5-read.5- ew - how like you our fish- accommodation in international business communication

7/29/2019 5-Read.5- EW - How Like You Our Fish- Accommodation in International Business Communication.

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Connor, Ulla. 1999'How like you our fish? Accommodation in international businesscommunication.'In: Business English : research into practice / edited by Martin Hewings andCatherine Nickerson. Harlow : Longman, 1999. Chapter 10, pp. 115-128

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10 How Like You Our Fish? Accommodationin International Business CommunicationUliaCormorIndiana U n i v ~ s i t y at Indianapolis

IntrodnctionEnglish is increasingly the language of business around the world. Its spreadhas been studied by linguists such as Braj Kachru (1986) who speaks of thethree circles of English: the inner circle (e.g. USA, UK), the outer circle (e.g.India, Singapore), and the expanding circle (e.g. China, Russia). I t is theexpanding circle countries in which English is taught as a foreign languagewhere, according to David Crystal (1997), a greater growth will take place inthe next decades.According to Crystal (1997), Englishes spoken in the countries in theexpanding Circle, such as the kind of English being spoken by French, Greek,and Finnish diplomats and business people, may have their national identitybut still retain their international intelligibility. Crystal suggests that a new kindof English, World Standard Spoken English (WSSE), may arise for use in situations when the need comes to communicate in English with people from othercountries for purposes of business, industry, and diplomacy. Little has yet beenconjectured about the nature of this world English, and no theoretical modelfor its future shape has been established.The nature of the international English spoken by non-native and nativeEnglish-spealctng business people in the globai business envirorunent, its structure and vocabularies, has been largely an uninvestigated area. Linguists,however, have begun to examine the discourse of spoken, native language business interactions. A few recent studies have focused on the negotiation stylesof business people using English as a second language. Firth (1995d) examinedthe interactive nature of spoken negotiations involving Danish and MiddleEastern non-native English-speaking international commodity traders, identifying the organisational structures of telephone calls in sales negotiations.Charles (1995) studied negotiations at business meetings between buyers andsellers in Finland and England. The focus of Charles's research was on differences due to the ethnic background of the interlocutors and the level ofacquaintance among them.

Other important areas of research which have contributed to the understanding of communication in the business workplace are the fields of compo-


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116 Ulla ConnoT

sition and rhetoric. In the USA a great deal of research has been conducted onthe professional workplace, examining written products and the rhetoricalprocesses underlying them. Two comprehensive anthologies, appearing adecade apart, document tbe significant contributions of tbe research: Odell andGoswami (1985) and Spilka (1993). Several chapters in these volumes document tbe writing processes and products in a multitude of dlfferent professionalorganisations and businesses. More recent research in composition and rhetorichas begun to study the effects of electronic conununication on business writingpractices and products (Sullivan and Dautennann, 1996).Although English has become tbe lingua franca of international businesscommunication, tbe emphasis of tbe research on workplace conununication bycomposition and rhetOlic experts in the United States has been on nativeEnglish-speaker practices in US settings. However, the increasing number ofpeople engaged in international business suggests the need for an expandedresearch agenda with a focus on native vs. non-native speaker interactions inbusiness settings. Clearly, knowledge about strategies used by native and non. native English-speaking business people will be useful for teachers of suchsubjects as business communication and trainers of future business personsaround the world.Furthermore, as reported by Louhiala-Salminen (1996), tbe nature of intemational business is changing from telephonic or face-to-face interactions to negotiations tbrough faxes and e-mail. Faxes and e-mail share characteristics of bothspoken and written communication, but little is known about standards offaxed and e-mailed communication in English. One could speculate, forexample, tbat less strict standards of English are applied in faxes tban in hardcopy either because of tbe level of informality, or a lack of self-monitoring. I fthis is indeed the case, research is needed to document tbese new standards.The sociolinguistic tbeory of accommodation, which has been widely used instudies of organisational communication and, more recently, applied inresearch on second-language acquisition, has potential as a descriptive andtheoretical model for explaining variations in the English spoken and writtenby native and non-native business people. Communication accommodationtheory (CAT) explains variation among interlocutors based on 'convergence', astrategy 'whereby individuals adapt to each otber's communicative behaviors interms of a wide range of linguistic-prosodic-nonverbal features includingspeech rate, p ~ u s a l phenomena and utterance length, phonological variants,smiling, gaze, and so on' (Giles et al., 1991b). 'Divergence' is tbe other majorstrategy included in the theory of communication accommodation. It refers tothe way or ways in which speakers accentuate spoken and non-verbal differences between themselves and others.Communication accommodation theory has been reviewed by Zuengler(1991), who considers it a sound and potentially useful tbeory of L2 variation.Zuengler reviews studies which have shown how L2 speakers can accommodate the ethnic identity of their students, thus causing variation in their L2across interlocutors. Among the most influential studies, Zuengler points to tbestudy by Beebe (1981). Beebe examined the accommodation behaviours ofChinese-Thai children and adults who were interviewed in Thai by one inter-


