The paper reports on a survey into the linguistic needs of law professionals in four European countries, with the aim of identifying their views on the importance and their use of foreign language skills as well as their preferences for ELP course content. The data, obtained from a questionnaire survey of 536 legal professionals from Poland, the Czech Republic, Croatia and Germany, show that while the respondents agree on many of the major points, there are also some differences conditioned by the respondents’ age and the specific tasks they perform in the legal profession. The article argues that these variables have to be taken into consideration in the LSP context because they determine some of the specific needs that need to be addressed in Legal English instruction. It is suggested that the findings about the lawyers’ self-perceived importance and preferred styles of learning are highly relevant for LSP practitioners, particularly when designing Legal English programmes and testing materials.

Abstract. Translation competence includes a complex variety of cognitive, linguistic and cultural skills. Translation in the field of law represents an even more demanding process, as it can be defined as "an act of communication in the mechanism of law" which leads "to legal effects and may induce peace or a prompt war" (Šarčević, 1997). In this paper, different aspects of the translator's competence in legal translation are discussed. In the introductory part, an overview of theoretical approaches to the translation process is offered. The main part of the paper is dedicated to problems and challenges that legal translators are faced with. Special attention is paid to teaching the documentary approach to translation of EU legislation within the Lifelong Learning Programme for Lawyer-Linguists in the Republic of Croatia. The problems occurring in legal translation and competences of legal translators are discussed from the teacher's perspective, based on the experience in teaching the course Introduction to the Theory of Legal Translation and Terminology within the Lifelong Learning Programme for Lawyer-Linguists at the Faculty of Law, University of Osijek, Croatia.

The purpose of the present paper is the study of the interaction between learning English for Specific Purposes (ESP), in particular, English for the Financial Sector, and general English proficiency. The research examines the effects of an ESP course being taught for a year on the students' general English proficiency.Two sets of tests were prepared for that purpose and administered to 30 first-year students of finance and law. The students took the placement test twice, at the beginning and at the end of the school year. To monitor test performance over a research period, a parallel form measuring the same competences was administered at the beginning of the second semester. In the test development process a special consideration has been paid to the level of difficulty and its relation to the students' prior educational context. Drawing on the National State Matura exams the test is set at Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR) Level B2. As regards its content the test is comprised of reading comprehension tasks (multiple matching, multiple-choice cloze, gapped text) and grammar tasks aiming to examine lexical and grammatical competence.There were two major assumptions in this study: 1) Learning ESP can improve students' general English proficiency, and 2) There is a more substantial improvement in lexical competence as compared to the improvement in grammatical competence.There is strong evidence in support of the first hypothesis, whereas for the second one the results were ambiguous. After major findings are presented and discussed, implications for ESP teaching are given in closing.

In accordance with the Bologna Declaration, modern languages and communication skills have a growing importance in all professions. With the prospect of Croatian membership of the EU and taking into consideration the conditions of the growing internationalization of law in general, knowledge of foreign languages represents an indispensable prerequisite for international com- munication within the legal profession. Thus, teaching foreign languages in the field of law, especially English and German, is necessary not only for the pro- fessional education of Croatian law students, but also for their mobility within the network of European universities. This paper presents a case-study of the current situation in teaching Legal English and Legal German in Croatian Law Schools. First, the status of foreign languages for specific purposes (FLSP) in the Higher Education System of the Republic of Croatia in general is analyzed. The main part of the paper is dedicated to teaching Legal English and / or Legal German as compulsory courses within the curricula of Croatian law faculties (status, syllabus design, teaching methods). Then some projects on teaching foreign languages to practicing lawyers will be presented. With the prospect of Croatian membership of the EU, specific education programmes for lawyer- linguists have been introduced by the Law Faculties of Zagreb and Osijek. These programmes, developed within the lifelong education project for lawyers, offer an opportunity for Croatian law students and young lawyers not only to im- prove their knowledge of Legal English and Legal German, but also to learn other languages of the EU, like French or Italian. These new programmes are the response of Croatian foreign language teachers to the current requirements of the European labour market and the challenges of the internationalization of the modern world.

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Knowledge of legal English, with English as lingua franca of international communication has become an essential precondition for communication of legal professionals worldwide. That is the reason why law students and legal professionals in Europe, especially those working in new member states of the EU, are interested in widening their knowledge in legal English within different forms of non-formal foreign language education. In this paper, the author presents a new paradigm of foreign language teaching at Croatian universities that was introduced due to recent changes in professional communication, the intensive development of IT, and growing importance of English in international context. The objective of the paper is to present examples of good practice and innovation in teaching LSP in Croatian higher education. The challenges of professional communication in the field of law are presented and discussed in the introduction of the paper. In the main part, the types of non-formal education are presented that were developed at the Faculty of Law Osijek, Croatia as a response to requirements of the EU labour market and the professional communication between lawyers. The first non-formal type of education presented in the paper is the Lifelong Learning Programme for Lawyer Linguists, and the second one the course Legal English for Civil Servants developed within the European cross-border project CATCH, organized by Croatian and Hungarian units of local and regional self-government. In the conclusion, the author discusses the achievements of the two programmes and offers her vision of the future developments in foreign language teaching at European higher education institutions.

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