Download perspectivbs on intercultural communication: a critical reading1

Pragmatics
4:3.309-3
13
InternationalPragmatics
Association
PERSPECTIVBSON INTERCULTURALCOMMUNICATION:
A CRITICAL READING1
Michael Meeuu'isand SrikantSarangi
The 4th IPrA conference in Kobe last year shaped its theme, 'Cognition and
communicationin an intercultura!context',around a number of panels which
provided for unified forums of discussion.But in the margins of these arranged
sessions,
there were a number of individualspeakersaddressinginterculturalissues,
who, in attendingeach others' presentations,
came to see the need to establisha
post-factum 'panel'. Indeed, exchangingimpressionsin the corridors of Shoin
Women'sUniversityabout how clearlythey sawtheir presentationsoverlap in terms
of a preferred approach to intercultural communication,they concluded that a
valuableopportunity had been missedto voicetheseoverlappingsin a panel session.
At the same time, however, the opportunify presented itself to continue the
cross-fertilizationof ideas, extendingit to other like-minded Kobe lecturers who
came to join the discussion.The presentvolume reports on the outcomesof these
reflections.
As a 'critical' reading of the Kobe lecturesbrought together in the present
specialissue,this introductory article can actuallybe read as a postscript to the
volume.Rather than merelyrewordingthe main theme and settingof each of the
contributions,we prefer to engage in what Garfinkel would call a 'purposeful
misreading'of the articles,raising issuesabout each of them which the individual
contributorsmay or may not have intendedto addressexplicitly.It is our purpose
to pick out some significanttrendsin order to demonstratehow we see this volume
as a challengefor and confrontationwith the field of interculturalcommunication
research.In doing so, we invite the contributorsand readersalike to evaluateour
readingvis-d-vistheir own.
A bassocontinuothat runs through the contributionsis a critical outlook on
interculturalcommunication.zThis critical outlook manifestsitself at two levels:at
the object level of the analysis of intercultural interactions and at the
metatheoretical level of the discussionof current trends and models within
t
The ideas presented here have greatly benefited from discussions with Dennis Day, Thiru
Kandiah, Tom Koole, David Shea, Shi-xu, and Jan ten Thije, as well as a number of other people.
'all the ideas remain our own
Many of them will at least agree that the usual disclaimer
responsibility',is this time not just a formal decorum.
t
There is, of course, no claim implietl that the present collection is the first attempt to adopt
a critical approach to intercultural communication - its precedentedstatus will become apparent
as severalarticles acknowledgethe foregoerswho have problematizedcurrent trends in intercultural
communication research.
310
Michael Meeuwis and Sikant Sarangi
interculturalcommunicationresearch.On the basisof reportedanalysesof empirical
interactional data sets, the authors make an attempt to reveal the ideological
processesat work in the communicativestructuresof interculturalencounters,or to
present alternative viewpoints and methodologicalapparatusesmore suitable for
such investigations.These critical data analysesthen lead each of them to
'interrogate' a selected
range of existing models and theories of intercultural
research, asking to what degree the analytic models are able to disclose the
dimensions of social inequality and power relations present in intercultural
encounters.The challengeis aimed at understanding
and 'denaturalizing'
some of
the key analytic constructs and categoriesthat in intercultural communication
research are glossed over or taken for granted as unproblematic explanatory
resources.
The first paper challengesthe way ethnicidentityhasin sometraditionsbeen
viewed as an ingredientof individualidentityat the macro level of societalstructure.
Drawing on the schoolof ethnomethodology,
the questionas to'how
Day addresses
ethnic identity is constructedin on-goinginteraction,i.e.,how people make relevant
the notion of cultural group membership in their discursivepractices. In the
particular context of the multicultural workplace,these cultural classificationsof
colleagues,superiors,and subordinatescan serve as functional strategiesin the
development of the professionaland the socialhierarchicalrelationshipsbetween
these different groups.Moreover, as the first voice in this volume,Day's casestudy
has the 'sobering effect' of showing that 'culture' is already interculturalper se.
