GABC Journal Third Issue Published

The third issue of the Global Advances in Business Communication Journal has just been published.  

The GABC Journal  is co-sponsored by Eastern Michigan University, the University of Antwerp and the Technological University of Malaysia.  

This is a free journal available online at

http://commons.emich.edu/gabc/

Since our first issue through today's post (November 7, 2014), the journal has had 13,672 downloads (as of November 4, 2014). This is an exceptionally high response to a new journal.  

Five articles have had over 1000 hits. The highest article has had over 3200 hits. This is "Global Advances in Business Communication from Multiple Perspectives: A Panel Discussion from Experts in the Field." 

The new issue contains articles from some of the top scholars in the field coming from China, Mexico, Japan and the United States: 

1. “Mobile Phone Use in Meeting among Chinese Professionals: Perspectives on Multicommunication and Civility” co-authored by Peter Cardon of the University of Southern California Marshall School of Business (and current President of the Association for Business Communication) and Ying Dai of the Shanghai Business School
“The Relationship Between Culture and Legal Systems and the Impact on Intercultural Business Communication”
2. co-authored by Iris Varner and Katrin Varner, both of Illinois State University College of Business
“The Role of Linguistic Ability and Business Expertise for Turn-taking in intercultural Business Communication,"
3. by Misa Fujio of Toyo University, Tokyo, Japan
4. "Managerial Use of Text Messaging in International Organizations" co-authored by José Guadalupe Torres and Roger Conaway both of the ITESM - San Luis Potosí, Mexico

Please do download the article and let me know what you think.

Second Issue GABC Journal Is Published

I am delighted to announce the second issue of the Global Advances in Business Communication (GABC) Journal. As Editor-in-Chief of the Journal, I wanted to announce it here on my blog. 

The second issue of the GABC Journal is available for free on line at  

http://commons.emich.edu/gabc/vol2/iss1/

The journal as a whole is available at:

http://commons.emich.edu/gabc

ABOUT THE JOURNAL

The GABC Journal is a peer-reviewed journal jointly published by the University of Antwerp, the Technological University of Malaysia and Eastern Michigan University.   I am the Editor-in-Chief. The Associate Editors are S. Paul Verluyten at the University of Antwerp and Hadina Habil of the Technological University of Malaysia.

The GABC Journal publishes original research on interdisciplinary business practices which shape and are shaped by the changing nature and level of global business communication.  To this end, the GABC Journal publishes articles that contribute to the knowledge, theory and practice of the global aspects of business communication in one or more of the following areas:

•  International and cross-cultural business communication and negotiations
• Global integrated marketing communication (IMC) and public relations
• Global business ethics and communication (including international law, government-business relations)
• Languages for business and managerial communication
• E-Semantics*

      *E-Semantics is a term coined for the GABC Journal referring to the cross-cultural, language-based international issues associated with search terms, string searches, social media expression, web design, web site user friendliness and electronic advertising keywords

CONTENTS OF THE FIRST ISSUE: FIVE ARTICLES AND A PANEL DISCUSSION

Articles

This second issue features the articles listed below (the article titles link to the articles themselves)::

Ø    David Victor (Eastern Michigan University),  Addressing Global Advances in Business Communication from a Global Perspective

Ø    Yvonne McLaren-Hankin (Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh, Scotland), 
Communicating Luxury to an International Audience: The Case of Scottish Cashmere

Ø    Naoki Kameda (Doshisha University, Kyoto), Japanese Global Companies: The Shift from Multinationals to Multiculturals

Ø   Margrit Zinggeler (Eastern Michigan University), Understanding and Teaching Variations of Every-Day Business Language and Behavior in German-Speaking Countries

Ø   Renata Kolodziej-Smith, Daniel Patrick Friesen, Attila Yaprak (Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan), Does Culture Affect how People Receive and Resist Persuasive Messages? Research Proposals about Resistance to Persuasion in Cultural Groups

Please download all of the articles in this issue.  Our first issue has been very successful with respect to downloads. Indeed, as of October 15, the first issue has had 7310 downloads. This is extremely high for a new journal in a specialized field.

LOOKING FOR ARTICLES FOR THE NEXT ISSUE

The GABC Journal welcomes articles in all rigorous research methods including both qualitative, theoretical modeling and quantitative approaches.

The GABC Journal applies masked reviews in which an editor and at a minimum of two subject-related experts examine submitted manuscripts.

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES

Now that the first issue is out, the GABC Journal is looking for its next issue of original articles (not under consideration elsewhere). This would be

• ·    Traditional scholarly studies of 15-35 double-spaced pages, excluding references, notes, and appendices.
•           Commentaries of 10-14 pages, excluding references, notes, and appendices.

Quantitative manuscripts must report estimates of reliability for all dependent measures, variance accounted for in tests of significance, and power estimates when tests fail to achieve significance. Content analysis employing quantitative measures should note intercoder reliability. Survey research should describe the sampling frame (relevant population), sampling method, sample unit, and response rate. Qualitative research must note standards used to insure the quality and verification of the presented interpretation.

All manuscripts must be in English, following the format specified in the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (5th edition). You may use either U.S. or British spelling, but use U.S. punctuation.  Authors must remove all personal and institutional identification from the body of the submission.

For further information and more detailed guidelines or to submit a manuscript, please go to the main site for the journal at http://commons.emich.edu/gabc/    

Please do submit.

 

"Which is the Best Language to Learn?"

"Which is the Best Language to Learn?"  In business, if the team on the other side of the table knows your language but you don’t know theirs, they almost certainly know more about you and your company than you do about them and theirs—a bad position to negotiate from. Many investors in China have made fatally stupid decisions about companies they could not understand. Diplomacy, war-waging and intelligence work are all weakened by a lack of capable linguists. Virtually any career, public or private, is given a boost with knowledge of a foreign language.

That is the question posed in the title of Robert Lane Greene recently posted an article in March/April 2012 issue of The Economist's More Intelligent Life online culture and lifestyle ezine  (http://moreintelligentlife.com/).  Greene himself is the author of You Are What You Speak (Delacorte Press: 2011), a fun little book on language usage.

Greene's short article "Which is the Best Language to Learn?" is a fun read raises a few good points about language learning in the English-speaker world.  You can read the article at:

http://moreintelligentlife.com/content/ideas/robert-lane-greene/which-best-language-learn

Greene gives the usual compelling reasons for learning another language. The first reason he cites is that  

learning any foreign language helps you understand all language better—many  Anglophones first encounter the words “past participle” not in an English class, but in French.

Well, for me, this was in Latin class, but the point holds true regardless of the language.

Greene goes on to say that song lyrics and poetry lose much in translation. Song lyrics seems the more popular motivator (at least, for most people that I know, when compared to poetry). When someone is in his or her teens or twenties, knowing song lyrics is a driving force. This is good for learning English as a second language as much of the world's popular music continues to be in English. I know several people who speak at least in part in English popular song lyrics. When people of my generation who grew up in Germany or France here the word "yesterday" with a pause, they often seem tempted fill in "all my troubles seemed so far away" and so on.

Actually, this can work for English speakers as well. I have trouble hearing the French third person present verb "repose" without hearing in my head "Marilou repose sous le neige" from Serge Gainsbourg. I associate other phrases with Jacques Brel songs and so on.



Alexander Pushkin

As for poetry... well, I love poetry myself, yet I don't know for how many poetry provides the impetus to learn another language. Nonetheless, it was poetry far more than song lyrics that was a motivator for me to at least get a passable reading ability in several languages. I have never mastered Russian, yet virtually every Russian I have met (even those without higher education) seems to love Pushkin.

