataires doivent elles aussi comprendre le contenu des documents. Si elles en sont incapables pour une raison ou une autre, le format verbal traditionnel d'un contrat de travail s'avère problématique. Afin de résoudre ce problème, Robert de Rooy, un avocat sud-africain, a conçu un contrat en bande dessinée, c'est-à-dire une version visuelle d'un contrat, pour l'un de ses clients. Dans mon article, j'examine la manière dont les contrats traditionnels peuvent être traduits en bandes dessinées qui conservent leur valeur à titre de documents juridiquement contraignants. L'objectif principal est d'étudier la manière dont a été traduit sous forme visuelle un contrat de travail traditionnel, en mettant l'accent sur les questions de contexte. L'analyse montrera de quelle manière les contenus principaux du droit du travail sont transférés dans un contrat en bande dessinée tout en respectant les conventions du langage visuel de la bande dessinée, ce qui permet de produire un document juridique clair, compréhensible, sans ambiguïté-et donc accessible-qui aide les parties signataires à comprendre leurs droits et obligations en tant qu'employeurs et employés.
This article presents a pilot study conducted in Hungary and Italy in the autumn of 2015. The study had two goals: to test the method of focus-group discussion for collecting data on a multimodal reading experience and to collect information on participants’ reading experience with comics, with an emphasis on their ability to understand the visual language of comics. The study examined the importance of the verbal mode in understanding non-verbal messages and the way in which the role cultural background and the competence to read comics affect participants’ interpretations of the meanings of the visual content of comics. In addition to answering the main research questions, the article reflects on focus groups as a data-collection method. The study indicated that cultural background, including the tradition of reading comics, may have an effect on enhancing participants’ understanding of the visual content of comics, which is also an important aspect the translator has to take into consideration.
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