1.1 The Business Discourse in Modern Linguistics
Despite the available various linguistic researches in the field of a business discourse and business communication, the concept "business discourse" still has no unambiguous definition in modern linguistic science. On the basis of the carried-out review of researches of the last years we will note that in many foreign sources authors select several terms describing various types of interactions and use of language in the sphere of business relations, such as "workplace discourse" [1; 2], "institutional discourse" [3; 4] and also "professional discourse" [3; 5; 6] and "business discourse" [7; 8; 9].
In this regard the trend of reconsideration of these definitions which bright proof is the fact that there are more and more modern researchers (P. Drew, J. Heritage, F. Bargiela-Chiappini is observed recently, A. Koester, etc.) make attempts to differentiate above-mentioned concepts. For example, most of scientists "workplace discourse" and "institutional discourse" is understood as wider concepts and are often used in literature as interchanged [1; 2; 3]. Such American researchers as P. Drew and J. Heritage, consider "institutional dialogue" ("institutional talk") as communication which belongs to performance of business instructions ("task-related") where "at least, one of participants of this communication is the representative of the official organization". Such interpretation is also relevant also for the concept "workplace discourse" [3, p. 3].
At the same time, "business discourse" and "professional discourse" are understood as more specific terms. If "workplace discourse" concerns the interactions happening in all views of professional spheres, then it is only possible to carry to a business discourse some of them. From this point of view, "business discourse" is the special subspecies of "workplace discourse" relating to the commercial sphere and is defined as special "social action in business contact". "The business discourse is how people communicate, using an oral or written language in the commercial organizations", – the famous Western European expert F. Bargiela-Chiappini [7, p. 3].
It is also necessary to note that definition of the concept "business discourse" demands first of all specification of the term "business" in broad and its narrow sense. Broad understanding assumes communication in the organization as parts of a business discourse as, according to foreign scientists, interaction between colleagues in the organizations of the private sector has much in common with interactions between office workers in public sector [10, with. 6]. Narrow understanding of a business discourse includes communication between its participants for implementation of joint business by means of various ways of business communication, for example, of business correspondence [11; 12], or by means of business negotiations [13; 14].
According to researchers S. Sarangi and C. Roberts, the main distinction between "professional" and "institutional" discourse consists in daily use of concepts [15, p. 15-19].
The professional (expert) as the member of a certain professional group, is the one who has certain skills, knowledge and abilities whereas the organization or institution is associated with a system, norms, implementation of powers more, than with a certain group of people. Thus, the "professional" discourse is created by the professionals having certain official duties and the rights, and the "institutional" discourse includes various genres authorized by a certain organization. Here it is possible to carry, for example, certain types of meetings, meetings or writing of reports on a certain sample. However researchers assume that these two types of a discourse can be crossed and take place within one context [15]. As C. Candlin notes, the professional discourse expresses "lawful participation" of the person in a profession which is based on certain skills and knowledge [16, p. 13]. Therefore, the professional discourse is also directly connected with acquisition of this professional knowledge and to become the professional, it is necessary to study certain types of knowledge and skills.
It is necessary to recognize that originally the interest of researchers in studying of a business discourse appeared in line with applied linguistics (applied linguistics), language for the special purposes (LSP – Language for Specific Purposes), English for the special purposes (ESP – English for Specific Purposes). In the American linguistics of business communication works P. P. Rogers and J. Thomas who paid attention to studying of language are devoted and also made the significant contribution to practice of innovative teaching according to the program of business communication. As F. Bargiela-Chiappini notes, business communication is strongly approved component in the American training programs that leads to collision of the theory, on the one hand, and practicians, with another [17, p. 65]. Though the American linguistic tradition is not inclined to the detailed analysis of texts that is distinctive feature of many European researchers, such macrotheories as had a great influence on it "the theory of abundance of mass media" (media richness theory), the nominated by R.L. Daft and R.H. Lengel [18, p. 199] and also the concept of the organizational genres offered by J. Yates and V. Orlikovsky, which are actively working in new tradition of rhetorical science [19, p. 13-17]. It should be noted that creation of the International Association on business communication (ABC – Association for Business Communication) and also such quarterly editions as "The Journal of Business Communication (JBC)" and "Business Communication Quarterly (BCQ)", had a huge impact on the researchers of the whole world who are interested in issues of studying of a business discourse and business communication.
It is also necessary to pay attention that in modern foreign researches the business discourse often is considered in terms of cross-cultural communication, in particular, of cross-cultural negotiations, business meetings and corporate communication (for example, e-mails, annual reports, shareholder letters, etc.). The most important role of professional competence and business experience in cross-cultural business contacts is emphasized: "… extensive knowledge of the English grammar will never be able to compete with twenty years of experience in quality of the international negotiator at the successful conclusion of the transaction" [20, p. 84-85]. The works which appeared recently were devoted generally to studying of a business discourse on the basis of different European languages, for example, French [21; 22], Netherlands [23], German [24; 25], Spanish [26; 27; 28; 29; 30], Danish [31], Norwegian [32], Portuguese [33].
A little under other point of view the Russian linguistic science considers questions of a business discourse and business communication. The scientist broad understanding of this phenomenon at which the business discourse is considered as a kind of an institutional discourse is peculiar to the majority. According to the Russian scientists (B.E. Aznauryan, N.A. Baranova, V.S. Grigorieva, V.I. Karasik, S.V. Mkrtychyan, T.A. Petrova, V.A. Ponomarenko, O.S. Syshchikov, V.G. Hartavakyan, E.V. Chilikina, T.A. Shiryaeva, etc.), belonging to corporation as to association of the people occupied with one business, and a working situation is done the person by the carrier not only personal qualities, but also the representative of a certain institute.
It is known that in the course of communication there is a selection of language means under the influence of communicative conditions. In this sense language of business communication represents close to ideal a model of "not creative" use of language units. So, according to P. Voloshin, communication with use of ready "blocks", the stiffened clichéd educations, is the dominating characteristic of business communication. This cliché is shown not only at the level of phrases and sentences, but also at the level of the whole texts, whether it be business correspondence, bank documents or presentation materials. Even the unofficial dialogical speech between participants of communication, as a rule, is not beyond standard, formal, globally clichéd units of big and small syntax [34, p. 84-85].
Thus, according to the Russian linguistic school, the business discourse as a kind of an institutional discourse, represents "a specialized clichéd kind of communication between people who can not know about each other, but have to communicate according to norms of this society" [35, p. 28]. In this regard several typical signs for characteristic of an institutional business discourse are distinguished:
1) the specific purpose of communication consisting in mutually advantageous professional activity, in establishment of conditions of cooperation, in achievement of the business arrangement between two and more interested parties or unilateral definition of positions on any question;
2) the specific participants presented in the person of managers of all links which are engaged in production, trade, rendering services; the business people having own enterprises; the scientific figures who are engaged in scientific developments, training of specialists, rendering consulting and expert services; various clients; people who are interested in business;
3) specific social chronotope, including social space and social time as important components for the social relations with communicants;
4) the specific values consisting in receiving profit, in effective management, in creation of partnership, monitoring of the competitive environment, selection and training, etc.;
5) the specific strategy of a business discourse presented in various forms depending on the purpose of professional communication, for example, the presentation, negotiations, articles in special media, interviews, an interview, trainings, etc.;
6) specific overall picture of the world as one of the main functions of institutional communication and stability conditions of business community;
7) the specific characteristics of texts which are expressed by the index of the social status representing the addressee of the text as the member of institutional community and also testifying to its belonging to professional business community [36].