Joseph Brodsky


 Back in my college days, I had the great honor of sharing meals on several occasions with one of the greatest Russian poets of the last century, the late Nobel laureate Joseph Brodsky.  When Brodsky began to wax eloquent on Pushkin, I shrugged and made a face. Let me say here that at the time my arrogance  (still a monster I must fight to keep in check today, and sadly not always successfully)  was beyond bearing. Even now, when I think back on the gall I had to smirk at what someone on Brodsky's level had to say about poetry at all, let alone RUSSIAN poetry, I am deeply embarassed.... but not then! When the great man glared at me and asked how I dared to denigrate a poet like Pushkin, I told him honestly that  I had read four different translations of selected works by Pushkin, none of which seem to did much for me. "That," Brodsky said with a thump on the table, "is because Pushkin is not Pushkin in any language but Russian." I then asked him whether that meant that poetry could not be read in translation at all... after all, Brodsky himself was one of the century's greatest translators of English into Russian. Brodsky answered that some poets could not be read apart from their own language, most poets could be experienced in another language in the hands of the right translator, and some poets work seemed to transcend translation. In the latter category, he suggested fell the Greek poet C. P. Cavafy. "Cavafy," he said, "was an empty pedestal." He did not go on to explain what that meant but it has been a metaphor that I have carried with me for decades. By the way, I don't speak Greek, but I DO love Cavafy's poetry in translation. I especially like the 1975 translation by Edmund Keeley and Philip Sherrard that I bought and read after this memorable dinner.

In any case, for me at least, song lyrics and poetry WERE motivators just as Greene described.  I would add to that list of the literary and popular the realm of movies, humor and jokes as well.

Greene's last point is actually at the heart of the field to which I have dedicated my professional life: international business communication. Greene writes:

In business, if the team on the other side of the table knows your language but you don’t know theirs, they almost certainly know more about you and your company than you do about them and theirs—a bad position to negotiate from. Many investors in China have made fatally stupid decisions about companies they could not understand. Diplomacy, war-waging and intelligence work are all weakened by a lack of capable linguists. Virtually any career, public or private, is given a boost with knowledge of a foreign language.

A bit simplistically put, and yet still correct. Language usage is intimately interconnected to international business communication success. This is a major part of the book that I am currently working together with my two good friends and colleagues Bertha Du-Babcock and Richard Babcock. This is at the center of my two earlier books and dozens of presentatons and articles of mine and of many others as well. In short, I believe this very strongly indeed.

So up to here, Greene's article simply makes the case for WHY you should learn other languages. The problem is that the article goes on to try to answer "Which is the Best Language to Learn?" Despite my praise for the article up to this point, this is, in my opinion, the wrong question to ask.

In any event, there can be no ONE best language to learn for all people learning another language or even a best language to learn for all English speakers. In short, the BEST language is NOT -- as the article concludes -- French.

This is a question that I am asked often. Very often. In the International Business Program that I direct at Eastern Michigan University, we require a second language for graduation. As a result, students regularly ask me what "the best language to learn" is. I never answer this question for them... rather I lead them to find the answer that best fits what their purposes and goals would lead them to choose.

I frequently give talks ranging from business consulting to governmental advice to high school gatherings. In these settings, someone often asks the question with a set language in mind. "Isn't the best language to learn for business X?" they ask filling in Chinese or Spanish or Japanese or whatever they happen to be biased toward themselves. I always deflect the response and answer that ANY language can be the "best language" -- this is not a question with a right or wrong answer.

In fact, I am not being coy in these cases. The best language to learn is entirely up to the individual learning the language. No language is intrinsically more helpful in business at least as long as it is a spoken language somewhere (in short, I have reservations about Latin and Akkadian (although if your business happens to be dealing with archaeology or ancient writings, even this has its benefits for business).

Instead, I try to add the two-word phrase "FOR YOU" to the the question Greene asks of "What is the Best Language to Learn?"

So what IS the best language to learn FOR YOU? It may be that FOR YOU French COULD be French as it was for Robert Lane Green in writing this article. French would be the best language for you if that is the language that you believe you will keep using or that appeals to you for some particularly compelling reason whether that be the song lyrics of Gainsbourg or an interest in doing business in Canada. For that matter, it seems odd that the Greene's article concludes the choice of French without bringing up one the strongest arguments for French -- the need for French both politically and pragmatically in Canada.

Yet French is NOT universally the best language for English speakers to learn. No language in and of itself can ever be that. So how do I respond to the request for guidance in selecting a language?

Know that there is no ONE best choice. People (well, at least English-speaking students) then ask me what language is most USEFUL? I suppose that the answer I give here, if pressed, is the language that you will master and -- let's get to the heart of the semantics of USEful -- the language that you will actually USE.  