Cultural identity is an accomplishmentof the 'work' interlocutorsdo in intercultural
- or interculturallyconstructed- interaction.It appearsthat, as abstractionsthat
are intersubjectivelyaccomplishedthrough talk, such categoriescan more sensibly
be accountedfor in discursive,constructivistterms, than in terms of objectively
identifiable attributesof people.
If these categoriesare matters of intersubjectiveconstruction,what is the
exactrelationshipof theseconstructsto conversational
behavior?Shi-xuapproaches
this question by way of criticizing a view of cultural attributions - i.e. the way
informantsdescribeand explainpeople'sbehaviorin culturalterms- as pre-existing
and stable cognitive structuresdetermining conversationalchoices.Referring to
recent discourse-analytictrends within Social Psychology, he opts for an
action-orientedapproach to attributions and stereotypicperceptions,in order to
examine how they are constructedin talk and what interactive purposes these
constructionsserve.Shi-xu arguesthat an action-orientedapproach to discursive
attribution formation and its local functionscan circumventa reductionfrom social
action to cognition dismissingindividual agency.As such, Shi-xu cautions against
viewing attributions and related perceptionsas collective properties of cultural
groups. This is of particular relevancefor studieswhich set out to reveal the role
ethnic perceptionsand stereotypesplay in interculturalencounters.
The two caveatsformulated in the articlesby Day and Shi-xu are targeted
at the community of interculturalcommunicationresearchersin general as well as
at the other articlesto come in this volume. Indeed,ethnic categories,discussedby
Day, and group stereotypes,elaboratedupon by Shi-xu,recur as analyticresources
in some of the other contributions,who in their turn go on to critically explore
intercultural phenomenaof different kinds.We are convincedthat this polyphonic
Perspectiveson intercultural comntunication
3lf
'contour'whichimplicitlyprofiles
the contributionsagainsteachother,is consistent
with, and can only be enrichingfor, a publicationwhich aims at critical insight.
Sheaappliesthe criticalstrategyof denaturalizalingtaken-tor-granted
analytic
constructs to the notion of contextualization and inferencing conventions,
problematizingthe way they have been used in some models for intercultural
communicationas given resourcesfor explainingcommunicativeconflicts.Turning
explarnns and explanandum around, he argues that contextualization and
interpretationstrategiesshould first of all be examinedwith respectto the ways in
whichthey are themselvesmediatedby the societalpositionsof the interactantsand
the situationalstructure of the conversationalactivity.They should not simply be
consideredas pre-givenand stable normative patternsthat just 'come along' with
the speakersinto the interaction.This discussionof the underpinningsof such
conventionsleads Shea to problematize the view that cases of intercultural
miscommunication
contextualization
and interencing
canbe tracedto culture-specific
conventions.
The next paper supports Shea's challengeof the analytic link between
culturaldifferencesand communicativebreakdown,and alsosharesShi-xu'sconcern
with the role of attributionsin interculturalencounters.Meeuwisdraws attention to
the fact that the relationship between cultural differencesand communicative
problemsis not at all straightforwardor invariable acrossdifferent intercultural
contexts.Reporting both on casesof interculturalcommunicativesuccessin which
discourseconventionsare realizedin a stronglydifferentiatedway and, conversely,
on casesof communicativeconflict where this realizationis lessdifferentiated,he
urges for a more refined and critical view of the relationship in question. He
suggeststhat such a critical view should take into account the way in which
historically institutionalized modes of ethnic prejudice tolerate technical and
culture-specific
deviationsfor one speechcommunity,but not for another.
One issue that will have become clear by now is the already-mentioned
reflexivitywhich is implicitly or explicitlypresentin all the articles:in each casethe
implementationof a critical perspectiveis two-fold in that it is both directed at the
processesat work in the very intercultural data under analysisand at the social
relevanceof some selectedapproachesto interculturalcommunication.The final
paper realizesthis reflexivityin a very concreteway. Contributionssuch as Day's,
Shi-xu's,
and Shea'slook at the way basiccategoriessuchas ethnic identity, cultural
attributions,and cultural differencesare not so much pre-determinedstructuresbut
are in fact themselvesconstructedin, and thus outcomesof, interculturaldiscourse.
Sarangiaddressesexactly these questions,but he shifts 'addressees':while those
other contributionsinvestigatesuchconstructionat the object-levelof intercultural
talk, Sarangiscrutinizesthe ways in which these constructionsare deployed at the
level of theory formation and researchpractice.He examines,among other things,
how certainanalystsof interculturalmiscommunication
play too much upon'cultural
differences'at the expenseof other factors in accountingfor (mis)communication
phenomena,to the point where they themselvescome to 'stereotype'intercultural
communicationas more 'intercultural' than 'communicative'in nature. As an
alternative,Sarangisuggests
that one shouldsituatethe interculturalencounterboth
in its societaland in its institutionalcontext.This allows him to trace the specific
discursivepracticesof interactantsinto the broader societalforces.
312
Michael Meeuwis and Sikant Sarangi
Amongst all the intercultural matters on which the articles in this volume
'culture' appearsas the most common
offer critical perspectives,the concept of
subject of interrogation'. At various levels of explicitness,a common trope
underlyingall the contributionsis the denaturalizationof an opaqueuse of culture
as the necessaryand sufficient explanationfor what is going on in intercultural
'culture' as the 'ultimate
interactions.But apart from criticizinga view and use of
explanator'of interactivephenomena,this publicationis, at the meta-analyticlevel,
'ultimate extenuotor'.It rejects the
also critical of a view and use of culture as the
mask of scientificneutrality and the essentiallyconformistcharacterof a discipline,
which predominantly refers to 'involuntary' processessuch as interference from
cultural or linguisticbackgroundas the causesof interactivetrouble, and, as such,
slightsactivitiesof socialexclusionand other ideologicalstrategiesdeployedby the
powerful in intercultural communication"
Although many of the contributionsdo not directly draw on the framework
of Critical Linguistics,we seea strongparallelbetweenwhat this volume as a whole
strives for and the mainstayof that critical tradition (e.9.,Fairclough 1985, 1988,
1989;Fowler et al. 1979;Kress 1989a,1989b;Kress& Hodge 1990).There is, first
of all, the issue of analyticreflexivity:in the developmentof its own model for a
the Critical-Linguistics
tradition comesto
critical studyof communicativeprocesses,
challengesome prevailingmodelsin the linguisticsciencesin a similarvein. It holds
againstthese models their inability or reluctanceto addresslinguisticpracticesand
strategiesorientedto societalinequality.Secondly,Critical Linguisticsholdsthe view
that any critical endeavorin the realm of linguisticanalysisnecessarilyimplies the
analyst's constant orientation to discourse as both being informed by and
contributing to the (re)productionof the socialorder. This focus on the discursive
manifestationof the structure-agency
relationshipis also one of the fundamental
ingredientsof the critical perspectiveson interculturalcommunicationpresentedin
this volume. The contributionsdemonstratethat power relationscan impossiblybe
revealed by limiting the intercultural study to descriptive- or at best locally
explanatory- accountsof micro-levelor macro-levelphenomenaalone.In general,
Kress (1989a: 446) writes that the goal of Critical Linguistics is "to move the
disciplineof linguisticstowards socialand political relevance,and by the use of its
insightsto provide a social critique by documentingstructuresof inequality".We
believe that the present publication,together with the other critical voices heard
before in the field of interculturalcommunicationresearch,can help to shapesuch
a preferred destinyof the discipline.
We would, finally, like to draw attention to the fact that in adopting critical
perspectiveson intercultural matters, the present special issue also offers the
possibilityof contributingto specifictheoreticaland methodologicalconcernsin the
linguisticsciencesin general.Many interculturalencountersare located in several
public and institutionaldomains- some of vrhich have provided the data setsfor
the following articles.The critical analysisof such interculturalsettingsrevealsthe
complexitiesinherent in the analyticcategoriesand dynamicprocessesinvolved in
talk in institutions,and can, as such, offer an opportunity for challengingsome
assumptions related to descriptive and explanatory constructs in the broader
language sciences, such as native speaker, native-speaker competence,
participants.
conversationalcooperativity,and socialequalitybetweenconversational
These notions can and do of course receivecritical treatment in communication
Perspectiveson interculftiral communrcation
313
theoriesof a more generalscope;but, asthisvolumecan testify,criticalintercultural
communicationstudiesare particularlywell equippedto bring them to the fore.
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