Episode Transcript
Speaker 0 00:00:00 Welcome to the us law essentials law and language podcast, the legal English podcast for non-native English speakers that helps you improve your English, listening, improve your legal English vocabulary and build your knowledge of American legal culture. Before we begin today's episode, I wanted to remind you that us law essentials offers online legal English, and online us law courses. Our courses are designed for students bar exam candidates, attorneys, and translators. If you are interested in learning more, please contact Daniel at Daniel us law, essentials.com or visit us law essentials.com and join us on LinkedIn and Facebook. And now today's episode.
Speaker 1 00:00:52 Welcome to us law essentials law and language podcast. I'm your host, Steven Horowitz. And today we continue our series of interviews with multilingual lawyers with our special guests all the way from Italy, Claudia Amato. Hi Claudia.
Speaker 2 00:01:09 Hi.
Speaker 1 00:01:10 Uh, but before we get started, I want to remind all our listeners that we now have transcripts available for past episodes. These are great for improving your listening and you're speaking. If you ever need ideas for how to use them, let us know, and we'll give you some help or you can let, you can ask Claudia too, I guess I'm sure she has some good ways to, to work with transcripts anyway. Uh, and how do you get access to the transcripts? Just go to the podcast section of us law, essentials.com and sign up and you get free access to all of our transcripts. It's that easy because our goal is to help you, our listeners improve your legal English. And now let me tell you about today's multilingual lawyer guest Claudia Amato. Claudia is a lawyer based in Savona Italy, which is in the Lauria region. She is the founder of speech L where she prepares lawyers and judges for the tolls exam, uh, and also helps them improve their confidence with legal English. And she also works as a legal translator and interpreter for the Savon court of justice. And she has an international legal English certificate from Cambridge university and also a TEFL te a teacher of English as a foreign language certificate. Welcome Claudia.
Speaker 2 00:02:30 Hi, thank you for inviting me.
Speaker 1 00:02:32 Yeah, it's really nice to have you here. So, uh, the first question I always like to ask is what languages do you speak?
Speaker 2 00:02:40 Okay, well, because I was born in Italy and I attended school here that is, um, here in Italy, where I live than is Seona. My first language is Italian, but at the same time, because my mom is Canadian. I've been, uh, exposed to, uh, the American English quite a lot when I was young. Um, besides this, I then studied English at school at, um, primary school, high school and et cetera. Then I at university, I didn't study languages. I studied law, but I, um, I worked for, um, a period, a quite long period of time, one year in London, in a law firm based in London. Um, well the first question here, people asked me what, but were the lawyers Italian or were they, uh, English? They were English, English lawyers. So that's why I put that in the language, uh, part, because I, um, I worked with, with, uh, with the English language and then in, uh, 2020 and did also a specialization course with a university here in Italy to be, and I, um, I became, um, certified translator, uh, for, just for legal English. So I had this specialization course. I did this, uh, specialization course in, uh, legal English translation. So this is, uh, basically my language. Oh, I'm sorry. I forgot to say besides English and Italian, I also speak very little Japanese that I Studi when I was at high school.
Speaker 2 00:04:26 So I'm not the only one. Good to know
Speaker 1 00:04:31 Me too.
Speaker 2 00:04:33 Yeah, it, it, it was difficult. I mean, it was difficult. Yeah. Stopped a little bit. I don't know. Did you ever stop studying Japanese for a while? Like from,
Speaker 1 00:04:45 Well, I, I learned it by going to Japan. I went after, after I was done with college, I lived in Japan for two years and taught English. So that's, I learned it by living there. So it's kind of embedded. I'm not, I'm not as good as I used to be, but it's a lot of, it's kind of embedded in my brain now.
Speaker 2 00:05:02 So I told him, yeah. So that you, you will never forget that I had, I, I mean, I was studying Japanese. I studied Japanese when I was at high school then because I started university and I felt a little bit overwhelmed because studying law and Japanese at the same time for my brain, it was a little bit too much. So I said, okay, pause a little bit. And then I pick it up again in 2018 because I decided to go and travel to Japan, uh, for a long period of time. So I said, well, probably because I would've, uh, my, my plan was to go to rural area. Um, I said, well, maybe I will need a little bit of Japanese. So I studied that again. And, but just the, at the survival level, just how to survive. And I managed to survive. Luckily,
Speaker 1 00:05:53 Where, where did you go in Japan?
