Intercultural Organizational Communication: The Social Organizing of Interaction in International Encounters

Abstract

Intercultural communication has mainly been described in terms of national differences disturbing the sending and receiving of messages. In this article, it is argued that the local organizational context has to be taken into account. By linking Bourdieu's theories on the social organization of differences to recent theories of organizational communication, the focus of the article is directed at describing the impact of informal and power-related aspects in intercultural communication. The usefulness of a theory on intercultural organizational communication is illustrated by the results of an ethnographic field study on Danish expatriates in a Saudi subsidiary.

Cultural Identity in Everyday Interactions at Work: Highly Skilled Female Russian Professionals in Finland

“…Russianness was given distinct meanings (as represented in the four themes), but there is also evidence of a critical examination of meanings and expressions popularly associated with Russian identity and disjoining one's ostensibly cultural enactments from the cultural. These findings support the argument that issues of cultural identity and cultural diversity should better be approached as emergent and socially constructed rather than through applications of sets of a priori facts about psychological and behavioral characteristics of specific cultural groups (Lauring 2011). The interviews could further be approached as naturally occurring data and examined with a discourse analytical approach.…”

“…Recently criticism has been voiced as to the need for approaches that would acknowledge the nuanced, dynamic, processual, and emergent character of cultural workplace diversity (e.g., Lauring 2009, Piller 2011. As a few researchers have now demonstrated (e.g., Lauring 2011, Ryoo 2005, Tanaka 2006), organizational experiences of ethnic minority employees extend beyond oppression; similarly, intercultural interactions in international corporate contexts do not occur in a social, political, and historical void. In addition, the few existing studies exploring cultural diversity as a subjective and intersubjective construct cocreated and negotiated in organizational members' interactions with one another (e.g., Barinaga 2007, Ely andThomas 2001) have demonstrated that cultural diversity may be given multiple, creative, and even contradictory interpretations that inform organizational members' practices in significant ways.…”

Nordic expatriates in the US: The relationship between cultural intelligence and adjustment

“…Research focusing on the effectiveness of social networking for Nordic expatriates would be interesting. Lauring (2001), for example, found that when Danish expatriates in Saudi Arabia undermined cultural differences in their networking and communication, decision-making was reported to be slower. As a result, further investigation in relation to communication, decision-making, and possibly communication cost, would be interesting for organizations.…”

Technology Enhanced Learning (TEL) Intercultural Competence: A Phenomenological Exploration of Trainees’ Experiences within Global Virtual Training Environments.

“…More specifically, ninety percent of the panel of expert interculturalists agreed that interviews, mixed measures, qualitative measures, self-report instruments, and triangulation were effective ways to assess intercultural competence (Deardorff, 2009, p.478). Lauring (2011) examined the area of intercultural competence in relation to global organisational cultures, but from the point of view of the communications supporting the employees' general work place tasks rather than the employees' personal experience of intercultural competence within global VTEs. In general, the literature has focused much more on the intercultural communication technology (Chiper, 2013) and the communicative pedagogy itself than how trainers can enhance the intercultural communication and improve training within global VTEs.…”