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How Like You Our Fish? Accommodation in International Business Communication 117

viewer who was ethnically Thai and another who was ethnically Chinese. Theinterviewees increased their Chinese accent in Thai when speaking to theChinese interviewer, thus converging psychologically for reasons of solidaritytoward stereotypical Chinese-Thai speech.An essential concept in accommodation theory is the notion of norms. Anorm has been defined as an expectation about behaviour that members of acommunity feel should or should not occur in particular situations. That is, theemphasis is on expectations and socially shared ideas about appropriate andinappropriate behaviour. Within the sociolinguistic tradition, the roles of place(e.g. church, courtrooms), situations, and norms predicted by courtesy andpoliteness have guided the search for situational and normative influences onlanguage usage.Conceiving of norms simply as features of a situation that determines thespeaker's code choice is not enough, however, according to some experts ofnaccommodation (Gallois and Callan, 1991). Situations themselves do not triggerlanguage or communication choice. Instead, roles and relationships within situations directly influence the choices made. In other words, contemporarycommunication accommodation theory considers sociological as well aspsychological motives. Accordingly, in the present study, the status of thespeaker (buyer, seller), inter-ethnic considerations (Finnish, Japanese,Estonian, Norwegian), and personal relationships (based on length of acquaintance) all enter into the choice of linguistic and rhetorical styles in the broker'scorrespondence.

The present studyThe present study was designed to gather authentic written communication ina small international business where a non-native English-speaking businessperson communicates with native and non-native English-speaking businesspeople throughout the day. The research was exploratory in nature, owing tothe scarcity of studies and theories in the area.The business studied was an international fish brokerage company in Turku,Finland. A small business, it consisted of the owner and his daughter, a parttime assistant. Both are native Finnish speakers and hold MBA degrees fromFinnish universities. The ownerlbroker worked for two Finnish companies inthe fish importing business before starting his own fish brokerage company in1990. While working for these Finnish companies, he spent four years in Canadaand one year in the United States in 1977--81 and 1986--87, respectively.The broker's Test of Englisli for International Communication (TOEIC) scores,taken in June 1995, were 460 in listening and 430 in reading, with the total of890. The assistant's scores were 495 and 435 in listening and reading, respectively, with a total score of 930. Both of their scores are above average. Thus,they are in fact good communicators in English with extensive repertoires. Inaddition to the skills of speaking, reading, and writing in English, the brokercommunicates comfortably in Swedish (Finland's second national language),and German, and he also knows some Estonian. The assistant is fluent inEnglish, Swedish, French, and Italian, and knows some German and Estonian.


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118 = ConnoTThe data consist of the entire written correspondence of the company in aperiod of two non-consecutive weeks: a week in December 1994 and a week inMay 1995. The business is seasonal in nature; a week in the fall captured themore intensive buying and selling phase, while the week in the spring documented a slower selling and buying period, in whlch more long-term planning

took place. The broker made copies of all the writ ten communication in theoffice each day. After the data collection, the broker answered questions toclarify such matters as the names of companies and the cOlmtries of the othercorrespondents if the information was not available dlrectly in the data.

Analysis of data and resultsThe analysis of the data was planned to shed light on a number of questions. Iwas primarily interested in describing what kinds of communicative needs anon-native English-speaking business person has in selling and buying productsaround the world. Among the issues I explored were:1 the medium of the communication in light of the changing natW'e of international communication (e.g. letters, faxes, e-mail, phone);2 the form of communication (e.g. memos, billing forms);3 the types of English used depending on the role of the broker in the negotiations (e.g. buyer, seller) .The first two areas address issues prominent in the field of the teachlng of business writing; the last point is concerned more with issues in applied linguisticsand sociolinguistics related to style and variation in native/non-native speaker(NINNS) interaction and non-native/non-native speaker (NNSlNNS) interaction.The analyses related to the first two issues in thls paper provide the backgroundfor a discussion of the main points in the study, the variation in English stemming from the broker's roles in the communication.

Media and forms of communicationThe complete data consisted of 92 pieces of communication. The majority wereone-page messages; the length ranged from one sentence to fowteen sentences.Al l the written communication was conducted using faxes. No letters wereexchanged, even in the case of promotional materials sent or received by thebroker. The impOltance of faxing suggested by thls finding is consistent with agreat deal of other research on the use of faxes in today's business. LouhialaSalminen (1995:75) surveyed 395 Finnish business people and engineers aboutthe preferred mode of written communication, and found that the majoritypreferred faxing over phoning or writing. According to her subjects, faxing isfast, easy, reliable, inexpensive, 'good as hell'. Faxing produces a document,has no time or place limits, and needs no intermediaries, according to thesurvey. Some disadvantages were also mentioned by Louhiala-Salminen'ssubjects: faxing may have bad print quality and it may easily be sent tothe wrong address. My own observations about the use of the fax in today'sinternational businesses, based on case studies by students in international


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How Like You Ou". Fish?Accommodation in lnternatimutl Business Communication 119

businesses in Turlm, Finland, (Fall 1994), and in Indianapolis, USA, (Fall 1995),also confirm the growing importance of faxing. Some fifty in terview casestudies estimate the use of faxes at an average of 80 per cent of the total correspondence. In the present study, no e-mail was used, and the use of the phonewas limited to clarification and confirmation. The lack of e-mail use may beexplained by the small size of the companies involved; Internet access twoyears ago was not as widespread as it is today.Faxes in these data assumed the role of phone calls in the negotiationdescribed by Firth (1995d). Firth's study documented the important rol e ofphone calls between the Danish and Middle Eastern business people in the salesnegotiations of huge quantities of cheese. According to the broker in the presentstudy, however, calls cost too much; faxes cost less money and are more conve-nient. Thus, a sequ ence of faxes resembled a negotiation in a phone conversation.Most pieces of communication were in the form of a memorandum. Figure 1shows an example of the memo style of the broker.

Good morning. ............ .

ESTONIAN FISHHave you received the shipment from Estonia?How l ike you our f ish?

RegardsFigure 1 Sample memo written by the broker

Typical of the broker 's style is the greeting 'Good morning' in the sample memo,placed below the address and preceding the line announcing the subject matter.The broker also often includes a friendly fareweli greeting such as 'Regards' or'Have a nice day', sometimes in the native language of the interlocutor.In addition to memos, the data also included copies of invoices, order fonns,and form-like sales negotiations or price quotations, as shown in F'igure 2.

Type of English in the communicationAs Tables 1 and 2 show, the language of the communication in the data wasEnglish, Finnish, Swedish, Norwegian, and Estonian. The percentage of Englishduring the first week (63.3 per cent) was somewhat higher than during the


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120 uua Connor

Good afternoon.NEW PRICES FOR ESTONIAN PERCH FILLETSAs you probably know , t he best f ishing seasonfor perch i s over i n Estonia. This has causedraw materia l costs to r ise sharply and I amafraid that we have to raise our prices aswell . Th e new prices are the following :Fresh perch f il l e t s :10-20g20-40g20-40g40-60960g+

skin-onskin-onskin-onskin-of fskin-of f

DEMDEMDEMDEMDEM

Right now the f i sh s i tuation is not so good ,espec ia l ly s ince yesterday we had stormyweather, but next week we are expecting to ableto make sh i pment . I f you are short of supply,we wil l do our best to f i l l your requirements .Best regards

