4-1. Intercultural and Transcultural Communication through Global Englishes — Transcript

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1. 0:03Hello, everybody. I'm Dr. Will Baker from the  Centre for Global Englishes at the University
2. 0:08of Southampton. And I’d like to thank  Professor Wenli and her colleagues for
3. 0:13inviting me to talk to you about global Englishes  and intercultural and transcultural communication,
4. 0:19and its relevance for teaching  through and about Englishes.
5. 0:26So I'm going to give three presentations.  In the first presentation here,
6. 0:31I'm going to talk about what global English is and  intercultural and transcultural communication are
7. 0:36and why they're important, and then  in the following two presentations,
8. 0:40we're going to explore the implications of  that for teaching and learning through English.
9. 0:47So in this presentation, we're going to look  at how English is used on a global scale for
10. 0:52communication across and beyond cultures  and nations. So specifically we're going
11. 0:59to look at global Englishes and intercultural  communication. And within that, we're going to
12. 1:04look at English as a lingua franca and approaches  to understanding intercultural communication
13. 1:09and the differences between earlier cross-cultural  approaches. We're also going to look at the most
14. 1:14recent theories of transcultural communication.  And finally we will look at key implications for
15. 1:20teaching. And this is what we'll expand  on in the following two presentations.
16. 1:28So firstly, global English is an intercultural  communication. Why is this important? Well,
17. 1:34as you can see from the diagram here, English  is estimated to be learned by and spoken by at
18. 1:42least 1.5 billion learners as a foreign language,  so this is non-native speakers of the language.
19. 1:49And as you can see compared to the  circles for other languages, this is
20. 1:53hugely more learned and spoken than any other  language in the world, so this means that
21. 1:59English is the most commonly used Lingua  Franca for intercultural communication,
22. 2:06so it's very likely that many of you regularly  use English to communicate with other people
23. 2:10from other cultures. So learning through English  whether it be EMI or CLIL or whether you're using
24. 2:18English for business or tourism, etc., you're  most likely to be using English for intercultural
25. 2:24communication and the kind of English you're most  likely to be using is English as a lingua franca.
26. 2:30And an important thing to take away from  this is that the majority of people who use
27. 2:34English are non-native speakers of the  language, and this has major implications
28. 2:38for how we understand how we need to use  English and how we teach through English.
29. 2:46So to explain some of the terminology I’m going  to be using. We'll begin with English, so global
30. 2:52Englishes is has been defined as the linguistic  and social cultural dimensions of global uses and
31. 2:57users of English, so that's the definition  we use at the Centre for Global Englishes.
32. 3:02To go into a bit more detail, we see it as an  umbrella term that covers English as a lingua
33. 3:07franca research, English is an international  language research and world Englishes research.
34. 3:13And today we're going to focus on English as a  lingua franca, as this is the most common use
35. 3:17of English and the most relevant one I think for  you. So Barbara Seidlhofer defines English as any,
36. 3:24English as a lingua franca as any use of English  among speakers of different first languages
37. 3:28for whom English is the communicative  medium of choice and often only option.
38. 3:33So the key point here is that English as a  lingua franca refers to a use of English,
39. 3:38it's not a particular variety of English, but  rather it's a variable way of using English
40. 3:43for communication between people who don't share a  first language. More recently Jennifer Jenkins has
41. 3:50defined English as a lingua franca or rather she's  defined it as English as a multilingual franca,
42. 3:55so here multilingual communication in which  English is available as a contact language
43. 4:00of choice, but is not necessarily chosen. So the  key point here is the emphasis on multilingualism.
44. 4:06So English as a lingua franca is seen  as part of multilingual communication,
45. 4:10yeah, and remember that the majority of English  as a lingua franca users are non-native speakers
46. 4:16of the language, so they will have another  language, so English is used in that sense
47. 4:20in a multilingual setting. Also the majority of  English as a lingua franca global Englishes use
48. 4:26is in settings which are not anglophone  settings, so again there'll be local languages,
49. 4:30so multilingualism is a big part  of English as a lingua franca,
50. 4:34or rather English as a lingua franca should be  seen as part of wider multilingual practices.
