Transatlantic Communications
Targeting Your Writing to U.S. Clients, Judges, and Colleagues
Help your non-native English writers translate American cultural and
stylistic expectations into concrete guidelines for drafting first-rate work
product.
Overview
In this interactive workshop, we focus on the 100 most common usage errors
that non-native English speakers often make—from mismatched prepositions and
verb tenses to awkward word choices and miscued tone.
To enliven the discussion, I focus on mistakes in actual work product your
lawyers have drafted. During this part of the workshop, attorneys typically ask
me to clarify many other usage issues that trouble them.
We also discuss how to edit for style. Participants receive a bookmark of 30
cuts and edits. We then work through 30 sample sentences as a group. Here, too,
the attorneys typically ask other questions about English legal-writing style.
The British version of the course, customized for U.S. and U.K. lawyers and
solicitors in London offices, focuses on editing for style and structure, with
special attention to differences between U.S. and British legal writing styles.
I emphasize British work product. We can also consider internal documents.
British Version
- “I liked very much that the course summarizes the main problems of legal
writing and proposes recommendations on how to avoid them. The course
materials are very useful. Thank you very much!”
- “Great course.”
- “Very inspiring presentation.”
- “I liked the practicality of the course.”
- “First-rate, engaging tuition.”
- “Great course, very understandable and useful.”
- “l liked being confronted with ‘common usage challenges.’”
- “Very practical and useful.”
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