1st Edition
Perspectives on Teaching Workplace English in the 21st Century
Acknowledgements
Preface
List of Contributors
1. Workplace communicative competence: On the value of pragmatic and interactional skills for English-speaking professionals
Christopher Jenks
2. Communicative needs of Chinese professionals in Hong Kong and pedagogical implications
Mable Chan
3. Struggles with BELF communication: Workers’ perceptions of communicative practices at a multinational corporation in Japan
Junko Saito
4. The big technology disruptor: Changes in the way we are communicating in English at work in Asian workplaces
Jane Lockwood
5. Exploring L2 learners’ use of communicative strategies: Implications for designing communicative tasks from a (B)ELF perspective
Jim Yee Him Chan and Ivy Wing Shan Chan
6. Digital literacies for virtual meetings: Exploring new challenges experienced by university business students
Xiaoyu Xu
7. Workplace Spoken Communication in English: Its status for graduate employees in Malaysia
Glenda Crosling, Munir Shuib, Siti Norbaya Azizan and Graeme Atherton
8. Teaching oral presentations at work: Bridging the gap between textbooks and workplaces
Phoenix W. Y. Lam
9. Challenges facing Thai professionals when giving English presentations
Krich Rajprasit
10. Learning workplace language in a vocational educational setting
Jean Parkinson and Averil Coxhead
11. Genre analysis of persuasive texts: Sales correspondence, invitations and charity appeals, and pedagogical implications
Mable Chan
Index
Biography
Mable Chan (PhD, Language and Linguistics, University of Essex, UK) is currently Associate Head at the Language Centre, Hong Kong Baptist University. Her main research interests include second language acquisition at the interface with language education and professional/workplace communication. She has published widely in these areas and secured key external grants from the University Grants Committee (GRF) and the Standing Committee of Language Education and Research (SCOLAR).
This excellent volume is essential reading for anyone wanting an up to date understanding of the teaching of English for business. The research includes in-depth exploration of authentic texts with exploration of genre, based on data from the workplace in a range of contexts, including emerging areas like online discourse. The focus is on teaching workplace communication with emphasis on communicative and interactional competence. By interrogating the language of business in classrooms, in text, in teaching materials and in the workplace itself, this volume is comprehensive in its approach to bridging theory and practice.
- Professor Melinda Whong, Associate Professor and Director, Centre fore Language Education, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology
