Section 1. Guidelines for reading texts on the use of international English in European business

With the continuing globalisation of markets and internationalisation of trade, professionals in a wide range of organisations, from large multinational corporations to small to medium size enterprises, are increasingly coming together to do business in the international workplace, frequently adopting a common language of communication. More often than not, this lingua franca is English. While English for International Business (EIB) has an essential function as a lingua franca in multilingual settings, it can also present challenges both linguistically and culturally, particularly as more and more interactions are between speakers whose first language is not English.

P. Rogerson-Revell’s paper reports on preliminary research which forms part of a larger scale study investigating the use of English as a lingua franca in international business meetings. The paper summarises the findings of a questionnaire exploring the use of EIB by a particular European business organisation.

P. Rogerson-Revell’s limited findings can help shed light on some of the language issues that may be present in such international contexts and the possible communications difficulties and frustrations that can result. A positive result is that, as well as uncovering some of these challenges, the analysis also shows an awareness by many participants of some of the strategies that can be used to overcome them.

Text 1-19. USING ENGLISH FOR INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS: A EUROPEAN CASE STUDY

(After P. Rogerson-Revell’s article in English for Specific Purposes, #26, 2007)

Introduction

This extract from an article in the ‘New York Times’ newspaper, reinforces what is now beyond dispute, regardless of any ideological objections, that the use of English for international business is firmly established in Europe:

... As European banks and corporations burst national boundaries and go global, many are making English the official corporate language.

Two years ago, when France, Germany and Spain merged their aerospace industries into one company, they not only gave it an English name – the European Aeronautic Defense and Space Company, or EADS – they also made English its language. In Germany, the national postal service, Deutsche Post World Net, increasingly uses English as its working language. Smaller companies are doing likewise. In Finland, the elevator maker Kone adopted English in the 1970s; in Italy, Merloni Elettrodomestici, a midsize home appliance maker, did so in the mid-1990s. Management meetings at big banks like Deutsche Bank in Germany and Credit Suisse in Switzerland are routinely in English. ‘‘I can’t give percentages, but now many executives are not Italian – French, English, Danish, Russian and so on’’, said Andrea Prandi, Merloni’s spokesman. ‘‘We consider ourselves a European group. For Europe, the official language is English’’.

While there are a number of reasons for the current spread of English both internationally and within Europe, many of these are founded on what Brutt-Griffler terms ‘econcultural’ grounds, i.e., they are the product of the development of a world market and global developments in the fields of science, technology, culture and media (Brutt-Griffler, 2002).

Many languages have been used around the world as contact languages for international trade and communication. Within Europe itself, there have been several lingua francas since Roman times, including Greek, Latin, French, German and English. The latter three are currently widely used in parts of Europe, and make up what Graddol refers to as the ‘Big Languages’ in Europe (Graddol, 2000). Nevertheless they are not the only languages used for international communication in Europe with, for example, Russian being used in the newer eastern European nations and the pidgin, or hybrid blend of several Scandinavian languages, ‘Scandinaviska’, used in several northern European countries (Louhiala-Salminen, Charles, & Kankaanranta, 2005).

Historically, the development of any language as a lingua franca or pidgin to facilitate communication between speakers of different languages has often been initiated by international commerce or trade. In fact the word ‘pidgin’ is said to be derived from the Chinese pronunciation of the English word business and Pidgin English was the name given to a Chinese–English–Portuguese pidgin used for commerce in Canton during the 18th and 19th centuries.

Indeed, in its strictest sense, the term ‘lingua franca’ seems to be equated with a pidgin being a language with no native speakers. The term English as a Lingua Franca (ELF) is generally used in this way to refer exclusively to the use of English between speakers whose mother tongue is not English (Firth, 1996; Seidlhofer, 2001). The term BELF (Business ELF) is also used by some (Louhiala-Salminen et al., 2005) to refer to the use of English for business purposes between speakers whose mother tongue is not English.

However, both of these terms exclude a substantial body of communicative events where English is used as a common language both between ELF speakers and between ELF and English as a mother tongue (EMT) speakers. Broader terms such as ‘English as an International Language’ (EIL), along with ‘Global English’ and ‘International English’, seem open to this more flexible and liberal interpretation. Consequently, in this study, the term English for International Business (EIB) is used to refer to the use of English as a common language in business contexts where both EMT and ELF speakers could be present.

This study focuses on one such context, where English is used for international meetings in a particular European professional organization, presenting and discussing some of the communication difficulties reported by the meeting participants. This preliminary study will form part of a broader discourse analytic study investigating the linguistic and sociocultural issues involved in using EIB. The initial study will not only inform this second stage of research but also hopefully make a small contribution to the growing body of knowledge on the use of English in Europe and particularly in European business.