51. 4:42Okay now turning to intercultural communication.  Intercultural communication can be defined as
52. 4:47communication where cultural and linguistic  differences are perceived as relevant to
53. 4:51the interaction by participants and or  researchers. Yep, so communication where
54. 4:57cultural or language differences affect  the communication in one way or another.
55. 5:05So to explain that in a little more detail, we  can make a distinction between cross-cultural
56. 5:10communication, intercultural communication, and it  will obviously be intercultural communication that
57. 5:15we're going to focus on. So I think cross-cultural  communication can be problematic. Yeah this is
58. 5:21problematic because it's too simplistic, I think  it's essentialist and it's stereotyped, but it is
59. 5:27perhaps the most common approach or understanding  of what I would call intercultural communication,
60. 5:32so if you look at the column on the left, you  have cross-cultural communication practices here,
61. 5:37so for example the practices of Chinese  people. Yeah how do they greet each other,
62. 5:41how do they say goodbye, maybe how do they do  things like communicate about eating, how do they
63. 5:47communicate apologies, uh compliments things like  that. Yeah and the idea is that if you build up a
64. 5:53description of those communicative practices, and  then you compare them with another group, so let's
65. 5:57say, I don't know, French communicative practices,  you can compare what's similar and different
66. 6:02and predict how intercultural communication or  cross-cultural communication will proceed. Yeah
67. 6:08but I think this is very problematic because in  intercultural communication, people typically
68. 6:12know they're communicating with someone who  has a different language and culture to them,
69. 6:16and they adapt their communication according to  that, so you can't really predict exactly what's
70. 6:21going to happen and you certainly can't predict  it based on what people do in their first language
71. 6:26and in their first culture. So in intercultural  communication, we focus on actual cases of
72. 6:31interaction. So intercultural communication  is typically based on research where people
73. 6:36have gathered data or people interacting  across cultural and linguistic differences.
74. 6:42So in intercultural communication, unlike  cross-cultural communication, cultures are
75. 6:46seen as dynamic and blurred, so there isn't  a clear line between one culture and another,
76. 6:52so for example there isn't a clear line  between Italian and British culture. There
77. 6:57are many overlaps between them, there are blurs  between them, people adapt bits of each culture.
78. 7:03Cultures are also seen as heterogeneous,  so they're not the same. People within a
79. 7:07cultural grouping will differ quite a lot, so  I’m sure you're all familiar with people who
80. 7:11have different ways of communicating  within your first language culture.
81. 7:17Furthermore, culture is not looked at just at the  national level, so national cultures are of course
82. 7:22important, our nations are an important part  of our identity, but they're not our only part.
83. 7:27We have many different communities or groupings  that we orientate towards, so this could include
84. 7:33local cultures, could also include global  cultures, but also things like our gender,
85. 7:38our age, our sexuality, our profession, our  family, our leisure group etc. So in intercultural
86. 7:44communication, we try not to make a priori  assumption about how people will communicate,
87. 7:50rather we look at what happens in the  communication and we expect variety,
88. 7:54diversity, and adaptability, and also importantly,  participants can be seen as in between cultures
89. 8:01whether not part of any particular culture. And  this is very different to earlier cross-cultural
90. 8:06communication research where people are seen  as fixed into particular national cultures.
91. 8:14So combining global Englishes and  intercultural communication research,
92. 8:17we can say that global Englishes an ELF like  all communication is not culturally neutral,
93. 8:22so I think that's an important point  because sometimes people think that
94. 8:25communicating through English as a global  language doesn't have any cultural content.
95. 8:30However, that's not possible. All communication  has participants, it has context, it has purposes,
96. 8:36and it has meaning, and all of this comes about  through culture, so culture is always there
97. 8:40in communication. However, what's interesting  about global Englishes and different perhaps,
98. 8:47is that the cultural references are not  fixed. So the use of English does not have
99. 8:52to be linked to any specific national culture,  so English in, English as a lingua franca is not
100. 8:59linked necessarily to the UK or the  US or any other anglophone culture.
101. 9:03It can be linked to the particular cultures of  the participants or the settings that they're in,
102. 9:08or even something more fluid, as we'll see  later on. And we should also point out or
103. 9:13I should also point out that this is not  unique to global Englishes. It's something
104. 9:16that probably happens in most multilingual and  multicultural settings, but it's just perhaps
105. 9:21easier to see through English as used as a  global language because it is so prevalent.
106. 9:31So what kinds of identities,  cultures and communities do we
107. 9:34typically see through global Englishes?  So I’ve listed a selection of research
108. 9:40studies here which highlight I think  some of the key things that we see.
109. 9:43So first of all, people often move between their  local L1 identities and more global orientations.
110. 9:50Secondly, people can share their multilingual and  multicultural identities, so typically people know
111. 9:57they're in an intercultural situation, yeah  and what's shared is that they have different
112. 10:01multilingual resources and that they have  multicultural resources as well. People may
113. 10:06also identify with very dynamic communities of  practice and virtual communities. So these are
114. 10:12the kinds of groupings that we get through things,  such as professions, so maybe a group of teachers
115. 10:16from different language and cultural backgrounds  who come together for a particular purpose.
116. 10:23We can also see third place identities. So these  are where people adopt an identity or a culture,
117. 10:29that's in between particular national cultures,  so it's not part of either one or the other.
118. 10:34It's not part of people's first language and  culture, but it's also not part of a target
119. 10:38language and culture. It's something more adapted  and hybrid. And then lastly, we see freer, liminal
120. 10:44and fluid identities and cultural practices.  That can't be linked to any one particular
121. 10:49culture or any name culture. Yeah, we'll look  at examples of both of these in a minute.
122. 10:58So having discussed some of the terminology  in theory, I think it would be helpful to
123. 11:02look at an example now. So this example is  called Bangkok cos play. It's a real example
124. 11:09recorded in a cafe in Bangkok and it's between  Philippe, who's a French speaker from Belgium,
125. 11:15and Nami, whose first language is  Thai and from Thailand. However,
126. 11:20as you can see here, it's a very typical kind of  health interaction and they're both using English
127. 11:24as the contact language to communicate with  each other. So I’d like to spend a minute
128. 11:30or two just quickly reading through  that and then we can talk about it.
129. 11:59Okay, so now you've read through that, what I  found really interesting here is the cultural
130. 12:05content of this conversation. So as you've  probably worked out they're discussing a cosplay
131. 12:11or a costume play. For anyone who's not familiar  with that, the little illustration at the side of
132. 12:16the dialogue shows what it is. So costume play is  where people dress up as their favorite Japanese
133. 12:22anime or manga character or Japanese pop star. So  the, this is a cultural practice began in japan,
134. 12:30but it spread very quickly around Asia, as this  example shows, and now is a global phenomenon,
135. 12:37so people don't just dress up as Japanese  anime and manga characters, they dress up as
136. 12:41cartoon characters from around the world, they  dress up as pop stars from around the world.
137. 12:46Yep so the two people here Philippe and Nami  are discussing a cultural practice that exists
138. 12:51at many different levels, so it originates in  japan as the nation, but then moved to a kind of
139. 12:57regional setting in terms of Asia, but has  now become a global phenomenon as well.
140. 13:03And also I think what you see here in  the discussion is references to very
141. 13:07local cultural practices as well. So in line two  Nami says, outside of MBK it's a cosplay right.
142. 13:13So MBK is a shopping mall in the centre of  Bangkok and there are spaces outside there where
143. 13:20lots of youth and teenagers often gather at the  weekends and in the evenings to do various things,
144. 13:26and I guess cosplay being one of them. So to  understand that particular part, I think you
145. 13:30need to have some local knowledge as well, and  there are clearly local cultural references there.
146. 13:35So what you can see here is English being used to  refer to many different cultural scales, national
147. 13:40ones, global ones, and local ones as well, and  I think most importantly and most interestingly,
148. 13:47none of these cultural references are  related to anglophone cultures in any way,
149. 13:50so there's no reference to the  UK or the US or Australia here,
150. 13:54yeah and they're of no relevance to this  conversation. So we see English used and we see a
151. 13:59lot of cultural content, but that cultural content  is very different to that perhaps you're more
152. 14:06traditionally associated with to do with national  cultures and a first language and culture.
153. 14:13So in some we can say that  intercultural communication
154. 14:16ELF leads us to question assumptions about  the links between languages and cultures,
155. 14:21yep. They're seen as very fluid and emergent, and  cultures and languages are not necessarily linked
156. 14:26on a national scale, so the English language  does not have to be linked to the UK or the US,
157. 14:31yet the English language can be used to both  represent and construct cultural references
158. 14:37and practices and identities that are linked  to any cultures that the participants choose.
159. 14:42So this super diversity and complexities  of languages and cultures highlights the
160. 14:46difficulty and inappropriateness of attempting  to set culture and language current connections.
161. 14:52So in the Bangkok cosplay example whose cultural  practices are they where are they located if
162. 14:57anywhere. And I think we can argue that this  even problematizes the inter intercultural
163. 15:03communication since it's not always clear  what cultures participants are in between.
164. 15:10So this leads us to the most current theory  which is transcultural communication.
165. 15:15Now I don't want to discuss this in too  much detail, but I think it would be helpful
166. 15:19to at least give you an overview of it.
167. 15:23So transcultural communication can be defined  as communication where interactants move through
168. 15:28and across rather than in between cultural and  linguistic boundaries, thus named languages and
169. 15:33cultures can no longer be taken for granted  and in the process borders become blurred,
170. 15:38transgressed and transcended. Yep so the important  thing to take away from this is that we can have
171. 15:43culture through global Englishes, but that culture  becomes so fluid and dynamic and adaptable. That
172. 15:50it's not easy or even perhaps appropriate to  try and associate it to any particular culture.
173. 15:57So if you remember the table we had with  cross-cultural and intercultural, I think we
174. 16:01can now add the transcultural to that. Now again,  I’m not going to read through this in detail,
175. 16:06but I think the things to highlight are  that cultures don't necessarily have to
176. 16:10be linked to any particular group. That any  boundaries between particular cultures can be
177. 16:15transcended and transgressed. The cultures  are heterogeneous and they're contestable,
178. 16:20so we can debate what our culture is. And that  people can move through many different scales
179. 16:27from the local to the global to the national, but  they don't have to be part of any particular one.
180. 16:34And importantly participants also don't have  to be in between any name cultures, yet they
181. 16:39can be part of multiple cultural practices  and cultural groupings all at the same time.
182. 16:47So again I think an example might help to  illustrate some of this. So in this example,
183. 16:53again, which is a real life example. This one  comes from Facebook, so this is an exchange
184. 16:58between two international students in the UK. Ken  who has Thai his first language and Hessam who has
185. 17:05Farsi as his first language and an Iranian  background. And again they use English as a
186. 17:10lingua franca to communicate with each other. They  both know each other quite well and they've, Ken
187. 17:16has started this, I don't quite know what you call  it, but Ken has started this practice where he
188. 17:21likes to post things on Hessam 's wall teasing him  about Bruce Lee and Jet Li. So Hessam really likes
189. 17:28Jet Li and really dislikes Bruce Lee. So here Ken  has posted a photo of Jet Li and then he's put it
190. 17:36next to a quotation from Bruce lee, but very  deliberately crossed out the Bruce and written
191. 17:41Jet next to it. Yeah he's doing this to tease  Hessam and to see what response he gets from him.
192. 17:47Yeah and as we can see here he gets a very  long response from Hessam and the teasing works
193. 17:53so what I’d like you to do now is spend a  minute or two reading through the exchange here,
194. 17:58and thinking about what are  the cultural references and
195. 18:01identities that are in this exchange,  and also what are the languages used.
196. 18:42Okay, so hopefully you've had  time to read through that.
197. 18:46As you can see here the majority of the exchange  is through English, but I would argue it's a very
198. 18:50multilingual use of English as a lingua franca.  So in line four we have the discussion of how
199. 18:55you spell lee so L-i, double-e, so this is  really referring to Cantonese and Putonghua.