Speaker 2 00:05:56 I did, um, a trail called the 88 tempo. That is on the island. Yeah. Chico that
Speaker 1 00:06:06 Yes. Yes. I know that,
Speaker 2 00:06:07 That,
Speaker 1 00:06:09 Wow. That must have been a wonder. That's a very different and unique ki I mean, most usually when people go to Japan, they go to Tokyo, they go to Kyoto, but you went and did the 88 temple hike.
Speaker 2 00:06:22 Exactly. I started there and you know what, I didn't know about this. I mean, I was totally unaware of this. And as I posted a, uh, a picture of the first temple, my Japanese teacher text me and she said, you know what? You are, uh, very close to my home. I didn't know you would've been coming. So I didn't even know that she went back to Japan and I didn't know that she lived there. So I already had a was
Speaker 1 00:06:52 How did you do, how was your Japanese? Did you get to use it a lot?
Speaker 2 00:06:56 <laugh> I used that a lot. I mainly used the same bunch of words that I had in my pocket, but I managed to survive. Cause sometimes two times I found myself in awkward situations just because I went there in, uh, August. And so it's, um, the period of the storms and the floodings and everything else. So it was important cause of that, but my Japanese helped me survive.
Speaker 1 00:07:24 <laugh>, that's a, that's a wonderful experience that that must have been really terrific. And, and have you lived in, in any other countries?
Speaker 2 00:07:33 Not at the moment, but I'm planning to, I mean, probably in the future, I will, I, I will. I see myself as, um, um, one of these digital moments that can travel and work at the same time. So this, this is my, my project, and I'm also helped by the fact that in Italy, I'm in Italy because I'm, I live in the, uh, European union. We can travel between all the, the different different countries. And so that'll help, that'll help a month in Paris would be good.
Speaker 1 00:08:06 Yes. Yes. That would be very, and you mentioned to me that you are planning to take something called the Q L T T the qualified lawyer transfer test, which I think would, would, um, is, is got, is an important piece of the digital nomad life, uh, potentially. Can you, can you tell us a little bit about that?
Speaker 2 00:08:29 Of course, this is a possibility that is available to lawyers coming from different jurisdictions, but the, the problem arose when, uh, the European union started to become even bigger and bigger and bigger, and we have this protected right, uh, to move and work in all the other, um, member states. And so, um, for example, if you are, um, a doctor, you can do your job in, uh, another country. And then the problem arose with lawyers because even lawyers wanted to travel and also work in other member states, but at the same time, the, um, judges and all the other lawyers of the different countries started to say, okay, you have this protected, right. But at the same time, the law is different. So they created, um, all these, um, learning paths in order to make sure that lawyers coming from, uh, other jurisdictions have the basic knowledge in order to, uh, provide their services in the other member states. So once you, um, take the test and you, of course pass the test, you are qualified to, um, to practice the, uh, the legal profession in the other member state. So I was thinking about taking the exam in, uh, Ireland in Dublin
Speaker 1 00:09:56 And what, what is tested on the exam? Because, I mean, you can't possibly learn the laws of how many, how many countries are in the EU. Now, how many member states,
Speaker 2 00:10:06 Oh, the the point you just take one exam for each jurisdiction. So it means that if I want to work okay, to move and work, for example, as I would like to, uh, in Ireland, you just, you have to take the exam there, but it's, it's quite a long path. It's more than one year. You have many different exams, you are tested, uh, your knowledge of civil law, um, commercial law, everything contract law is tested. So it's quite a long pass,
Speaker 1 00:10:35 But, but because you're a qualified lawyer in Italy, you have the, you have the ability and the right to take that exam. Whereas in the past, you'd have to go to law school in Ireland and study there and go through their program.
