United in diversity
European Union’s motto
The language of Europe is translation
Umberto Eco
With its 24 official languages and thanks to the work of its translators and interpreters, the European Union preserves and fosters language diversity like no other political institution in the world. It is exciting to find multilingualism specified in one of the very foundations of the Union¹, the Treaty on the European Union, especially after reading the magnificent description in the Treaty’s Preamble (if you haven’t seen it yet, it’s really worth taking a look at).
EU policy states that new EU legislation shall come into force only once the legal acts have been translated into all official languages. What’s more, European citizens are free to address any EU body or institution in their mother tongue.
This unique aspect of the Union has drawn the attention of researchers from all over the world. A recent example is Nils Ringe’s article The languages of politics: How multilingualism affects policymaking in the European Union.
In his analysis of political language, the author makes a clear distinction between monolingual, state-level contexts, and the multilingual European environment. Whereas at state level language is often used as a political tool to achieve specific goals (for example, propaganda), at EU-level language mostly serves its original purpose: communication. Indeed, European policymakers are aware that their messages will also be conveyed in other languages and therefore tend to use simpler, more direct and neutral language. They strive to be as clear as possible by reducing ambiguity and avoiding any ideological message.
So what about our fellow translators and interpreters? Despite the fact that in the EU communication, especially written communication, tends to be far less culture-specific, their work is far from easy. Huge terminological databases have been complied to ensure consistency and these need to be kept up do date. Moreover, the volume of new documents requiring translation is vast. As for discussion and debate, let’s not forget that the European Union remains a political entity and this can entail disagreement, something that can be challenging to interpret.
In short, not only does the European Union care deeply about language diversity, it has also been developing a new, political language of its own, which very often manages to avoid conflict and drive cooperation.
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1 - Art. 55 (ex Art. 53) of the Treaty on the European Union.