Intercultural Communication and ESP: Points of Intersection

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Intercultural Communication and ESP Points of
Intersection

• Ulla Connor
• William Rozycki
• Indiana Center for Intercultural Communication
• Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis
• 2007 TESOL Convention
• Seattle, WA, March 21-24, 2007

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Culture as a burning issue in the 21st century

• Culture is one of the two or three most complex
  words in the language (Williams, 1983, p. 87)
• Early notions of culture, the received view,
  consider large groups as sharing a definable
  culture (ethnic, national, international)
• Postmodern views see culture as a dynamic,
  ongoing process which operates in changing
  circumstances to enable group members to make
  sense and meaningfully operate within those
  circumstances (Holliday, 1999, p. 248)
• Culture has become less and less a national
  consensus, but a consensus built on common
  ethnic, generational, ideological, occupation
  or gender related interests, within and across
  national boundaries Kramsch, 2002, p. 276)

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Treatment of culture and communication in ESP

• Dudley-Evans and St John (1998)
• Theory culture comprises various aspects such
  as national, professionaland personal cultures
  (p.66)
• Practice Present received culture model of
  Hofstede (1991) and Trompenaars (1993), e.g.
• In diffuse cultures, such as China and
  Indonesia, the bossIn specific cultures, such as
  Australia and the Netherlands, the boss (p. 67)

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Relevant theories of intercultural communication
for ESP
Interacting large cultures and small
cultures Byrams (1997) theory of intercultural
competence Kramschs (1998) intercultural
speaker and (Kramsch Lam, 1999) third
space Accommodation theory in communication
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Two paradigms (Holliday, 1994, 1999)
Small cultures Large cultures
Non-essentialist, non-culturist Essentialist, culturist
Relating to cohesive behavior in activities within any social grouping Culture as essential features of ethnic, national, or international group
No necessary subordination to or containment within large cultures Small (sub)cultures are contained within and subordinate to large cultures
Interpretive, a process Normative, prescribed
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Large and small cultures in the classroom
Complexly interacting small cultures in an
educational setting. Atkinson, 2004 adapted from
Holliday, 1994, 1999.
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Byrams (1997) theory of intercultural competence

• Five key ideas
• Attitudes
• Knowledge
• Skills of discovery and interaction
• Skills of interpreting and relation
• Critical cultural awareness

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Accommodation in English as a Lingua Franca

• Communication accommodation (Giles et al., 1991
  Coupland Jaworski, 1997)
• Native and nonnative English speakers
  accommodate toward World Standard English
  (Crystal, 1997)

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Accommodation (cont.)

• How like you our fish? (Connor, 1999)
• Finnish fish broker adjusts his English to
  accommodate his buyers and sellers
• To buyers he is more polite
• He adjusts his grammar and style depending on his
  understanding of their language ability and
  culture

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Culture in 2 ESP programs of ICIC

• English for Specific Purposes in Business,
  Finance, and Economics (Ministry of Finance of
  PRC)
• Training for International Postdoctoral
  Researchers

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Ministry of Finance program(Connor, Rozycki,
McIntosh, 2006)

• Large culture
• Chinese
• Small cultures
• disciplinary
• generational
• gender
• Intercultural competence
• interaction and negotiation in the third space
• power stance
• Accommodation
• linguistic and interactional strategies for L1
  and L2 in the third space

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Postdoctoral researchers(Connor Mbaye, 2004)

• Large cultures
• Chinese
• Korean
• Small cultures
• disciplinary, gender, generational
• Intercultural competence
• Accommodation
• oral communication
• written communication

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Relevance of intercultural communication models
for ESP programs

• 1. Large vs. small cultures
• 2. Intercultural competence and negotiation in
  the third space
• 3. Accommodation in the third space by L2 and L1