Figure 2 Sample form-like price quotation

second week (41.9 per cent). During the first week, there was more actualbuying and selling in English between interlocutors from several countries,wh ile during the second week the broker conducted more pre-quotation negotiations with his Finnish suppliers. In the tables, the broker's role as either buyeror seller is identified. 'Other' refers to his interlocutors} which include buyers}seliers, and intermediaries such as shippers and bill collectors. Most correspondence dealt with the buying and selling of fish. Four pieces of communicationduring the secpnd week, called 'non-contract' in the table, refer to messages inwhich the broker complained to the manufacturer about a malfunctioning newmachine used to test and store fish samples.

Table 3 includes general patterns of interaction in the communication: routineinterchanges of buying, selling and transporting fish among well-known associ-


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How Like You OU?' Fish? Accommodation in International Business Communication 121Thble 1 Language of con-espondence by sender and role (Week 1)Sender Language

English Finnish Swedish Ge1'man N01wegian Mixed; Tbt a lsFinnish! (%)English!Estonian

BrokerBuyer 10 3 1 14

(28 .6)Seller 14 6 19

(38 .8)OtherBuyer 4 4 8

(16.3)Seller 2 I 3 1 7

(14.3)Intennediary I I

(2)Totals 31 12 I 3 2 49(%) (63.3) (24.5) (2) (6.1) (4.1) (100)

Thble 2 Language of conespondence by sender and role (Week 2)Sender Language

English Finnish Swedish Norwegian TotaJs(%)

Bmkffl'Buyer 4 10 4 18

(41.9)Se ller 8 3 11

(25.6)Non-contract 2 1 3

(7)I- I-(2.3)*

Dlhe/'Buyer I I

(2.3)Seller 2 2 4

(9.3)lntelmediary 3 2 6

(11.6)To tals 18 19 4 2 43(%) (41.9) (44.2) (9.3) (4.6) (100)"'internal office commun ication


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122 UUa Conno1'Table 3 Pattems of interaction (%)Interaction

Routine interchangesSlight deviationsNew communication

Week 171218

Week 2652312

ates; slight deviations from routine interactions; communication with new business contacts, The examination of the tnteractions reveals a complex pattern ofsales, purchases, and negotiations, Although the majority of the communication involved existing associates - buyers, sellers, and intermediaries - thebroker also continuously received and sent information concerning new business relationships. As the discussion in the next section will show, there is amarked difference in the level of adherence to or deviation from standardpatterns of communication, depending on the type of interaction and degree ofacquaintance,The English used was not the English found in prescriptive textbooks; insteadit was English full of code switching and non-standard granunatical structures,Code switching was frequent, especially in the correspondence between thebroker and his Norwegian and Estonian suppliers, The broker frequently usedNorwegian and Estonian words when communicating in Swedish or Englishwith the Norwegians and in Finnish or English with the Estonians, Both sets ofinterlocutors, when communicating in English, used certain terms only inNorwegian or Estonian such as mandelfisk (a direct translation into Englishwould be 'almond fish' and would not carry the intended connotation). Anotherexample of code switching is the Estonian word nahaga ('with skin') andnahata ('without skin'), Since both interlocutors spoke both languages, codeswitching was a meaningful use of language, in most cases for clarity, sometimes for fun or to create solidarity,There was a great variation in the level of grammatical correctness in thecommunication, Promotional materials and form-like quotations by the brokerhad few grammatical mistakes. These pieces were used frequently, and theirlanguage was edited more carefully, Other kinds of communication tn the datashowed little regard for educated usage, An example is the broker's response tothe quality of a sample: 'I have got the first feedback from our samples, Taste isgood but the toping [sic ] is too soft, It is running down during cooking andserving.' Anotller typical language sample is: 'Have you received the shipmentfrom Estonia? How like you OUf fish?'