I don't much like the argument of how widespread a language is because how widespread a language is does not actually predict how useful it may be. By the "widespread" logic, one has to first determine issues of language reach (how many other people speak the language even if it is not their first language). For language reach, Greene's conclusion of French has much to commend it... but then again, so does Spanish or many other widely understood languages.

If language reach is left out of the equation, the "best" language could just as easily be Chinese for the most number of speakers. Several people who left comments following Greene's article argued just that.

One could argue for future markets and needs, choosing on this line perhaps Portuguese for the growing strength of both the populations and the economies of Brazil, Angola and Mozambique. Indeed, one could add to that East Timor if political upheaval are one's interests or, for that matter, Portugal itself if one's interests run to economic upheaval and concern for the Eurozone. Just to fill out the list, the other officially Portuguese-speaking countries are Guinea-Bissau, São Tomé and Príncipe and Cape Verde, all interesting in their own right for the right person. 

I often find that a language that is little spoken by other English speakers (or whatever your language is) places people who DO speak it in higher demand in business settings. Many people speak both English and Spanish (or Russian or French or German) relative to the number of people who speak fluent English relative to, say, Thai, Yet as Thailand grows in economic or political importance, Thai grows in demand giving you an edge for having a much-needed but less common qualification -- and that is quite aside from the appeal of Thai to those simply interested in Thailand or who have Thai friends! I had a Armenian-speaking student who said she wanted to learn a third language besides Armenian (and English) because she felt that "Armenian is a useless language." I am glad to say that I convinced her otherwise and we discussed wasy in which she could embrace the opportunities opened up by Armenian language skills.  Only after that did we discuss the possibility of learning a third language as well (she chose to study Spanish). 

So all of this is to say simply that ANY second language is a useful language and the language that is the BEST language is the one that is best for YOU.

I welcome your input and thoughts on this ramblings.

Clip Art Sources:

Image of French newspapers is from Robert Lane Green's article itself: http://moreintelligentlife.com/content/ideas/robert-lane-greene/which-best-language-learn

More Intelligent Life logo: http://torsionmobile.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/04/intelligent_life_logo.png

Marilou sous la neige album: http://beyondthenoize.blogspot.com/2010/12/marilou-sous-la-neige-ou-la-melancolie.html

Yesterday album: https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiqqw4SSE6xyFDtnpUU6T2GANyUhcyd8KUbE9PR5ckOGjlPUA-a-jb04XAWFYKo9qkxFHEfxbfjpyMLnJqw8sNEmdWOAF1wED0kn1_od9L6IE1Y5eg2n8geLI0kWXBbdfXybdLoji0wirc/s1600/beatles.jpg

Brodsky: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Joseph_Brodsky.jpg

Pushkin: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:A.S.Pushkin.jpg

Languages image: http://www.thw.coventry.sch.uk/MFL/MFL.gif

Multicolor conversation image: http://www.learnthailanguage.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/conversation.jpg

Falamos Português: 
https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEidkIWL3WKh-DY4zyxDsIJsE5KL0xp866NngwKdag6rL-Sn9pQ_Ua4Zj0lUmeERtNc8cJAofnmkPYw5LQsc-hUg7KGGLRfgZi9a2WlwdbL6M9VCcC0Tnctj-ssOdPwPcC5snpg3UkgSGXbg/s1600/falar-portugues.jpg  

Global Advances in Business Communication Journal's Inaugural Issue

I am delighted to announce the inaugural issue of the Global Advances in Business Communication (GABC) Journal. As Editor-in-Chief of the Journal, I wanted to announce it here on my blog. 

The GABC Journal is available for free on line at  

http://commons.emich.edu/gabc

ABOUT THE JOURNAL

The GABC Journal is a peer-reviewed journal jointly published by the University of Antwerp, the Technological University of Malaysia and Eastern Michigan University.   I am the Editor-in-Chief. The Associate Editors are S. Paul Verluyten at the University of Antwerp and Hadina Habil of the Technological University of Malaysia.