Speaker 2 00:10:49 Exactly, exactly. Um,
Speaker 1 00:10:52 So that's somewhat similar to in the us, since we've got 50 states and 50 jurisdictions, you can take the bar in one state, but often other states will have an agreement with the states where you can wave in to that state and you don't have to take the bar again, or you can just go and take the bar also, but that's a lot of, that's a lot of work as well. Huh.
Speaker 2 00:11:14 So we have test, which is, it's difficult, it's challenging, but it makes it possible for you to work abroad without ha without having to go back to university.
Speaker 1 00:11:25 Right. And I assume if you're doing it in Ireland, the, the exam is in English. And if you're doing that exam in Spain, it's in Spanish, et cetera, et cetera.
Speaker 2 00:11:34 Exactly. It works exactly that way.
Speaker 1 00:11:40 And, and how do you study for it? Are there courses that you take or, or online or books or how do you do it?
Speaker 2 00:11:48 I oh, oh, okay. Because this is my future plan. So I must admit that I'm not that prepared about that at the moment, but I'm did a sort of overview. I overview the, um, the website of the Dublin, um, law support center, whatever, and they will provide you with books. So you, you will of course pay for the books, but they have books to, uh, to make sure that, you know, all the knowledge that they want. And there are also courses, but unfortunately I think that you have to attend the courses there. So it's, um, you, you must be present in that's something that I'm not sure I can do. I don't know whether they have already prepared online based and preparation courses. I hope they will, if they will, I will definitely, um, register for these courses, but I mean, they're quite prepared. It's not something, uh, it's just me. I mean, I have to, uh, still look into that,
Speaker 1 00:12:55 Right. So there's a, there's a whole system for how people do this.
Speaker 2 00:12:58 They're prepared.
Speaker 1 00:13:00 I know in the us, there's, there's a whole industry of bar exam preparation companies, private companies that, that help people. So I, yeah, so it sounds like there's something at least somewhat similar, um, that exists over here,
Speaker 2 00:13:14 But I don't think that for them, it's such a business because even the, the costs for the exams are not that high. So for example, in, um, in the UK, it was like 10,000 pounds, which is quite a lot instead in the, in Ireland, it was much less, much less. Oh,
Speaker 1 00:13:34 Wow. Okay. So that's a really, that's a good point of contrast. Mm-hmm <affirmative> yes. Education, everything in the us tends to be much more expensive. Uh, and, and so you'll be working with, um, English and Ireland. You've, you've worked with English in London and you said your mother's Canadian and, and then I, I guess you must encounter American English as well. Is it, is there, is, is, are there challenges to navigating the different Englishes
Speaker 2 00:14:03 Of course on a daily basis? Because I also learned that even grammar rules sometimes change between American English and, uh, British English. So that was a little bit challenging at the beginning, but I'm aware of that. So I initially I thought, well, so did I make that, did I make a mistake? Uh, which was also possible of course, but I said, then I asked mom and she said, well, that's just the way I used to say these things. So don't worry about that. We, that that's our jerk. So don't worry about that. Just, you know, British English is a little bit different, so just get used to that too. It's good that you are exposed to, uh, British English as well. So that was good, but it wasn't that difficult. I mean, the fact is that when you work in a formal environment, everything that is, uh, a jerk is not involved, so it's much easier to, to follow the, the language,
Speaker 1 00:15:00 Everything that is not a what,
Speaker 2 00:15:02 Uh, jerk like, uh, I mean,
Speaker 1 00:15:05 Oh, jargon,
Speaker 2 00:15:06 Jargon. Yeah. So you don't, uh, you don't speak, um, as a young teenager would speak. I mean, it's right. Easier. That's easier.
Speaker 1 00:15:16 So let's see. So you have, so your work falls into two main categories. There's your teaching and there's your legal translation work. Um, can you, can you tell us a little bit about your work?