In an interview with me concerning the written correspondence data, thebroker emphasised that the first priority tn any communication was getting hispotnt across, He regarded himself as a fluent, successful communicator, He wasaware of his linguistic wea!rnesses although he did not consider flaws in faxedor e-mail English a problem; in doing business or making money he felt that ifproblems did occur, they were related to other issues, Ftnthermore, he did notjudge his business associates on the grounds of their English language ability


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How Like You Ou,'Fish? Accommodation in Interrta.tional Business Communication 123or lack thereof. 'As long as their fish is good and fresh and they deliver in time;-I'm happy,' he said of his sellers. The point is that he could not possibly judgehis business associates by their English language ability even if he wanted to -competition is too fierce and good suppliers are scarce, and so is the product,fresh fish.

It could happen, of course, that errors in language could cause miscommunication and problems in carrying out negotiations and business deals. In thisdata set, however, language errors did not seem to prevent sales or shipments,although data were limited to only two weeks. On the other hand, some minormisunderstandings related to language errors might have occurred even thoughthey did not surface clearly in the analysis.Yet, a distinction needs to be drawn between grammar and specific businessor trade terminologies. The latter do make a difference, and, according to thebroker, he and his associates need to be very careful in using them. A comparison of the general language level and the use of specifiC terminology .is shownin Figures 3 and 4.Figure 3 includes a message to a seller giving instructions about delivery. The

Barre l s of head -o f f herr i ng i s OK.Documents : Hea l th/San i tary/Qual i ty ce r t i f i ca t e s

Cer t i f i ca te of originYo ur i nvoice to [Company name] shou ld no tf o l l ow the truc k . I t wi ll s end to Hel s ink i .Enc l o sed two documents wi l l fo l low the t ruc k.Number of copies :- Pl e ase give the truc k driver two se t s o f or ig ina l documents and

keep one se t in y our f i l e .(Company name] i s ask ing as s oon as po ss i b l e ase t o f documen t s to He ls i nk i by f ax,oas ! (Company name] ' s con tract i s based onlOO kg per barre l , I s that corr ect ?Bes t regards

Figure 3 Sample message sent to an Estonian supplier showing differencesbetween genel'allanguage level and use of terminology


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124 UUa Canno?'

PERCH FILLETSI have got yourfrom Chamber of

name and addressCommer ce , We are in terested i n:

Frozen pe r ch f i l l e t s 10-20gDel i vered Tal l inn

20-40g2 0-40g40-60g60 - 80g

s kin-onskin-onskin - o ffs k in -o f fskin-off

(In unpr i nted plain whi t e Skg box, glazed , inplas t i c bag)Whole gu t ted , head - offFresh perch 50-250 g

250+

a ll s izes

Is your f ish f r om Peips i jarv or from Balt i cSea? Is your perch f i l l e t s hand made ? How manypeople you emp loy in f i l l e t s pr oduct ion . Wherein Eston i a i s your production fac i l i ty located?I am l ook ing forward t o hear i ng from you .Be s t rega r ds .

Figure 4 Sample message sent to an Estonian supplier showing differencesbetween general language level and use of terminology

granunar of the language is less than peliect: 'It will send to Helsinki' instead of'It will be sent to Helsinki.' The business terminology is complete} however:'Documents: HealthiSanitaIY/Quality certificates, Certificate of Origin, two setsof original documents.'Figure 4 includes a message to a prospective seller: 'I have got your nameand address from Chamber of Commerce", Is your perch fillets hand made?How many people you employ in fillets production?' Again the message showsless than perfect granunar, but the terminology used, according to the broker, isaccurate: 'frozen perch fillets, skin-on, skin-off, glazed, whole gutted, head-off',In sum, the level of language correctness in the data was related to the function of the communication - new contacts deserved more emphasis on thelanguage, resulting in a level of usage approximating to standard native-speakerusage, Furthermore, although the language in the entire correspondence was


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How Like You 0u1' Fish?Accommodation in Inte1-national Business Communication 125

informal, great care was taken with certain business and shipping telminology.Naturally, it may be that different standards apply in different businesses; forexample, case studies conducted by business majors in my business writingclasses in Indianapolis suggest that an international law firm, for example,dealing with tax law requires formal, grammatically correct language in all ofits outside-the-firm communication. Yet, I expect that most businesses showsome variation in correctness depending on the function and role of thecommunication.

