UCL CENTRE FOR LANGUAGES
& INTERNATIONAL EDUCATION
Course Units 2015-2016
German for Professional Purposes II
Prerequisite for entry
Successful completion of German Current Affairs and Culture (Social, Historical and Political) at the UCL CLIE, or equivalent
qualifications/experience.
Course duration
20 x 2-hour classes.
Self-Study
80 hours in total.
Course codes
LCGE6007, LCGEG007 and LCGEM007.
Aims and Objectives
The course is designed for very advanced level students requiring the language for professional purposes.
It comprises knowledge and understanding both of the structure of the language and its use in professional environments,
such as presentations, meetings and conferences. The course covers career development in the target language
countries, business culture and conventions, negotiating and interacting, reading specialist texts (i.e. in the student’s main
degree subject e.g. engineering), note-taking and debates as well as other related topics. These areas will be related back
to the student’s degree subject.
The course will enhance knowledge and use of linguistically complex structures (a variety of styles and registers from a
range of authentic material).
Various transferable skills will also be further developed.
Functions
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expressing specialised opinions, critical topic-related comments;
debating, commenting, negotiating;
suggesting, accepting, refusing;
describing, defining;
composing written pieces of information for professional purposes;
conducting presentations on complex professional topics;
conference skills;
note-taking.
Course Content
Main topics/themes to be covered
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employment in business and industry;
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job applications and interviews;
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conference papers;
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conducting meetings;
business cultures;
project management.
Skills
Reading
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reading for gist, scanning for specific information in professional sources;
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in-depth analysis of professional topics in relevant publications.
Writing
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formal business letters;
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analysis and review of articles;
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note-taking from presentations;
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writing up presentations;
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professional reports and conference papers;
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journal articles;
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CVs and covering letters.
Listening
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radio, TV, audio- and video-tapes;
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presentations;
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professional debates.
Speaking
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formal and informal discussions, debates, round table;
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presentations;
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conferences.
Linguistic Structures
Discourse Strategies
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analysing/comparing texts from various professional sources (different text types, styles and registers);
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preparing oral contributions for different audiences;
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spoken versus written professional communication.
Main aspects of these strategies
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structuring (logical structures);
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linking devices (lexical, grammatical);
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stylistic levels and their usage;
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professional vocabulary.
Learning Resources
There is no textbook for this course.
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Monolingual dictionary (not pocket size).
Materials for the course will be drawn from:
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Authentic written material from various sources such as Die Zeit, die Wirtschaftswoche
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Authentic audio and audio-visual material.
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Aktuell ’05, Harenberg Lexikon der Gegenwart
In addition there is a wide range of language learning materials available for self-study in the Self-Access Centre.