McGraw-Hill's Spanish and English Legal Dictionary : Diccionario Juridico Ingles-Espanol [Abridged] [Hardcover]

Henry Saint Dahl (Author)

Book Description

ISBN-10: 0071415297 | ISBN-13: 978-0071415293 | Publication Date: August 7, 2003 | Edition: 1

McGraw-Hill's Spanish and English Legal Dictionary defines hundreds of words in business law, civil and criminal law, contracts and torts, constitutional law, family law, labor law, liability, probate, property law, and international trade agreements. It includes more than 13,000 entries in Spanish and in English.

One feature that distinguishes this fully bilingual dictionary from the competition is its extensive collection of encyclopedic entries, including citations of judgments, torts and contracts, as well as civil, penal and commercial codes from the United States, Spain, and Spanish-speaking nations worldwide. It also features dozens of side-by-side sample claims, invoices, and other legal documents.

Editorial Reviews

From the Back Cover

The only authoritative, fully bilingual abridged legal dictionary

McGraw-Hill's Spanish and English Legal Dictionary is a practical, multicultural reference that defines hundreds of core terms in business law, civil and criminal law, constitutional law, family law, labor law, procedural law, liability, probate, property law, and international trade agreements. From Abatable nuisance to Zoning laws and from Abandono del servicio (Dereliction of service) to Zutano (John Doe), Henry Saint Dahl deals with core subjects in detail, explaining terms with reference to statute and case law and enabling an understanding of the different legal systems.

This unique dictionary features an extensive collection of authoritative encyclopedic entries, including citations of constitutions, judgments, official reports, opinions from attorneys general, as well as civil, penal, procedural, and commercial codes from the United States, Spain, and Spanish-speaking nations worldwide. It also includes legal writing by specialists from several countries. At the end there are master lists of key entries by subject matter to allow quick access to areas of specific interest.

Compact and concise, this useful tool is designed to help all those who need an understanding of legal issues across the Spanish-English linguistic and cultural divide.

About the Author

Henry Saint Dahl is an attorney admitted to practice in New York, Texas, Washington, D.C., Buenos Aires and Madrid. He lives in Charlottesville, Virginia.

Tamera Boudreau is an attorney admitted to practice in Texas and before the Federal Courts of Puerto Rico.

Product Details

• Hardcover: 512 pages
• Publisher: McGraw-Hill; 1 edition (August 7, 2003)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0071415297
• ISBN-13: 978-0071415293
• Product Dimensions: 9.3 x 6.2 x 1.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.9 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 2.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #72,370 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
  • #16 in Books > Law > Dictionaries & Terminology
  • #20 in Books > Law > Law Practice > Paralegals & Paralegalism
  • #96 in Books > Education & Reference > Dictionaries & Thesauruses > Foreign Language > Spanish

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

31 of 31 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Interesting but out of date and missing many key terms, May 27, 2006

By 

Steven Capsuto (Philadelphia, PA United States) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: McGraw-Hill's Spanish and English Legal Dictionary : Diccionario Juridico Ingles-Espanol (Hardcover)

Of the numerous Spanish<>English legal dictionaries I use regularly, this is consistently the one least likely to include the terms I need. I suspect it's partly because this is an abridged edition, and partly because the sources that the author(s) cite include very few publications that are even remotely recent. Another problem: the entries generally provide narrative explanations rather than functionally equivalent terms. The explanations are cogent, clear, interesting, and often establish differences in meaning between different countries. However, this approach is not helpful if you're a translator trying to figure out the best English-language equivalent for a Spanish legal term or vice versa.

27 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Diccionario Juridico ABREVIADO pero muy importante., August 16, 2005

By 

Eduardo J. Tellez A (Miami, Florida) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: McGraw-Hill's Spanish and English Legal Dictionary : Diccionario Juridico Ingles-Espanol (Hardcover)

Este es un diccionario que se disfruta mucho leer o ojear, siempre hay algo nuevo por aprender o algo viejo que recordar, es fácil de usar por su índice temático y las abreviaciones al final de cada palabra, si tienes dudas por alguna definición del sistema jurídico Anglo-Sajón tal ves aquí lo puedas encontrar, al igual que si necesitas traducir algún documento legal el diccionario te puede ayudar y facilitar la definición.

Casi todos los países de América Latina esta incluidos con alguna sentencia o ley importante(Nicaragua, México, Guatemala), al igual que países como España y EU. Las definiciones están muy bien explicadas de forma clara y breve así que si necesitas profundizar mas tendrás que buscar en otro diccionario, pero lo mas importante lo puedes encontrar aquí y a un buen precio, este diccionario es una muy buena inversión, definitivamente una buena adquisición para todos los que nos movemos en el mundo Jurídico.

Los precios de otros diccionarios son muy altos y esto se debe a que profundizan mas en algunos temas(Derecho Procesal, Laboral, Inmigración etc), son en varios tomos, tienen una bibliografía mas extensa(notaran que este solo menciona lo esencial) y este para ser un diccionario ABREVIADO tiene muchas definiciones importantes de Derecho Internacional, Penal, Laboral, Civil, Filosofía, Familia, Obligaciones, Contratos y Ambiental.

Si eres estudiante de Derecho este diccionario te ayudara mucho, si deseas profundizar mas te recomiendo del mismo autor Dahl's Law Dictionary, otro diccionario muy útil es el del autor Español Enrique Alcaraz Varo. En ingles el libro de Jay M. Feinman "Law 101: Everything You Need to Know About the American Legal System" es una muy buena introduccion al sistema Legal de EU, ademas del diccionario "Black's Law Dictionary" y en Español los diccionarios de Guillermo Cabanellas de Torres.

22 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Rough & Ready Translation, October 23, 2005

By 

David Walker - See all my reviews
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This review is from: McGraw-Hill's Spanish and English Legal Dictionary : Diccionario Juridico Ingles-Espanol (Hardcover)

I am a prosecutor, and I needed a dictionary to help translate the basic legal terms that are necessary to explain a guilty plea to criminal defendants. For my purposes the dictionary has been helpful. The dictionary enables me to find some word that will be close enough to my intended meaning to enable the defendant to follow. It is a handsome hard cover volume.

However, it doesn't have the kind of detail that you might want to explain to clients of different cultural backgrounds the more subtle differences between legal expressions. As one somewhat trivial example that comes to mind, we use the word audiencia for hearing. This dictionary also has the word vista for hearing, but it gives no insight into the difference between the two words -- when you would want to use one rather than the other. So, I just use audiencia because that's what our local translators use, and I trust them.

For simple translations, this dictionary is a great value, and I am very happy to have it. I am not skilled enough in spanish to be able to explain subtle differences in meaning -- or for that matter to write a review in spanish, so I don't find the lack of detail to be a problem. If you want detail, you won't find it here.