The GABC Journal publishes original research on interdisciplinary business practices which shape and are shaped by the changing nature and level of global business communication.  To this end, the GABC Journal publishes articles that contribute to the knowledge, theory and practice of the global aspects of business communication in one or more of the following areas:

•  International and cross-cultural business communication and negotiations
• Global integrated marketing communication (IMC) and public relations
• Global business ethics and communication (including international law, government-business relations)
• Languages for business and managerial communication
• E-Semantics*

*E-Semantics is a term coined for the GABC Journal referring to the cross-cultural, language-based international issues associated with search terms, string searches, social media expression, web design, web site user friendliness and electronic advertising keywords

CONTENTS OF THE FIRST ISSUE: FIVE ARTICLES AND A PANEL DISCUSSION

Articles

This inaugural issue features five articles:

Ø      Jane Thompson Johansen (University of Southern Indiana) A Postmodern International Business Communication Model in Three-Dimensions  

Ø      Xiaofei Xu and Bertha Du-Babcock (City University of Hong Kong), "Impact of English-language Proficiency on Chinese Expatriates’ Adjustment to Overseas Assignments"  

Ø      Judith A. Ainsworth (University of Montreal), "Integrating Methods and Strategies from Language Teaching and Business Studies in Languages for Specific Business Purposes Courses"    

Ø      Ronald C. Cere (Eastern Michigan University) "Foreign Language Careers for International Business and the Professions  

Ø      Deborah Reed Scarfino, Kelli J. Schute, Christina Pryor and Tanna White Campbell (William Jewell College) "Effects of Culture and Education on Ethical Responses on Our Global Society"  

 

 

Articles

In addition to the five articles, this initial issue includes a special panel discussion interview that I conducted with 17 leading experts from around the world on the state of the field. The panel discussion contributors are:

·    Richard Babcock, University of San Francisco

·    Bertha Du-Babcock, City University of Hong Kong

·    Claire Babanoury, Wharton-Lauder at the University of Pennsylvania

·    Roger Conaway, ITESM San Luis Potosi, Mexico

·    Hadina Habil, UTM, Malaysia

·    Daphne Jameson, Cornell University

·    Naoki Kameda, Doshisha University, Kyoto

·    Orlando Kelm, University of Texas at Austin

·    Leena Louhiala-Salminen, Aalto University (formerly Helsinki School of Economics)

·    Banikanta Mishra, Xavier Institute of Management, Bhubaneswar, India

·    Priscilla Rogers, University of Michigan

·    Sheila Sasser, Eastern Michigan University

·    Ayseli Usluata, Yeditepe University, Istanbul

·    Joo-Seng Tan, Nanyang University, Singapore

·    Barry Thatcher, New Mexico State University (and Edito-in-Chief of the Journal of Rhetoric, Professional Communication, and Globalization http://www.rpcg.org/index.php?journal=rpcg )

·    Iris Varner, Illinois State University

·    S. Paul Verluyten, University of Antwerp

 This is an exciting collection of insights from some of the greatest minds interested in the subject.

LOOKING FOR ARTICLES FOR THE NEXT ISSUE

The GABC Journal welcomes articles in all rigorous research methods including both qualitative, theoretical modeling and quantitative approaches.

The GABC Journal applies masked reviews in which an editor and at a minimum of two subject-related experts examine submitted manuscripts.

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES

Now that the first issue is out, the GABC Journal is looking for its next issue of original articles (not under consideration elsewhere). This would be

·        Traditional scholarly studies of 15-35 double-spaced pages, excluding references, notes, and appendices.

·        Commentaries of 10-14 pages, excluding references, notes, and appendices.

Quantitative manuscripts must report estimates of reliability for all dependent measures, variance accounted for in tests of significance, and power estimates when tests fail to achieve significance. Content analysis employing quantitative measures should note intercoder reliability. Survey research should describe the sampling frame (relevant population), sampling method, sample unit, and response rate. Qualitative research must note standards used to insure the quality and verification of the presented interpretation.

All manuscripts must be in English, following the format specified in the Publication Manual of the American Psychological Association (5th edition). You may use either U.S. or British spelling, but use U.S. punctuation.  Authors must remove all personal and institutional identification from the body of the submission.

For further information and more detailed guidelines or to submit a manuscript, please go to the main site for the journal at http://commons.emich.edu/gabc/    

Please do submit.