Here are excerpts from the most recent tips on SlawTips, the site that each week offers up useful advice, short and to the point, on practice, research, writing and technology.

Research & Writing

How Do You Note Up a Specific Paragraph of a Case?
Susannah Tredwell

There are a couple of ways of noting up a specific paragraph of a case, with the easiest option being on CanLII. For CanLII, start off by searching for the case you are interested in. … . . . [more]

Here are excerpts from the most recent tips on SlawTips, the site that each week offers up useful advice, short and to the point, on practice, research, writing and technology.

Research & Writing

Unnecessary Legalese, Mostly Archaic
Neil Guthrie

Commence: This word is unavoidable as a technical term in litigation: one commences an action under the Courts of Justice Act, RSO 1990, c C43, for example. But don’t use the word in normal parlance or non-technical writing, where it sounds fussy and pompous. … . . . [more]

Here are excerpts from the most recent tips on SlawTips, the site that each week offers up useful advice, short and to the point, on practice, research, writing and technology.

Research & Writing

Redundancies Galore
Neil Guthrie

All of these seen recently. Action plan: I suppose there could be a plan to do nothing (an inaction plan?), but generally plan implies taking action — so the first element inaction plan is redundant. … . . . [more]

Here are excerpts from the most recent tips on SlawTips, the site that each week offers up useful advice, short and to the point, on practice, research, writing and technology.

Research & Writing

There Are Some Hard to Find Foreign Cases on CanLII
Susannah Tredwell

One of CANLII’s lesser known resources is its Foreign reported decisions database which “includes some decisions issued by foreign courts and tribunals and that are of special interest for Canadian law.” … . . . [more]

Here are excerpts from the most recent tips on SlawTips, the site that each week offers up useful advice, short and to the point, on practice, research, writing and technology.

Research & Writing

Unnecessary Lawyerisms
Neil Guthrie

These aren’t always confined to lawyers; they permeate the e-mail and speech of law clerks, legal assistants and students. Advised: The phrase Please be advised that … has to be one of the most leaden openings of all time. Cut to the chase and just convey the actual information, without the pointless preamble. … . . . [more]

Here are excerpts from the most recent tips on SlawTips, the site that each week offers up useful advice, short and to the point, on practice, research, writing and technology.

Research & Writing

Miscellaneous Jargon
Neil Guthrie

We’ve had lots on bad business jargon in this space, but other fields of endeavour have also been polluting the language. Surface: This is from the world of technology, a jargon-generator if ever there was one. … . . . [more]

Here are excerpts from the most recent tips on SlawTips, the site that each week offers up useful advice, short and to the point, on practice, research, writing and technology.

Research & Writing

Key Takeaways
Neil Guthrie

This was cited in Guthrie’s Guide as an example of bad business jargon, without much additional commentary. Because of its ubiquity, this dreadful phrase merits a few words. … . . . [more]

Here are excerpts from the most recent tips on SlawTips, the site that each week offers up useful advice, short and to the point, on practice, research, writing and technology.

Research & Writing

A New Resource for Translations of Canadian Case Law
Susannah Tredwell

The Centre de traduction et de terminologie juridiques (CTTJ) at the Université de Moncton has been working on a project to translate important unilingual Canadian court decisions into Canada’s other official language. … . . . [more]

Here are excerpts from the most recent tips on SlawTips, the site that each week offers up useful advice, short and to the point, on practice, research, writing and technology.

Research & Writing

More Redundancies
Neil Guthrie

Lawyers find it difficult to use one word when they could use two. Here are some further examples. Forward progress: All progress is forward-looking; that’s why it’s progress. Null and void: The two elements mean the same thing, so there is no need to use both. … . . . [more]

Here are excerpts from the most recent tips on SlawTips, the site that each week offers up useful advice, short and to the point, on practice, research, writing and technology.

Research & Writing

Terrible Transitions
Neil Guthrie

In an op-ed piece prompted by the Ontario government’s threatened invocation of the Charter’s ‘notwithstanding’ clause (s 33), Professor Lissa Paul of Brock University mused about the prevalence of similar ‘useless adverbs’ in student writing: ‘”Notwithstanding” and the Transition Word Epidemic’ … . . . [more]

Here are excerpts from the most recent tips on SlawTips, the site that each week offers up useful advice, short and to the point, on practice, research, writing and technology.

Practice

The Dangers of Dopplelawyers
Shawn Erker

Be careful: There may be another you out there, lurking in the non-SEO-optimized back quarters of the internet. Another website profile with your name, maybe even your firm’s name, but with different contact information. …

Research & Writing

More Terminology: Law Students
Neil Guthrie

A friend, who is originally from the UK and not a lawyer, asked me why we call our . . . [more]

Here are excerpts from the most recent tips on SlawTips, the site that each week offers up useful advice, short and to the point, on practice, research, writing and technology.

Research & Writing

Use the CanLII Manual to British Columbia Civil Litigation to Find Annotated Rules of Court
Susannah Tredwell

Last Thursday, CanLII unveiled its newest endeavour: the CanLII Manual to British Columbia Civil Litigation. The resource consists of nine “pathfinders” dealing with specific areas of the law, a guide to civil procedure at the BC Supreme Court, and annotated rules of court for both the BC Supreme Court . . . [more]