The main assumption proposed in this book is that legislative drafting represents an example of professional discourse, where the propositions of specialized information is translated into meanings, and such meanings are given as input to the rules and strategies of grammatical formulation. A relevant question for our understanding of modern legislative process is related to the effects of context at different levels, within which legislative process takes place. By looking at those levels, the analysis conducted in the book demonstrates that it becomes possible to reach a deeper understanding of the professional groups taking part in the process, better assess the lexico-grammatical and textual features of its final product (i.e., normative texts), and suggest alternative linguistic and textual strategies aimed at making texts more accessible to potential readers and/or intended users.

Giulia A. Pennisi studied Political Science and International Relations at the University of Palermo where she works at the chair of English Language and Translation. She holds a M.A. in Comparative Literature, Michigan State University (USA). She is Associate Fellow at the Institute of Advanced Legal Studies (IALS), University of London, where she is responsible for the "Legislation and Language" project. Her research is focused on specialized languages with a particular attention to the lexico-grammatical and textual analysis of discourse genres within multilingual and multicultural contexts.