Exploring professional communication: Language in action

Stephanie Schnurr , Exploring professional communication: Language in action , London : Routledge , 2013. Pp. xiii, 234. Hb. $150.

Book Reviews

In Exploring professional communication: Language in action, Stephanie Schnurr innovatively takes an applied linguistics perspective to explore professional communication. This book follows a structure of first presenting professional problems, then proceeding to a discussion of intervention and engagement with these problems, and finally theorizing the issues. This applied perspective offers invaluable information for scholars interested in professional communication.

The chapters in this book make use of various authentic examples of professional communication in different settings, and employ numerous conceptual models to illustrate how the issues of professional communication may be explored in meaningful ways. Most creatively, in addressing the various topics of professional communication, the book mainly takes the perspective of applied linguistics, 'which is supplemented with theoretical and empirical insights gained in several other disciplines, including communication studies, sociology, anthropology, business and management, organizational sciences and leadership studies' (p. 1). The research methods and analytical linguistic frameworks cover ethnography, conversation analysis (CA), genre analysis, interactional sociolinguistics, and critical discourse analysis (CDA).

Chapter 1 first defines 'professional communication' by taking into account Erving Goffman's frontstage and backstage encounters, transactional and relational aspects, workplace discourse and institutional discourse. Specifically, professional communication is conceptualized very broadly as 'interactions which may take various forms and which take place in a context that is broadly related to work, and involve at least one participant who is engaged in some work-related activity' (p. 17). This chapter then outlines three changes that have affected professional communication in a variety of ways and that are crucial for an understanding of how communication is done in any workplace, namely, the internationalization and globalization of the economy, technological advances, and what has been described as the 'new work order'.

Chapter 2 presents different genres of professional communication, which are reflected by specific interactions between professionals and lay people, exchanges among professionals, as well as one-way communication between an organization and its members and clients. Then genre analysis is introduced as an approach to systematically describing the specific features and functions of different kinds of professional communication.

Chapter 3 further explores some of the differences in communicative...