Variation in the broker's languageThe sociolinguistic theory of accommodation was used in this study to explainvariation in the broker's language. In the present study, the status of the speaker(buyer, seller), inter-ethnic considerations (Finnish, Japanese, Estonian,Norwegian), and personal relationships (length of acquaintance) were allrelated to the choice of linguistic and rhetorical styles in the broker's correspondence.

An exploration of the data in the present study suggests accommodation tothe expectation of the audience depending on the task, the role of the broker,the ethnicity of the interlocutor, and interpersonal relations. Accommodation ishere interpreted as 'convergence'; the broker adapts to his interlocutors'communicative behaviours rather than using divergence strategies exclusively,strategies whereby speakers accentuate differences between themselves andothers.The role of the broker as either buyer or seller seems to have an effect on hislanguage use. In the analysis, previous research on power relations in crosscultural negotiations by Charles (1995) provided a useful model. Charlesadapted Fairclough's (1989) theory of power relations to examine negotiationsbetween Finnish and British buyers. 'Status' in Charles' work Cf. 'role' in thepresent study) refers to the general norm which buyers and sellers are expectedto observe. In terms of power relations, buyers are primarily expected to exerta degree of control over the seller. Sellers, on the other hand, accept the buyer'scontrol over the situation. The broker in the present study, when assuming theseller role, used more polite and more correct language than when he assumedthe buyer role. This is particularly obvious when he dealt with his Japanesebuyers, as the first sample fax in Figure 5 shows. In the fax, the broker asks forpayment using very polite language. Interviewed about the fax, he explained .that 'since the Japanese are polite people' he made a special effort to be politeand use the word 'please' and the conditional form 'could'. Neither 'please' northe conditional form are frequently used in Finnish to express politeness. Frommy own Finnish language and cultural background I perceive that the broker'slanguage in this sample does suggest extra effort in politeness. The secondsample in Figure 5 informs a Swiss buyer about the availability of fish in politeterms. The two samples in Figure 5 are representative of the broker's languagein the role of a seller, in which he accepts the buyer's control over the situation.

These two samples written by the broker as a seller contrast with the friendly,informal manner of his faxes to his suppliers, I.e. in situations where the broker


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126 UUa ConrUYr

I nas no tny name f[sel ler compa y paymentS 0rece i ved aU; l yOU pleaseye t cou1un roe . . ng t ~ l e gree i s c a u s ~ check what when i t has beendelaYs 0::C. d in ToKYo .pal

GOod mOrn ing ,We Sho uldf haveOr Wedn Perch fi l lP eSday h' etsl ease I Se t Us k .Prices are th now Youre same needs .

Have an '~ c e day !

Figure 5 Sample messages by the broker in seller role to (1) a Japanese and (2) a Swissbuyer

is a buyer. Examples are given in Figure 6, which includes four sample faxessent to a Norwegian supplier. The broker uses a great deal of convergence inusing a form of English that he knows is familiar to the supplier, a non-nativespeaker with less formal education than the broker. The language includesshort, simple sentences; questions are formed in a manner typical of questionformation in Norwegian with no do-auxiliary equivalent such as 'what youthink?' As pointed out earlier, there is also a great deal of code switching suchas mandelfisk to show solidarity. The relationship between the broker and thisNorwegian supplier is based on a long-term working relationship and mutualrespect.Figure 3 included a sample fax sent to an Estonian supplier. It demonstratesfurther the interaction between roles, personal, and inter-ethnic relationships.The tone is friendly and informal, typical of the broker's language to hissuppliers, i.e. when the broker is in a buyer role. Yet, the tone of the language isdifferent from that sent to the Norwegian supplier. The fax in Figure3 is typicalof those sent to the Estonians: it repeats information, spells out details andregulations about shipping in great detail, and uses oversimplified language.The repetition about shipping regulations emphasises the importance of gettingthe paper work done 'just right'. The oversimplification is designed to aid the


