This article investigates the development of intercultural awareness in an electronic mail (e-mail) discussion project between Hungarian learners of English and American speakers. Students discussed topics relating to cultures, languages, and pedagogical issues. The e-mails were analyzed in terms of language skill improvement, apprehensiveness…

This article examines three critical issues relating to the role of culture in teaching English as an international language (EIL): Firstly, the way in which top-down processes of globalisation, accompanied by the widespread desire for English in many former colonial countries, have in general fostered the negative effects of dominance,…

The worldwide spread of English has recently received much interest. Issues relating to the multifaceted roles of English around the world have been highlighted and purist positions about English challenged. In particular (a) the assumption that British English is the only valid standard of English; and (b) the notion that the "native speaker" is…

This article explores the rhetoric of the four official languages (English, Mandarin, Malay and Tamil) in Singapore and the domestic aversion towards Chinese "dialects" and colloquial "Singlish". The "Speak Mandarin Campaign" alongside the "Speak Good English Movement" represent a display of intercultural and transcultural ideologies which…

English language education is in the process of change regarding teacher identity and the ownership of English. Cultural issues are implicated in this change. Critical cosmopolitan approaches in the social sciences are critiquing the primacy of national cultures which they consider a Western imposition on the emergent identities of the Periphery.…

In this article, I try to further develop my notion of the "transculturing self." Firstly, I discuss Nietzsche's positions on "self" and "subject," arguing for the idea that "there is no self." Hence, I try to show that "identity" is the outcome of a (co-)construction originating in the circumstance that each individual needs to meet external…

This contrastive study is concerned with relations between rhetoric and ethnicity in second language (L2) writing. It investigates the influence of Chinese rhetoric on expository writing in English by three groups: the majority Chinese Han group, and two ethnic minorities, Tibetan and Mongolian. Relying on a contrastive text analysis of 30…

This paper discusses some basic properties of intercultural communication (treated from the point of view of linguistic pragmatics as fundamentally similar to any other form of communication, and emphasising the need to move radically away from any essentialist substantiation of "culture") against the background of contexts of migration. Three…

Culture and identity are dynamic realities. Therefore, the essentialist view of culture and identity does not explain the process of integration of minorities in a context of acculturation, and leads to policies of "ghettoisation". This text focuses on what we describe as "cultural transfusion". By means of this process, we analyse two tendencies…

Culture, persuasion and language are closely intertwined in intercultural business communication. Hence it is important to study language and persuasion and solicit professional members' views about how effective communication is situated in different cultural contexts. This paper aims to report findings on differences in expectations for good…

Since its inception in 2003, the popularity of "Second Life (SL)", an online 3-D virtual environment, has increased exponentially. The global reach of "SL" and the opportunities it provides for cross-cultural exchange using multiple modes of communication in real and virtual worlds make it an ideal venue to examine cross-cultural engagement.…

Students enter higher education with multiple identities that reflect their social, ethnic and cultural origins. Students from minority ethnic groups (as opposed to "new immigrant" or international students) straddle more than one cultural and language setting. This paper reports a Scottish study which suggests that, as university students, both…

Language teaching in the last 10-15 years has seen a shift away from the communicative approach and towards the paradigm of intercultural (communicative) competence. It has also been influenced by a broader educational shift away from an emphasis on print literacy and towards multiliteracies. At the same time, we have witnessed the rise of…

This paper argues that the challenge of intercultural communication has often been overlooked in discussions of indigenous language literacy in Africa. The omission continues despite the fact that literacy practices in Africa have often served as a means of intercultural communication, especially among highly educated Africans. Proposals for the…

Professor James Gee addresses issues of linguistics, literacies and cultures. Gee emphasises the importance of Discourses, and argues that the future of literacy studies lies in the interrogation of new media and the globalisation of culture.