Working in English
Chapter 4
U214B (Communicating in English)
Why & How do people talk at work?
• Do you speak in the same way when you speak to
your friends as when you speak to your boss, a
doctor or someone at the bank?
• If not, what are some of the differences?
• What are the reasons for the differences? Is it
because of your relationship with the person? Is
it because of what you are trying to get done?
• What about the difference between interactions
among professionals, and interactions between
professionals and the public?
How do people talk at work?
• English used in everyday situations can be distinguished from English used
in the workplace (which could be a physical or virtual space).
• English spoken in the workplace has special characteristics of language
and interaction patterns.
• People working together interact using structured and goal-oriented
genres that have evolved over time.
• The professional practice, for example architecture, is distinguished by
multimodal literacy.
• English has a special status as a work language, as it is an international
language.
• Business relationships are not all professional, technical and impersonal.
There is a role for humor and power in managing workplace interactions
and the connection between language and power, for example in job
interviews.
• Language is conceived to be more key for jobs involving paper work and
the word, such as education, administration and courts of law for
example, and less so for manual job which are perceived to use language
less centrally. But these jobs do use language and other symbolic systems
for exchange of instructions and information in linguistic form, and they
also use language to interact socially , in so far as working conditions
permit this , and in specific ways as appropriate to each job.
How does workplace talk differ from
ordinary conversation?
• Chapter 1 contrasted everyday conversation with the sorts of
talk that takes place in institutional settings such as places of
work.
• Following Emanuel Schegloff, it was noted that turn-taking
often has to follow institutional rules, and following Pierre
Bourdieu, it was emphasized that certain speech acts can only
be carried out by a holder of institutional authority.
Greg Myers agrees with this as he describes that in a meeting
‘[t]urns are typically assigned . . . by the chair . . . and the . ..
chair but not others may interrupt (Myers, 2004,p.53)
However, it is important to recognize that much workplace talk is
not structured in this way, … and is conversational and
informal.
Discourse Analysis can help us understand the subtle differences
between more and less formal kinds of workplace interactions.
See Allington and Mayor p.136 + Activity 4.1.
How does workplace talk differ from ordinary
conversation? Discourse Analysis of two extracts
• Activity 4.1 shows examples (read them in the book
pp.138-140) of two talk exchanges between co-workers.
 One is messier, with speakers interrupting each other and
overlapping with one another;
The vocabulary and intonation show speakers’ emotions and
personal opinions.
 In the second extract, the vocabulary seems more neutral,
the speakers are clearly talking about things related to
their work and they use special business vocabulary;
Typical of workplace interaction is that the participants are
speaking with a clear purpose and are trying to arrive at a
decision, rather than ‘just chatting’
How does workplace talk differ from ordinary
conversation? Discourse Analysis of two extracts
According to Paul Drew and John Heritage, ‘institutional talk’ as they call workplace
and professional talk, differs from everyday conversation in three ways:
 It is goal-oriented: participants usually focus on some core goal, task or identity .
. . Associated with the institution or workplace. For example, in Extract 2, Chris, the
chair, goes over the goals by setting the agenda for the meeting. As a result, the
meeting is structured, with one topic dealt with at a time.
 There are constraints on what participants will treat as allowable
contributions, i.e. on what participants may say.
In Extract 1, speakers interrupt each other, while in Extract 2, Chris, the chair, has the
right to guide the discussion and where it is expected to restrict contributions and
move to the next point. But these restrictions are not absolute, as Ann interrupts
Chris, and they depend on the formality of the specific institutional context.
 There are inferential frameworks and procedures that are particular to the
specific institutional or workplace context. These inferential frameworks the
participants in the meeting draw on include their assumptions about how such
management meetings in their institutions are normally conducted, as well as
background knowledge of the business and its procedures. Related to this is the
fact that special professional or technical lexis is often used, such as the terms
related to business or technology.
How does workplace talk differ from ordinary
conversation? More on the three points of difference
Institutional talk is goal-oriented, it has its constraints &
allowable contributions, and each institutional context has its
own inferential framework and procedures.
In institutional talk, one common feature among all three categories is
that the interactions are asymmetrical ,that is , some speakers
often have more power and/or special knowledge than others. For
example, in the example quoted in the chapter, Chris chairs the
meeting and has a more powerful role than others; however the
CEO has a more powerful position in the organization.
