Page 385 - Handbooks of Applied Linguistics Communication Competence Language and Communication Problems Practical Solutions

Editors’ introduction 363

Editors’ introduction

Section 4 focuses on a number of key concepts and issues in intercultural com-
munication that are subject to ongoing discussions within the field. Three of the
chapters deal with issues that are ethically important: discrimination (chapter
18), power and dominance (chapter 19) and stereotyping (chapter 20). Two of
the chapters deal with concepts that are analytically important: identity (chapter
20) and communities of practice (chapter 21). The authors write from different
standpoints, illustrating the range of viewpoints and interests that exist within
the field. However, all four chapters try to incorporate both broad and narrow
conceptions of culture, and illustrate how social and cultural analyses can be
combined at the micro and macro levels.
A special feature of Martin Reisigl’s chapter on discrimination (chapter 18)
is that it goes beyond verbal communication, drawing attention to other aspects
of semiotic processes, in particular, visual communication. Reisigl defines vari-
ous subtypes of discrimination, such as depersonalization, separating, distanc-
ing, accentuating differences, devaluing and many more. Discrimination is very
often implicit and indirect; for example, many immigrants are faced with indi-
rect discrimination in the labour market by not having the same chances as
natives. He takes into consideration economic, political and historical factors
and the related structures of hegemony and dominance. Like Gunther Kress and
Theo van Leeuwen, he addresses the imaginary relationship between visually
represented individuals and viewers. Visual discrimination by symbolic distan-
ciation, for example, means to depict specific persons or groups of persons in re-
lation to the viewers as if they were not ‘close’ to the viewers, ‘strangers’. Com-
parisons of the representations of in-groups and out-groups permit a diagnosis
of whether there is discrimination or not.
In chapter 19, Winfried Thielmann draws special attention to conflicts of in-
terest and perspectives in institutions. Adopting as a starting point the concept
of cultural apparatus developed by Konrad Ehlich and Jochen Rehbein, he
shows how conflicts within institutions result from knowledge asymmetries,
differing use of language, and varying interests. Because of institutional power
structures and role-specific behaviour, institutional agents often do not become
aware of the failure of intercultural communication. Even when agent and client
belong to the same society and speak the same language, communication be-
tween an institutional member and a member of the general public is already in-
tercultural communication in the narrow sense. Thielmann also delves into the
highly asymmetrical relationship of first world donor countries and third world
recipients of foreign aid. Intercultural science transfer often runs the risk of
being a silent instantiation of dominance in intercultural communication. He
discusses the successful development of the Grameen bank in Bangladesh