French to English Translation

This direction comes into play when a French document has to be sent to an English-speaking country. The source may be a document issued in France, but it may just as well be a diploma, a livret de famille or an administrative record from Belgium, Switzerland, Canada or the Francophone countries of Africa; the target is the English-language institutions of the USA, the UK or Canada. Although this direction is the mirror of the en|fr pair, the legal flow runs the other way: concepts of French civil law are conveyed to an Anglo-Saxon reader.

The principal users are people with an education or employment history in a Francophone country who move to an English-speaking one. A student applying with a French or Belgian diploma for a master’s degree in the USA or the UK, someone submitting documents of Francophone African origin to a Canadian immigration procedure, and a family using a French livret de famille for a family procedure in an English-speaking country are the typical profiles for this direction. Documents from Africa and the French overseas regions call for particular care in conveying place and authority names correctly.

Challenges specific to this pair

Accents in French names are brought into line in the English target text with the spelling in the person’s passport; “Éric” in one document and “Eric” in another delays the application. The distinctive names of French administrative documents (acte de naissance, relevé de notes, casier judiciaire) are translated into English by their institutional function, not word for word. Number and date formats are likewise rearranged for the English target.

The second difficulty lies in legal and educational terminology. Concepts particular to French higher education such as licence, maîtrise or grande école are not forced onto an English degree; the recognition decision is left to the assessing institution. French marking (out of 20) is not converted but explained. In Francophone African documents the administrative structure of the country of issue can differ from that of France, so institution names are conveyed according to the reality of that country.

One of the most frequent snags in this direction is the abbreviations and official formulas of French documents. Formulas such as Né(e) le or délivré le are carried into English by their meaning rather than as set phrases; institutional abbreviations are expanded and, where necessary, also given in their original form. Registration and file numbers are not translated, but the record they belong to is stated. On a diploma from Francophone Africa, the name of the ministry or university that issued the document is explained in a form the English reader can recognise, because the other side may take that institution to be a French one. In multi-document immigration files the person’s name is kept consistent with the passport spelling across all documents, and accents are handled the same way throughout. The positions of official seals, stamps and signatures in the source document are preserved with a note in the translation; the document having obtained, in its country of issue, the apostille the English-speaking target country wants is as important as the validity of the translation, and this step is planned from the outset.

Which documents call for this direction

Education files (diploma, transcript, course descriptions) make up the core of demand. They are followed by birth, marriage and family record documents; criminal record certificates and administrative certificates; and commercial contracts and company documents. Because the marking system and course structure of French and Francophone diplomas differ from the Anglo-Saxon system, the content is conveyed in full so that the assessing institution can read every course correctly. In documents from Francophone Africa, the institution names of the country of issue are explained for the English reader. In family and immigration files, the English rendering of documents such as the livret de famille is given together with the function of every entry it contains, because this document is not a single certificate but a record that gathers several events in one place. Throughout the file the person’s name is kept consistent with the passport spelling and accents are handled the same way in every document; even a small inconsistency makes it harder for the official reviewing the application to link the documents to the same person.

• French/Francophone diploma, transcript and course descriptions
• Birth, marriage and family record documents
• Criminal record certificate and administrative certificates
• Commercial contract and company documents

Chain of certification

Since the target is an English-speaking country, no sworn translator system applies; the USA and the UK ask for a translation with a certificate of accuracy (certified), while Canada asks for a translator registered with a professional association or an affidavit. An apostille has to be obtained for the source document in its country of issue. You can see the different expectations of each target on the country certification regime page and find which papers are needed in the document guide.

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