Justin Charlebois
Community of Practice Involvement Obligations.Abstract
One way of studying group involvement is through the paradigm of communities of practice (CofP) (Lave 1988, Lave & Wenger 1991). Students on university campuses are simultaneously members of various CofPs. This article investigates the CofPs Japanese students were involved in while studying in the United States. It found that the whole notion of CofP involvement is framed (Bateson 1972; Tannen & Wallet 1993) differently by Japanese. Specifically, the Japanese frame for attendance obligations and appropriate behavior is tighter (Goffman 1963) than that of their American counterparts. The results of this study suggest that what constitutes good demeanor is different in both societies and highlights the cultural relativity of frames regarding community of practice involvement. (community of practice, frame, obligations, expectations, deference, demeanor, tightness, looseness, giri, ninjo,omote, soto, uchi, ura).
Keywords: community of practice, frame, obligations, expectations, deference, demeanor, tightness, looseness, giri, ninjo, omote, soto, uchi, ura.
Hanna-Kaisa Desavelle & Saku Mäkinen
Addressing the Consumer in Standardised Advertisements: Linguistic Cues in French and Finnish Technology Products’ Advertising Texts.Abstract
The complexity of the challenges in global marketing communications which concern technology products arise from e.g. geographical variations, trends in globalisation and the evolutionary changes of technologies. In response to this complex environment multinational companies need to find a balance between adaptation and standardisation to achieve effective advertising. We explore linguistic cues used to address the consumer in standardised advertisements of technology products in France and Finland. The advertising texts are studied with the theory of enunciation, which takes into account the communication situation and textual organisation. Furthermore, we elaborate what the linguistic cues imply as linguistic strategies in standardised advertising. The corpus indicates that, despite standardised product information and images, consumers are approached via dissimilar linguistic means in different cultural settings, revealing a differing relationship towards technology.
Keywords: theory of enunciation, advertising text, standardisation, linguistic strategies, France, Finland
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Mohammed Farghal
Accidental Humor in International Public Notices Displayed in EnglishAbstract
This paper examines accidental humor as it manifests itself in international public notices displayed in English. It shows that accidental humor, just like intentional humor, essentially stems from script opposition and script overlap (Raskin, 1985). However, it lacks intentionality, which plays a key role in contrived humor. In this way, accidental humor is based on the interaction between the text and the receiver, apart from the producer. In particular, accidental humor in interlingual communication is the output of the producer's language incompetence in the target language, whereas it is the result of the producer's landing in unintended ambiguity in intralingual communication. In such humor, therefore, the initiator infringes one or more maxims of conversation (Grice, 1975), unlike intentional humor, where the joke teller exploits conversational maxims for communicative purposes, in order to generate conversational implicature and, subsequently, laughter. Keywords: accidental humor; intentionality; implicature; script opposition; flouting a maxim; infringing a maxim; interlingual communication.
Frank Meyer
A Comparative Look at Scandinavian Cultures: Denmark, Norway and Sweden and Their Encounters with German Refugees, 1933-1940.Abstract
This article is a comparative study that points to the differences between national cultures in Scandinavia, as they are reconstructed from source material left over from the encounter between Scandinavian insiders and German outsiders in the pre-World War II period. This article uses a variety of memoirs, notes, interviews, and other records produced by German refugees in Scandinavia, and by Scandinavians who encountered German refugees in the period 1933-1940. Danes, Norwegians and Swedes characterise and are characterised by the German refugees. Thus, in-group and out-group mechanisms highlight patterns that help to constitute national cultures. This article provides a few examples that show the comparative differences in the ways in which German refugees were seen and treated by the Scandinavians who encountered them. It also provides a few examples that show the comparative differences in national culture in Scandinavia, as those differences appeared to German refugees.
Keywords: Scandinavia, culture, comparison, encounter, German refugees.
Back to startMargaret Murphy and Mike Levy
Politeness in Intercultural Email Communication: Australian and Korean PerspectivesAbstract
This paper presents initial results from analysis of data collected on the topic of politeness in intercultural email communication from a large cohort of Australian academic and general staff at an established metropolitan university. We were interested in the language used by these staff members while they conducted their initial email communication with their contacts overseas. The contacts overseas were, for example, fellow professional colleagues, representatives from educational institutions and foreign students. The staff members did not know personally their overseas email partners in the sense that they had not previously met face-to-face. In particular, we were interested in if and how the staff members incorporated politeness indicators in their email language and how they interpreted politeness, or lack thereof, in their incoming emails. The paper also describes and analyses the politeness strategies in intercultural emails used by a smaller cohort of Korean academics at seven universities in Korea. Results show differences in politeness, both in expectations and use, between Australian and Korean academics.
Themes and conceptual developments were identified in the primary data-gathering instrument, the questionnaire, using qualitative data analysis. The software package Leximancer was used for text analysis (Smith 2002). The software analysis confirms and strengthens our own qualitative analysis. Results show aspects such as formality in language and use of correct titles are important politeness considerations in intercultural email communication. These politeness considerations however, vary according to culture and results show many discrepancies on these and other aspects between the Australian and Korean data. Figures showing ranked themes display these results visually.
Keywords: intercultural e-mail communication, Australian university staff, Korean academics, unkown overseas e-mail partners, politeness strategies, qualitative data analysis.
Back to startFélix Neto
Changing intercultural attitudes over timeAbstract
Diversity is increasing within the Europe, and in Portugal in particular, and higher education will likely play a key role in preparing people to function in this new environment. This study assessed the effectiveness of an Intercultural Relations course at changing student levels of attitudes towards diversity and feelings of self-worth. The results indicated that the course had a positive impact on the multicultural ideology and increased ethnic tolerance and self-esteem, but it had no impact on gender-role ideology and ageism.
Keywords: multicultural ideology, ethnic tolerance, prejudice, self-esteem. Back to start
Yumi Nixon and Peter Bull
Cultural communication styles and accuracy in cross-cultural perception: A British and Japanese studyAbstract
This study examines the effects of cultural communication styles on cross-cultural perceptual accuracy. In Experiment 1, the communication accuracy of British and Japanese participants was assessed within their own cultures and compared across five interpersonal contexts: age, competition, intimacy, kinship and status. The results showed that the British were significantly more accurate on intimacy scenes while the Japanese were significantly better on age, competition and status scenes. In Experiment 2, accuracy between cultures was compared. When British and Japanese participants viewed both British and Japanese scenes, the British were more accurate in the perception of kinship and status scenes while the Japanese were more accurate on intimacy scenes. The significance of the results is discussed in light of expressivity, perceptual sensitivity and social rules.
Keywords: Cross-cultural perception, Perceptual sensitivity, Intercultural miscommunication, Cultural specificity, British and Japanese study, nonverbal communication.
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