200. 19:05Also we have on line nine cannon feast  punch, which I guess is a translation of a
201. 19:10Chinese martial arts term. I’m also guessing it's  supposed to be cannon fist not cannon feast punch.
202. 19:15But also if you look at the English. The English  is very, well, it's certainly not native like,
203. 19:20so on line two, I am going, I am gone kill you,  rather than gonna kill you or going to kill you,
204. 19:26yeah but it causes no problems, it's  understood perfectly by Ken and it's not
205. 19:30corrected by anybody. So I think we have very  much English uses a multi-lingua franca here.
206. 19:36And in terms of the cultural content, I think this  is very transcultural, so whilst we can link it
207. 19:42to particular name cultures, it also transcends  them at the same time. So you have the subject
208. 19:47which is martial arts which originates in China,  but is now very global and I think not associated
209. 19:52with any one particular culture even though  most people recognize its origins of Chinese.
210. 19:57We also have the two people being discussed  the martial arts stars, Jet Li and Bruce Lee,
211. 20:02who again, have Chinese origins other one in  Hong Kong one in Mainland China, but also both
212. 20:08became Hollywood stars, and then went on to  be global globally recognized movie stars.
213. 20:14Yeah and then on top of this we also have the  identities that the participants adopt. So Hessam
214. 20:20who his first language is Farsi and comes from  an Iranian background, orientates or identifies
215. 20:25as the expert in martial arts, so he knows how  to spell the correct spelling of Li, he knows
216. 20:31about Jet Li's achievements. Yeah, on line six  to nine he gives lots of information about Jet Li
217. 20:38and also he shows some expertise in martial arts,  talking about cannon fist punches. So Hessam here
218. 20:44takes on the martial arts expertise. Here you  might not have predicted or expected based on
219. 20:51a kind of first language and first culture  correlation. So I think what this example shows is
220. 20:58English uses a lingua franca, but embedded  in a much kind of wider multilingual context,
221. 21:04and I think you see multiple cultural references  here with no one fixed cultural reference. So we
222. 21:09have local, national, global, and also cultures  such as martial arts which are not fixed to any
223. 21:15one particular place, and then participants such  as Hessam orientating towards cultural identities
224. 21:20that would not perhaps be possible  without being able to transcend borders.
225. 21:27Okay so that's outlined some of the features  of global Englishes and intercultural and
226. 21:33transcultural communication. So what I’d like to  do now is quickly summarize those the key points
227. 21:40from that, and then start to talk about what some  of the implications are for learning and teaching
228. 21:45through English. So first of all, global English  and ELF research shows us a diversity of English
229. 21:53uses, users, settings and purposes, so we're  talking about a very variable use of English here.
230. 22:00And we're also talking about intercultural  communication, yep so global Englishes are
231. 22:05used for intercultural communication, but we need  to recognize that intercultural communication
232. 22:09is taking place on multiple scales or levels,  from the local to the national and the global,
233. 22:14and negotiation and mediation are central to  successful communication. Yeah and we should
234. 22:20also see communication as transcultural where  people move through and across borders and
235. 22:25boundaries where particular named languages  and cultures are transformed and transcendd.
236. 22:33What does this mean for teaching? So teaching  both through and about English requires a shift
237. 22:38in focus, so we need to recognize that English is  used as a global Lingua Franca for intercultural
238. 22:44communication, and the relevance of focusing on  native English speakers and anglophone cultures
239. 22:49becomes much less relevant if at all relevant.  We need an understanding of English as a global
240. 22:55Lingua Franca as part of a multilingual repertoire  rather than a monolingual standard variety,
241. 23:01so we teach English as a multilingua  franca. And we need more recognition
242. 23:07of global English and ELF as fundamentally  intercultural and transcultural processes
243. 23:11which are not tied to any particular target  culture and certainly not anglophone cultures,
244. 23:16and adaptation and flexibility is essential.  So we teach English as part of the process
245. 23:22of intercultural communication which leads to new  conceptions of communicative competence. And this
246. 23:28is what we will explore in later presentations.  Okay, well, thank you very much everybody.多謝.
247. 23:39I hope I said that right and I look forward  to speaking to you in the next presentation.