Cross-Cultural Aspect in English Business Correspondence

cross-cultural aspect in english business correspondence




          Abstract:
      Differences in cultural background may affect business correspondence between different countries, and International English may be evolving a cultural style of its own. In correspondence, business people from the low-context cultures of Northern Europe and North America sometimes inadvertently offend their counterparts in high-context cultures by assuming that their correspondents share their values. Such correspondence might be more effective if writers used a rhetorical framework and lexico-grammatical peculiarities to conceptualize in their letters a sense of their addressees' conditions and of their own roles in relation to their addressees. This dimension of relationship may be difficult for people from low-context cultures. However, because of the increasing use of English as a lingua franca of business, correspondence standards may be changing. The results of the study have shown that croos-cultural aspect has a great impact on English Business correspondence.
          Key words: global business, cross-cultural communication, English business correspondence, business letter.





      Introduction

      In today’s global business environment, more and more of us are required to understand people which come from countries and cultures different from our own.   While there is no short and easy way to learn about a given culture in any depth, there are some general principles that lead to success in communicating and conducting business with people of backgrounds unlike our own. Cultural factors play   an important role, functioning as invisible barriers. International business communication is communication that crosses national boundaries for business purposes. Communication among people from the same culture is often difficult. Therefore, communication between people from different cultures   from the point of view of language, values, customs   and ways...