Speaker 2 00:15:28 Yeah. Okay. I started my career, uh, as a translator and as a core interpreter. Uh, I, it was just at the beginning. I mean, it's something that I still do. It's something that I like doing. It's something that, uh, helped me learn a lot about what I do, but at the same time, now I'm more focused on teaching legal and English because I find it, uh, much more creative, much more challenging than just translating what other people say. And so I'm more focused on that right now, but it was, it's always nice to go to court and having to translate, uh, court hearings and the recordings and being involved in the investigations. So it's something I keep doing just because I, I, for me, it's fun. It's fun. It's not well paid because unfortunately, uh, court appointed experts here in Italy are paid very little. I mean, you don't go there for money. You just go there for experience or, and just because you, you liked your job, but it was a good way to start. And in fact, it's still, I'm still there just because I, um, I feel positive about it. I just like this way of working. I like working with the, with the court system.
Speaker 1 00:16:50 Have you had any particularly interesting or tricky or challenging situations in your experiences?
Speaker 2 00:16:57 Unfortunately, a lot, a lot, for example, once, and I think it was my first, the first time I was in court, there was this American, um, man who he had some mental health issues declare mean he was, um, I mean, he had a doctor, not with him, but he was, uh, treated and he decided to go, uh, on holiday. He decided to go to France. He went there, he rented a car. And then he, I don't know how it happened, but basically he arrived in Italy and then he went into panic because he, um, he didn't have the insurance coverage. And so he started, uh, punching, punching people in, in the streets. I mean, he got crazy, got crazy. Then he took the car again and he left, uh, his wife on the motor wave. So she couldn't, she didn't know how to arrive in a city. And so she had to call the police and it was such a nightmare, such a nightmare. And plus when the hearing finished, they left him basically without nothing because he lost everything because it just went crazy. And so I, I spent the, the whole, the, my entire afternoon helping these people, finding a plane to come back home, finding something to eat. And was it was, it, was it, it was fun. I must admit that then other things happened during the years over the years, but yeah, that's, it was fun. I, I would <inaudible>
Speaker 1 00:18:37 So it went beyond the, uh, the legal English into,
Speaker 2 00:18:41 Beyond yeah. Then still context. So sometimes I just check whether they're okay or not. And they're they're okay. So good. <laugh>
Speaker 1 00:18:51 So you really get the personal side of it, because so much of, of law and law practice, you deal with somebody's problem, but you might never interact with that person again, or, you know, that company or that, whatever, like you just see that little sliver, but, but it sounds like you got a much more personal kind of experience or, or a connecting kind of experience. Um,
Speaker 2 00:19:13 I D I did that. I just felt I, I had to help those people.
Speaker 1 00:19:20 They were lucky to have you as an interpreter or a that day. And, and what about, tell us a little bit about your teaching work
Speaker 2 00:19:30 Okay. About this is the part of my job that I like the most. I teach lawyers, I teach judges here in, and, um, I now also have a class of, um, students of the law faculty of, um, they're based in, in Russia. I don't remember the name of the, uh, the south rural state university in Russia. And I'm preparing these students for a mood competition, the yes. Up mood competition.
Speaker 1 00:20:04 Oh, wonderful. The Jessup mood com mood court competition. That's that's, I've heard a lot about that. That's terrific.
Speaker 2 00:20:10 And it's, yeah, it's terrific. It's sadly, it's a, it's a good experience for students because they it's the first time they interact at, um, at an international level with students, with other students, from other jurisdictions and countries and whatever. Plus I guess that, that is one of the, uh, this is one of the first times in which they have to do something, uh, on their own. That is so complicated. That is, they kind of act as if they were the lawyer or the judge, et cetera. So they're, it's really challenging for them and that I feel, um, I I'm happy to help you to help them with, uh, with this. So this is the, the part that I I'm really enjoying. In fact, they, they have to, um, file their memorials tomorrow. So today it's a great excitement, their, their keep casting me to ask me information. So it's, it's a very, uh, challenging day as a teacher to,
Speaker 1 00:21:13 Okay. So, so you're teaching, you're working with Russian moot court students or students preparing for, for international. What else are you doing with your teaching?