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How Like You 0'1/,1' Fish? Accommodation in International Business Communication 127

. minceda t USl.ng .ke toThey are n theY would 11.salmon but le and,_ a t the satnP . tute100 ,... subS t 1. eoss ib i l i ty to trout . They aTP . d salmon . d salmonml.nce of ml.nceusing a

trout.lo t

They are not .salmon U S ~ n g m'Or sa l 1nCedfee l t h a t . ~ o n t rout , braw 1s a ' uts material . '1'h n ~ n t e L e s t i n ample to [B ey ask a g

.name] uYer comn. ~ a . n y ~ s

[BUYerth C O ~ a . n ye Price Of , .name] askednext sea mandel f '[ Son r h "s k ' fprice] . aVe gi Orth . per kg Wh Ven1nk? Next . at Yourece ' Week w1Ve comm e ShOUldSdJnPles . ents of Your

Figure 6 Sample messages sent t o ~ a ~ N : o r w : : r - - - - - - - _ . . . J Estonians whose English language skills, according to the broker, are notstrong. The entire correspondence with the Estonian suppliers reflects a 'b igbrother' attitude on the part of the broker and suggests an unequal relationship.This tone was intentional, as verified by the broker in an interview, and reflectsa common attitude of Finns towards Estonians. The broker told me that hewants to help the Estonian fish suppliers get started with their operations inthe international market and goes out of his way to assist. Thus, the analysissuggests that the convergence exhibited by the broker is affected by languageas well as fam iliarity with business conventions.


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128 [Tllo. COIt?:orConclusionMost of the communication was conducted in English with non-native Englishspeaking suppliers and buyers as the broker's interlocutors. All communicationwas conducted through faxes. A great deal of variation was found in thebroker's language in the faxes, depending on the purpose of the communication(routine vs. new communication), the broker's role in the brokerage transac-tion (buyer or seller), the language and cultural background of his interlocutor,and the personal relationship he had with the interlocutor.The sociolinguistic theory of communication ,accommodation was founduseful in explaining the variation in the broker's language. It was found that thebroker usually used 'convergence' in communicating and that no single condition determined occasional divergent behaviour. The four conditions - the taskor purpose of the communication, the role of the broker, the ethnic backgroundof the interlocutor, and interpersonal relationship - help explain the variations.The present study was conducted on the written communication of international business communication. Future studies, aimed at describing andanalysing language use of international managers, need to include the analysisof both spoken and written interactions in order to obtain a full picture of thelanguage needs in English of international managers. Naturally, future studieswill need to examine international business language in a variety of companiesin terms of their size, the type of industry, and country. For example, with theincreased use of the Internet, we need to learn more about the language used ine-mail, both for internal and external purposes.The study has implications for the teaching practices of international business communication. First, it points to the increasing importance of new tech-nologies in the conduct of international business. In Firth's study (1995d),telephone calls were used to negotiate deals; in the present study, faxes wereused instead of phone calls due to the lower cost and the added advantage ofthe written record that faxes provide. Today, three years after the data for thepresent study were collected, e-mail may be in the process of replacing faxes asthe preferred form of communication, even in small businesses.Second, the findings of the present study suggest that there may be anemerging .international English of business, the features of which are neitherpurely received British nor standard American. Instead, the English used is flex-ible, with accommodation by speakers with emphasis on intelligibility. DavidCrystal (1997) argues that there may be on the rise 'a new form of English', aWorld Standard Spoken English (WSSE), because speakers of various Englishesneed to meet the demands of the international situation. According to Crystal,international conferences and the Internet have already 'felt the pull of this newvariety' which 'talres the form, for example, of consciously avoiding a word orphrase which you know is not going to be understood' (Crystal, 1997:137). Crystalmaintains that this new variety is still in its infancy and very little is known abouthow it works, in other words few empirical data have been documented.The present study shows evidence of the emergence of a truly internationalEnglish, in which native and non-native speakers of English are more concernedabout mutual intelligibility than about keeping to some 'standard' form ofEnglish such as standard American or received British English.