Master en Droit à finalité spécialisée

17:33 Dec 11, 2018 

In the US and UK master's degrees in law are normally called LLM's. Here are some examples of LLM programs referring to focused areas of studies as "Concentrations":

https://llm-guide.com/concentrations (this is an international site -- the LLMs are not just US but also UK and EU)

Harvard: "CURRICULAR CONCENTRATIONS
Students who are interested in the fields of corporate law, finance and governance, international human rights, or taxation may pursue a concentration in one of these fields." https://hls.harvard.edu/dept/graduate-program/gphandbook/aca...

Emory:
http://law.emory.edu/academics/llm-degree-program/llm-concen...

In the UK they may also use "specialisation" or variants on that word (all-caps added by me):

Cambridge: "Some students elect to obtain a general LLM, choosing papers from various unrelated legal fields. Others choose to SPECIALISE in commercial, European, international or intellectual property law, taking at least three papers in one of these areas so as to receive a designation to their LLM indicating the SPECIALISM pursued."
http://www.llm.law.cam.ac.uk/about-the-cambridge-llm-program...

00:54 Dec 11, 2018 

Is there a way to split the Kudoz points between multiple professionals who contributed to this with relevant insight?

21:15 Dec 10, 2018 

You asked if I think the university's own translation is wrong. I do. It's not used in the US/UK to mean what "finalité spécialisée" means.

"Professional focus" is uncommon in the Anglophone higher ed world, and when it's used, it means the degree is more professional than usual (e.g. a degree in writing means learning to write poems and novels, but a degree in writing "with a professional focus" might mean technical and commercial writing). That makes no sense here, because a graduate degree in law is by definition professional (it qualifies you to enter the legal profession). There is no "less professional" version of a law degree.

What we say in the US/UK to indicate focus on a particular subfield of the main field (e.g., main field = law, subfield = human rights law) is specialization or concentration. That's what "finalité spécialisée" means.

Having been asked to do translations myself for a French university when I was a young student with no qualifications in translation, I don't think we can assume the university hired a qualified translator -- they might have just grabbed an exchange student or a Belgian student doing an English degree.

20:59 Dec 10, 2018 

Hello,
I am not sure whether you realize that "professional focus" and "professional master's degree" mean different things. From your response to my comment on your proposed translation, it sounds like you don't.

Adding "finalité spécialisée" doesn't make THE DEGREE professional (all graduate law degrees are "professional" by definition). Finalité spécialisée/professional focus/specialization/etc. means *what part of the law profession your studies focused on* (in this case, it was transnational, comparative and foreign law).

The Belgian university translates "finalité spécialisée" as "professional focus." That works -- so does "specialization" or "concentration" (these are both terms used to describe certain courses of university study). All of those work, and all of them require the rest of the degree's name in order to make sense: "Professional Focus (Transnational, Comparative and Foreign Law)," or "Specialization in Transnational, Comparative and Foreign Law," etc.

That's all fine. But it doesn't mean that your "professional master's degree" translation is correct -- and FYI, speaking as a US lawyer whose sibling is a law professor, it is not correct.

16:49 Dec 10, 2018 

@Michelangela, I gave the link, you missed it

16:23 Dec 10, 2018 

Thanks for including the entire name of the degree. My answer below references that.

21:55 Dec 9, 2018 

The context is an Excel file with comparisons between 3 candidates. Parcours en enseignement supérieur has it for one candiate "Master en Droit à finalité spécialisée (Droit transnational, comparé et étranger)" and mentions the Catholic University of Louvain later. Thanks!

21:09 Dec 9, 2018 

It seems to be used in Belgium: https://www.studyrama.be/spip.php?article454

"La finalité spécialisée (FS), remplaçant le Diplôme d'études spécialisées (préparant à une spécialisation professionnelle)"
https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Master_(Belgique)

"Professional focus" is the term they used for "finalité spécialisée" here:

https://uclouvain.be/en-prog-2018-droi2m-ldreu200s (English)
https://uclouvain.be/prog-2018-droi2m-ldreu200s (French)

20:46 Dec 9, 2018 

It's master's degree (possessive, presumably because it means the degree of a master).
https://www.dictionary.com/browse/master-s-degree

If I google the French term, I see a bunch of degrees at different universities but they all say WHAT the finalité spécialisée is. I mean, it says there's a master's program in law with a finalité spécialisée -- and then it lists the ones you can choose from (finalité spécialisée en gestion; justice civile et pénale; droit de l'entreprise; droit européen; etc.).

Isn't there something in the text to indicate which finalité spécialisée this degree was in?