Another kind of asymmetry is in differential knowledge for example
in interactions between professionals and lay people (e.g. a doctor
and a patient), where the professional has knowledge of the
institutional procedures. This means that participants in workplace
interactions have institutional identities which interact with their
personal and discursive identities (the role they are playing at any
particular time in the interaction).
Workplace Talk – type of discourse/
functions
• To go back to the goal orientation of workplace interaction is to
say that they are transactional, which means that
participants focus on doing a particular workplace task
(compare to getting things done – Michael Halliday’s
ideational function). An example of that is Extract 2, where the
participants are trying to decide when to tell the new
employee to join/sign his contract.
• Workplace interaction can also be relational; that is, the
purpose is more of a social one (Compare to Michael Halliday’s
interpersonal functions of language) – similar to informal talk
between friends, but used as a small talk between colleagues
at work, usually to build a good relationship and to bond
socially.
Professionals talking –
•
Front-stage & backstage
Professionals, or people working for organizations interact with co-workers, but many also
deal with lay members of the public in the course of their work.
o Interactions among co-workers, where people are working together in the same
workplace, occupation or profession.
o Interactions between experts in an organization or profession and members of the public,
that is, between ‘insiders’ in particular areas of work and ‘outsiders.’ (see Activity 4.2 p.
142 as example).That includes lay-professional encounters; for example interactions
between doctors and patients, or service providers and customers.
According to Erving Goffman social life can be studied in two regions- frontstage &
backstage; (Goffman, 159,p.135, in Mayor & Allington p.141)
frontstage –areas ‘where a particular performance is or may be in progress’, whereas
backstage --areas ‘where action occurs that is related to the performance, but
inconsistent with the appearance fostered by the performance’
The metaphor by Goffman implies the presence of an ‘audience’ in frontstage activity, as in
interactions between lay people and professionals, and a setting in which ‘best behavior’ is
expected.
The backstage setting, on the other hand, is more relaxed and ‘allows minor acts which might
easily be taken as symbolic of intimacy and disrespect for others present (Goffman, 1959,
p.129) -- such as co-workers laughing, talking over each other and teasing; it may be quite
informal; participants may interrupt each other & disagree fairly directly
Workplace genres
Discourse Communities:
A discourse community is a group of people who use particular ways of
communicating in order to pursue a common goal. The members of a
discourse community do not necessarily work closely together or
form relations involving mutual engagement. However, their spoken
and written interactions may still be characterized by a particular
register. A register is a set of conventions for language use, possibly
including specialist vocabulary.
The concept of discourse community was originally developed by the
linguist John Swales (1990), who became interested in how
professional groups, such as scientists, developed and used specific
genres of speech and text (e.g. academic articles, conference papers
and laboratory reports) as an integral part of their professional
practice.
Workplace genres
• A genre, according to Swales, is a “class of communicative
events . . . which share some set of communicative purposes . .
.[The] rationale shapes the schematic structure of the discourse
and influences and constrains the choice of content and style’
(Swales, 1990,p.58). See definition of genre in Chapter 2.
• This definition highlights two key aspects of genres:
 Different texts and or utterances can be said to belong to the
same genre because they share the same communicative
purpose.
 Genres follow particular patterns or ‘schematic structures’,
which may involve participants playing specific roles, and using
particular vocabulary or a particular style of speaking or writing.
(See Activity 4.3 pp.144-5)
Genres in a changing world of work:
the example of the business email
• The business email has to a great extent replaced the
traditional business letter, as well as some kinds of
telephone communication. Like the blog (examined in
Chapter 2 & compared to the journal entry), the business
email has features of both written and spoken language,
and has been influenced by a variety of other genres. So
genres are not fixed or immutable; they change over time
(e.g. through the influence of technology).
 Some people have suggested that business emails have
developed from the genre of written memos, which are
company-internal messages, while others remark that
email is also used for other kinds of messages, for example,
very informal exchanges between individual colleagues,
such as a two-line invitation and that may be the source .
(See comparison and analysis of business email on pp.147-8)
Genres : the business email/ the letter
Typical characteristics of :
Written English and Spoken English
Written English
 Elaborate syntactic
structures
 Explicit constructions
 Complete information
units
 Formal language
Spoken English
 Simple syntactic structures
or simple clauses linked
with ‘and’
 Reliance on context:
reference to shared
background or knowledge
 Elliptical forms: words ‘left
out’
 Informal language
The Business Email
Compare to: the letter/ spoken language
Business emails may have the following features:
 simple syntactic structures
 Reliance on context: reference to people and things that both the
sender and the recipient know
 Elliptical forms: [It’s] Not urgent/ [I] Had a chat with
 Informal language: such as contractions, he’d, you’re, can’t;
abbreviations: Pls (please); colloquial , everyday vocabulary: chat, get
together
 Use of emoticon: which, unlike the characteristics above, is not part of
spoken language.
