This site uses cookies. Some of these cookies are essential to the operation of the site, while others help to improve your experience by providing insights into how the site is being used. For more information, please see the ProZ.com privacy policy.
Cookie settings
tarification préférentielle de l'électricité
Ingénierie pour le vivant
May 4, 2018 11:50
6 yrs ago
9 viewers *
French term

s\'obligent mutuellement à une communauté de vie

French to English Law/Patents Law (general) marriage
Les époux s'obligent mutuellement à une communauté de vie.
Proposed translations (English)
4 +1 have agreed to live together and maintain marital relations
4 +4 mutually undertake to cohabit
3 +1 mutually bind each other to a community of life
Votes to reclassify question as PRO/non-PRO:

Non-PRO (2): mchd, Jennifer White

When entering new questions, KudoZ askers are given an opportunity* to classify the difficulty of their questions as 'easy' or 'pro'. If you feel a question marked 'easy' should actually be marked 'pro', and if you have earned more than 20 KudoZ points, you can click the "Vote PRO" button to recommend that change.

How to tell the difference between "easy" and "pro" questions:

An easy question is one that any bilingual person would be able to answer correctly. (Or in the case of monolingual questions, an easy question is one that any native speaker of the language would be able to answer correctly.)

A pro question is anything else... in other words, any question that requires knowledge or skills that are specialized (even slightly).

Another way to think of the difficulty levels is this: an easy question is one that deals with everyday conversation. A pro question is anything else.

When deciding between easy and pro, err on the side of pro. Most questions will be pro.

* Note: non-member askers are not given the option of entering 'pro' questions; the only way for their questions to be classified as 'pro' is for a ProZ.com member or members to re-classify it.

Discussion

AllegroTrans May 5, 2018:
I think context is clear here I am assuming this is from a pre-nuptial agreement. Phil's reference to the Civil Code appears to indicate where the wording originates from (assuming the text is from France)
Nikki Scott-Despaigne May 5, 2018:
Context With an idea of the surrounding context, together with an indication of the purpose of the text, there is a strong chance that this could be rephrased. Otherwise, the term "communauté de vie" remains unclear. Is it necessary to qualify it? Is it appropraite to refer to the letter of the law (e.g. "within the meaning of art. 123 of the law ABC"), or would that not be an overtranslation?

More info would probably help determine what solutions are appropriate here. Without it, suggestions are likely accurate in isolation, but perhaps less so in context.
AllegroTrans May 5, 2018:
The purpose of translation is to end up with a phrase that both accurately reflects the meaning of the source text and makes sense in the target language. In this case it isn’t rocket science. In the majority of legal expressions, 'community' is a false friend as the underlying meaning is much more akin to 'joint', 'in common' etc. In English a community is something entirely different, and 'consortium' is really a business term.
mrrafe May 5, 2018:
Consortium As noted in response to AllegroTrans, the simple US legal term for the communauté in philgoddard's quote is consortium. However, that word incorporates 200 years of US judicial case law which probably finds no legally accurate equivalent in Fr. law. On the contrary, the Code Civile has expressly abolished loss of consortium as a cause of action while it remains alive and well in the US. In contrast, communauté de vie does exist as a standardized Fr. legal expression (cliché, if you will) and, as such, conveys a distinct meaning in Fr. jurisprudence. So I feel stuck with "community of life" no matter how peculiar or unattractive it may be as an anglicism. The reason there's so much legalese in the world is that one can lose a lot of content and innuendo by resorting to "plain English."

Proposed translations

+1
5 hrs
Selected

have agreed to live together and maintain marital relations

Fascinatingly (I think), it doesn't just mean live together:

D'une part, l'article 215 alinéa 2 du Code civil impose aux époux de partager une communauté de vie dans une résidence. Cela signifie que les époux s'engagent à disposer d'une résidence commune. Ceci ne les empêche cependant pas d'avoir des domiciles distincts. D'autre part, la jurisprudence envisage la communauté de vie sous l'angle de la cohabitation charnelle. Ce point signifie que les époux s'engagent à entretenir ensemble des relations sexuelles à un rythme régulier. Le non-respect de chacune de ces deux obligations peut constituer une faute justifiant aussi bien le divorce que l'allocation de dommages et intérêts.

http://droit-finances.commentcamarche.com/faq/23659-communau...
Peer comment(s):
agree AllegroTrans : You have expanded on the Civil Code but I think this is reference material rather than an answer; in any case | think B D Finch's answer contains all that is implied
17 hrs
Yes, you're probably right.
Something went wrong...
4 KudoZ points awarded for this answer.
+1
14 mins

mutually bind each other to a community of life

***
Example sentence:

The love of the spouses requires, of its very nature, the unity and indissolubility of the spouses' community of persons,

Reference:

http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p2s2c3a7.htm

https://halshs.archives-ouvertes.fr/halshs-01738265

Peer comment(s):
agree Chakib Roula
1 hr
Thank you
neutral philgoddard : "Mutually" and "each other" is a tautology, and the whole phrase sounds translated in my opinion.
5 hrs
Agreed, tautology, but its being a statute makes me leery of editorial "improvements." The legislature would have done better to say "s'imposent" than "mutuellement" but they didn't.
neutral AllegroTrans : Never heard of a 'community of life': pure Translationese
7 hrs
This is a Fr. legal term. I've never seen it either; the only possible Eng. equivalent I know is "consortium," but that word would be a mistranslation because it incorporates centuries of definitional court decisions which of course are Eng. only.
Something went wrong...
+4
4 hrs
French term (edited): s'obligent mutuellement à une communauté de vie

mutually undertake to cohabit

"S'obligent" means that each one of them is making that undertaking. It does not mean that they bind each other.

Re cohabitation, see: https://www.proz.com/kudoz/french_to_english/general_convers...
Peer comment(s):
agree Yolanda Broad
39 mins
Thanks Yolanda
agree AllegroTrans : or "to live together as man and wife" // a matter of opinion of course, but that is precisely the commitment contained in the French Civil Code; feminism is something else
4 hrs
Thanks AT – I think "man and wife" is a bit loaded with pre-feminist baggage.
agree Jennifer White
5 hrs
Thanks Jennifer
neutral Nikki Scott-Despaigne : AT's suggestion fits with standard UK terminology. Perhaps "(hereby) both agree to...".
18 hrs
See my note to AT.
agree philgoddard : I like Allegro's version.
23 hrs
Thanks Phil
Something went wrong...
Close search
Term search
  • All of ProZ.com
  • Term search
  • Jobs
  • Forums
  • Multiple search