Speaker 2 00:21:24 I, uh, teach, um, a group of just, um, judges here and they they're all so good. So this is really challenging because they, uh, they have a very good knowledge of the English language. Plus they have a lot of experience and they, uh, they're used to studying. So if I give them homework, they do their homework. So this is really good. I
Speaker 1 00:21:50 Wasn't. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:21:52 And we, we don't prepare for any, um, language examinations for, because they're, I, I would say that they're because of their level, they're beyond that. So with them, we, we study, uh, for example, the British legal system or the American legal, uh, system, we then review some of the, um, li landmark cases in the us. For example, we talk about the lives of, uh, some ju uh, ju justices of the Supreme court. So it's more like a cultural meeting than a proper legal English lesson. So we do, um, it's we study, we study together. So that is mainly what I do with them. And then with the lawyers, instead, we always prepare something that is always more practical, like, uh, writing emails that are short and persuasive, and that goes strict to the point. This is what they ask me to do for them. Or we, we prepare contracts, we see some temp, we look at some, uh, templates together. We, we do a different type of, uh, work activity. And then we prepare for the, uh, toes exam. That is the, uh, test on legal English skills that is quite famous here in Europe.
Speaker 1 00:23:24 Oh, can you say more about, about the toes exam? Is that through
Speaker 2 00:23:27 Cambridge it's? No, the IEC was through Cambridge. The one that I, uh, that, that I took when I was, um, at the beginning of my career, but now it's no longer available, probably because it, it was a bit too difficult for Stu I don't know why it was a, it was just, um, decision. Uh, so that is no longer available. We have instead the, to exam that is provided by, um, Oxford university process, I think, but by Oxford, not Cambridge this time and still it's really good, they have just changed the, the book and the new book is as good as the first one, even better. And it provides students with a general background of, uh, legal, English, grammar, and, uh, vocabulary. We study together, uh, employment law, the law towards, or contract law, the not criminal law, which was instead available with the <inaudible> exam. Oh, good. Really good. So very good starting point for lawyers who want of course, to improve their legal English skills.
Speaker 1 00:24:40 Oh, wow. And, and I'm thinking back to a comment you made about the, when you work with the judges, that it's a lot of, it's a lot of, uh, sort of American culture or legal cultural knowledge, and it's not so much legal English, but I, I was thinking actually background knowledge and culture, knowledge is part, is such a big part of comprehension that I, I would, I would say that that is very much part of legal English.
Speaker 2 00:25:04 It is, it is, it is. But in fact, I can't, I generally don't do that with lawyers because they're more, more, I mean, practicing lawyers, because they're more on practical things, things that they can in their, uh, daily activity instead judges, uh, I mean, at least the ones with, uh, with whom I worked are more focused on the, uh, cultural background on the study of the law from, uh, the, the, the past. So they really like this, and I like that too. So this gives you, um, a possibility of doing everything. I mean, I, I can study both the things and it's, this is good for me too.
Speaker 1 00:25:48 And, and how do, how do your students or your clients find you, do you, is it word of mouth? Is it, do you have a big billboard in the middle of the city? Like, how does that, how did, how did you build up your, your, um, your, your student base in your classes?
Speaker 2 00:26:07 Okay. So I must admit that I'm not very good at marketing myself, but besides lucky in my students market my products more than what I do for myself. So it's word of mouth mainly then I, I sometimes call, uh, contact the diff the, the different law societies that we have here. And because in Italy, every, um, every city has its own, um, like council of lawyers. So I generally call each of them to ask whether they would like to, uh, sponsor some of these, uh, courses. Then I also have, uh, now finally, I'm fi I finally have my website that is www.speech.eu. This is my website.
Speaker 1 00:26:59 And we'll, we'll put that in the show notes.
Speaker 2 00:27:02 <laugh> okay. It's uh, yeah, speechle because I wanted to, my first idea was L speech, but let's speak or speak, but speechle was, was a, a good option in my mind. I think
Speaker 1 00:27:16 It's, yeah.
Speaker 2 00:27:18 I also have, um, uh, a page on Instagram, an Instagram account that is against speechle, where I upload some, um, posts about a vocabulary or grammar. We now ha uh, we're now reading a book altogether. I mainly read the book because at the moment, most of my students are a little bit shy, so they want to, they don't want to interact, but we are, we have also this, uh, legal English book club.