 Not having to sign the name, necessarily, at the end of the text of the
letter; the name already appears at the bottom of the message in his
‘signature file’, which is a regular feature of emails at work.
 Level of formality of a business email differs based on the level of
acquaintance between the people communicating, and although
informal features are present, some emails may be more similar in
formality to a business letter than to spoken English and would use
features typical of written English.
English as an International Language
used in intercultural communication
• Another distinguishing factor of English used for work, as opposed
to English used in social encounters or family settings is that the
speakers or writers are often not native speakers of English.
• Native speakers is a term used loosely to describe a person who
grew up using a language to communicate (as opposed to a person
who learnt it as an adult or studied it as a so-called ‘foreign
language’).
• For many years, people who are native speakers of different
languages have used English as a lingua franca (or ‘contact
language’) for purposes of trade. More recently, English has
become the international language, not only for trade, but for all
kinds of business and other forms of international
communication. In fact, there are now many more people using
English in this way than people who use it as a native language.
• Much research is interested in the features of ELF (English as a
Lingua Franca), for example the work of Barbara Seidlfhofer (2004)
and her team of researchers.
Common features of lingua franca
interactions
• Seidlhofer (2004) and others have identified a
number of features of pronunciation, vocabulary
and grammar, as well as discourse features that
seem common to lingua franca interactions and
deviate from native speaker English. Jennifer
Jenkins (2000) suggests that there is , in spite of
the differences, a ‘lingua franca core’.
• It has some pronunciation features, grammatical
features, and discourse features (first described
by Alan Firth, and Giles et al.)
• The view of these ‘non-standard’ features and
linguistic behavior specific to ELF context is
discussed.
English as an International Language
Common features of lingua franca interactions
a) Pronunciation features that are used in ELF are sometimes thought
of as essential for mutual comprehension among ELF speakers, such
as the contrast between long and short vowels , which is lost in ELF.
 /I/ (live) and /i:/ (leave) -- core ELF features
Some other sound distinctions that native speakers make do not seem to
be considered essential by ELF speakers, such as the various sound
that correspond to the letters TH
 /ϴ/ (think) and / ∂ / (the)
b) Grammatical features that occur frequently in lingua franca
interactions and deviate from standard English include
(Seidlhofer)
 dropping the third person – s (e.g. she say)
 Invariant question tags (e.g. general use of isn’t it? Instead of forms
such as doesn’t she? aren’t you? )
 ‘non standard’ use articles (e.g. omitting or inserting a or the)
 ‘non standard’ use of prepositional patterns(e.g. study about... )
Common features of/ approaches towards
English as a lingua franca interactions
These would be considered errors in grammar, but
Seidlhofer and other researchers in ELF argue that, as
they do not cause any problems in comprehension
among lingua franca speakers (and may even aid
understanding in some cases), they should be
considered typical features of ELF, rather than
‘mistakes’.
The point above – considering ‘non’ standard’ usages as
features of ELF , rather than ‘mistakes’ -- relates to a
wider argument made by researchers of ELF that as
English is now used as an international language, native
speakers of English no longer ‘own’ English and it is
therefore not up to them to determine what is
acceptable – at least in international English usage.
Common features of/ approaches towards
English as a lingua franca interactions
As far as discourse features are concerned Alan Firth (1996), who was
one of the first researchers to analyze ELF business interactions,
identified something referred to as the ‘“let it pass” strategy.’ He
found that in telephone conversations between international
clients,…. the speakers would regularly ‘let pass’ things that were said
that could potentially cause misunderstanding. Speakers would be
tolerant and would not focus on language ‘errors’ and there was
rarely a breakdown in communication.
Another feature of lingua franca discourse identified in many
interactions is the use of accommodation strategies.
‘Accommodation’ involves adapting to the speech and behavior of
the person you are speaking to (Giles et al, 1990). Typical
accommodation strategies in ELF interactions include repetition,
paraphrasing, simplification and code-switching (switching to a
native language of the other speaker).
