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Abstract
This paper discusses the link between empirical research in business discourse and the development of appropriate teaching materials for the teaching of business language. It highlights three key areas of interest; new media, the organizational context and the impact of national culture, and it suggests a number of activities that could be used to raise student awareness of these three areas within international business communication.
1. Introduction
The research papers showcased in this Special Issue represent current empirical work in the investigation of business discourse. All the researchers concerned are involved both in research in business contexts and in the teaching of business language. But how are we to reapply their research-based ideas in a classroom situation, be that with pre-experience general business language courses or vocational courses designed to train established business people in language for specific purposes? It is this theme that I wish to pursue here.
Elsewhere I, and others, have discussed the fact that research in business discourse consistently points to three main areas of concern for those of us involved in teaching business language: (1) the need to incorporate the genres associated with new media into our teaching; (2) the need to take the organizational, i.e., business, context into account; and (3) the need to understand the interface between local communicative genres on the one hand and global business genres on the other (see Nickerson 2001; Nickerson 2000; Akar and Louhiala-Salminen 1999; St John 1996). The research studies represented in this Special Issue suggest that these three areas of interest should remain a priority, if we are to present our students with appropriate teaching materials. This short paper will deal with each of these areas in turn, illustrating them with examples taken from this Special Issue, together with further examples in other work. At the end of each section I will suggest a number of activities that could be used to raise student awareness of the specific area of interest.
2. New media
The papers by Akar and by Gimenez in the present volume emphasise the role that new media play in today's business world. Akar shows the importance of fax communication in the corporations she studied in Turkey and Gimenez provides us with a fascinating discussion of...