Speaker 1 00:27:51 Oh, what a nice idea. I saw some of that on LinkedIn, you posted your, I saw you reading part of the book and I thought that was really terrific. So, and, and let me ask you, um, uh, as we, as we sort of get to the, the end of our discussion, um, what, uh, do you have any advice that you like to give people or advice that, that someone's given you that's been really helpful?
Speaker 2 00:28:14 Okay. Well, the, um, the first advice would be for students, never give up on your dreams. First of all, because sometimes it's a little bit difficult to, um, to go on when, because when the word becomes to be a little bit challenging, but dreams are dreams. So you can just wait a little bit, uh, with a little bit longer to, uh, make them happen, but they must be there then another, this is something that I don't know who told me about this, but who told me this? I don't know. But, um, someone told me stay where you feel empowered, which is really good for me. I mean, if I don't feel I am empowered in, in a certain place, that means that it's not a place where I should be, so I should stay where I feel that I can, uh, really, um, give my contribution to, or, uh, be helpful. Otherwise, if I don't have this feeling, I should just leave and find another thing that is probably, um, for me,
Speaker 1 00:29:21 I would agree. I would agree with that one. And I, I wish somebody had told me that much earlier in my, in my life. And
Speaker 2 00:29:29 Yeah, because otherwise you find yourself stuck into situations that might be good for other people, but they're not good for you. And you wonder why, but there's not a why there's, you're not okay for that position. Just change it. Mm-hmm <affirmative>. So it, sometimes it's easier than, uh, what we think. And the last piece of advice would be, and this is good. This is a famous quote, I don't know, from who, by whom, but, but it's a good one. Do something today that your future self will thank you for,
Speaker 1 00:30:03 Huh? That's a really nice way to think about it. Yeah.
Speaker 2 00:30:07 And I try to apply this too in my daily life, so I not only preach, uh, but I, I try to do all these things.
Speaker 1 00:30:17 So is this in doing this, this podcast interview today? Is this something that your future self might thank you for?
Speaker 2 00:30:25 Yeah, of course, of course.
Speaker 1 00:30:28 Good. Good.
Speaker 2 00:30:30 If it's a good one, I will tell myself, you see Claudia, you can do your own podcast, so you can produce your own podcast too. You can speak, you can, you can do it.
Speaker 1 00:30:41 Oh yeah. And we, we talked earlier before we started recording, um, that you're, you're planning to start a podcast where you talk about movies that, uh, have legal themes, which I thought was a terrific idea.
Speaker 2 00:30:56 Well, I have some movies in my mind, but the idea is, uh, first of all, to focus on the, uh, dialogues between the main, uh, characters that sometimes are, uh, interesting for students to focus on the vocabulary, to focus on, uh, of course the, uh, all of the background, legal knowledge that we sometimes need to have in order to also understand the, the plot of the, of the movie.
Speaker 1 00:31:24 I, I am very much looking forward to that podcast and I, I will, I will definitely recommend it and, and let all my future students know about it. So thank you for having that idea and, and really looking forward to it.
Speaker 2 00:31:37 We'll see. So now I must do my best to make it real
Speaker 1 00:31:42 Right now. Now it's, now you've said it in a public forum. <laugh>
Speaker 2 00:31:48 That's what is good when you, you say things in public, then you are compelled to do these things. <laugh>
Speaker 1 00:31:54 Exactly. Okay. Well, thank you so much for taking time to join me today. Uh, we will, as I said, we'll include any relevant links from this episode in the show notes. And I wanna remind our listeners to, to subscribe to the us law essentials podcast on apple, Stitcher, Spotify, Himalaya, or wherever you get your podcasts. And you can also listen to all episodes on the us law essentials.com website. Uh, and if you have any questions, comments, reactions, ideas, et cetera. We always love hearing from our listeners. Uh, you can contact us by email at Daniel, us law, essentials.com or through the us law essentials Facebook group or LinkedIn group. Oh. And we'll also make sure to add Claudia's, uh, LinkedIn, uh, profile on in the show notes. So you can connect with her as well. So thanks everyone for listening to us, law essentials, law and language podcast, and stay essential.