See examples in Activity 4.7 – the different forms of English used in
different business faxes to ‘accommodate ‘ to the speech of different
customers.
•
English as an International Language
Intercultural business communication
Inspired by the discussion and interpretation of using different styles of discourse by the
author of faxes (Danish) when sending them to international clients (Estonian or
Japanese) (Conor discussed pp.154,155, Activity 4.7), it has been noticed that in English
as a lingua franca interactions, non-standard language usage causes very few problems.
Increasingly studies of intercultural communication have shown that
misunderstandings can be caused by cultural differences, rather than by linguistic
difficulties.
(See examples of British and Chinese – Helen Spencer-Oatey’s (2000)case study & Italian
company with international distributors case -- Gina Poncini (2002)pp. 156-8)
Some sources of problems (Oatey) can be attributed to:
o The need for group face (not individual face; see chapter 1) by both parties.
o Misunderstanding of the relative status of the representative team (resulting in an
inappropriate welcome, and a morning starting badly)
o Cultural differences such as in level of formality expected, what the respective rights
and obligations of hosts and guests that was expected may create misunderstanding
(preferred informality and minimizing hierarchal differences in the UK as opposed to
‘large power distance’ in Chinese culture).
But many intercultural, international encounters happened without misunderstanding, and
certain features such as technical terms, personal pronouns and evaluative language
helped create a sense of group identity and build a positive relationship. (Poncini)
Relationships at work
• Communities of practice are groups or teams of people who regularly
interact for a particular purpose, for example at work (Wegner, 1998; in
Allington and Mayor p.158).
• The term ‘practice’ indicates that people in such groups are trying to get
things done and that they have developed routine procedures for this.
According to Etienne Wegner, ‘communities of practice’ are characterized by:
1. mutual engagement: means more than simply working together; it also
indicates that people working together develop a relationship.;
2. joint enterprise: refers to working together for a common purpose to
achieve particular goals.;
3. a shared repertoire: refers to the means by which the members of a
community of practice communicate with one another. This category
includes the language and jargon that are specific to a workplace (specific
words, abbreviations that are used regularly). However, shared repertoire
consists of more than just language; according to Wegner, it includes
‘routines, words, tools, ways of doing things, stories, gestures, symbols,
genres, actions, or concepts.’
A good example describing relationships at work through language is Reading
B, with focus on Humor and workplace culture (Janet Holmes)
Language and power
• In outlining the distinctive characteristics of workplace language, the
chapter has pointed out one key feature which is asymmetry &
power difference in many workplace interactions.
• Such asymmetry is particularly apparent in ‘front stage’ encounters
between ‘professionals’ and ‘lay’ people; for example doctors and
patients.
• One critical aspect of many communications between professionals
and lay people is the extent to which the professional is willing and
able to talk about relevant topics in away that is clear to the
uninitiated outsider.
o There are cases of professionals trying to maintain control and power
by ‘blinding with science’.
o But failure to make professional talk accessible to the nonprofessional is not necessarily deliberate (on purpose).
Professionals often simply find it very hard to speak of their work in
any language other than that of their discourse community.
Language and power
Explanations for lack of common knowledge and
understanding
• Research on intercultural business communication, such as that by
Spencer-Oatey, showed that lack of common knowledge and
understanding between professionals and a client may not be a result of
technical matters only, but may be related to differences in cultural and
linguistic experiences of the people involved as well.
Celia Roberts and Sarah Campbell(2006), aimed to discover whether ethnic
minorities were disadvantaged in gate-keeping encounters that
favored or advantaged British candidates in job interviews.
They found that ‘ethnicity itself was not the major indicator of success’ since
‘[candidates who were born abroad were much less likely to be successful
than British candidates, whether white British or …members of minority
ethnic (communities within Britain] (Allington and Mayor p.161).
The problems for candidates born outside the UK was not their general
competence in speaking English, but their lack of what Pierre Boudieu calls
linguistic capital: the ability to produce utterances that will considered
appropriate in a range of specific social and institutional situations, for
example using the right level of formality to make a good impression
(Bourdieu, 1986 [1983], Bourdieu and Passerson, 1990[1970] in Allington and Mayor 161).
One example is the response concerning benefits of ‘teamwork’ where an interv
iewee talks about benefits to himself, whereas what is expected is to discuss benefits to the
‘institution’ he will be working with. See Activity 4.10 pp.161-162