In recent years regarding linguistic works of the Russian scientists questions on improvement and modernization of a categorial terms framework in the field of studying of features of functioning of language in a business context and developments of the new cross-disciplinary scientific direction - business linguistics are even more often brought up. Within this direction the Russian linguist Y.V. Danyushina considers the most acceptable use of the term "business discourse", explaining it with circumstances of the amplifying internationalization of society and science, including language of science of a terms framework on the basis of English-language terms [37]. According to this treatment, the business discourse is defined as
"open set of the texts integrated by business subject in combination with extra linguistic factors (in narrower sense), and as verbalization of mentality and ideology of business (in broad, philosophical sense)" [37, p. 57].
The review of modern works of the Russian linguists studying such difficult language phenomenon as a business discourse showed that this problem draws attention of scientists from the most different aspects: in terms of its linguistic features (T.N. Astafurova, V.Y. Doroshenko, M.G. Malovichko), genre versions (A.N. Kudlayeva, Meng Shiu, O.V. Trofimova, M.A. Shirinkina), the pragmatic and pragmalinguistic manifestations (I.V. Drabkina, N.V. Komleva, M.V. Koltunova). The analysis of a business discourse in terms of its figurativeness, emotionality, expressivity, idiomaticity (N.M. Potapova, I.M. Nekipelov, V.A. Ponomarenko, O.Y. Scherbakov) is carried out, tools for argumentativeness of business statement (N.A. Balandina, A.A. Beltyukov) are described. Cognitive aspects of a business discourse (O.A. Beznayeva, Z.I. Guryeva, V.D. Shevchenko) and his cognitive modeling (T.A. Shiryaev), feature of a term system in business communication (A.A. Papazyan, T.V. Yudina), the strategy of understanding and interpretation of professional communication texts (E.N. Malyuga), the complex analysis of an English-speaking network business discourse (Y.V. Danyushin) are of particular interest.
Due to growth of business activity of the population of our country and expansion of foreign economic relations of subjects of market economy of Kazakhstan in recent years the keen interest of domestic linguists in issues of professional communication in modern business community is also observed. The Kazakhstan researches are devoted to various aspects of studying of a business discourse: to lexical and stylistic features (N.I. Ergaziyeva, A.T. Esetov), use of terms and term formation (B.S. Ashirova), to a cliché and designs of a cliché as to the main components of official style (M.K. Mambetov), language of official business documentation (L.S. Duysembekov), influence of the Kazakh culture on process of Kazakh business language studying (G.A. Birali), role and functions of business communication (G.Z. Bakirov); to the linguistic analysis of a business discourse genres, such as business letter (Z.K. Salkhanova), the used argument in the business letters (A.K. Baymurunov), to requirements to texts of official style including the multimedia application to the electronic textbook (A.S. Tsoi), semantics and pragmatics of the English business lexemes in Kazakh (G. Doszhan), etc.
The special attention is deserved by researches of comparative character in which the Kazakh and Russian languages of business communication are compared. So, S.K. Erezhepova carried out pragmalinguistic comparison of features of the resolution as separate genre of a business discourse in the Kazakh and Russian languages. Common features of resolutions, according to the researcher, are explained the Kazakh and Russian languages by the fact that the Kazakh texts most often are not original, and translated from Russian [38].
Besides, as showed the analysis of the Kazakhstan linguistic researches, the Kazakhstan linguists address numerous and various works of the foreign researchers devoted to an English-speaking business discourse with an opportunity further to apply this experience to realities of the Kazakhstan reality. Today the business discourse in English in Kazakhstan takes the leading positions among other foreign languages in the sphere of business communication with foreign partners and the organizations. Moreover, as mark out E.D. Suleymenova and G.G. Burkitbayeva, the speed and scale of distribution of an English-speaking business discourse led to a situation in which the Kazakh and Russian languages sometimes are under strong influence of English [39]. The Kazakhstan scientists are interested in functioning and semantics of nominative phrases in business correspondence (A. Aytureev); a role of words connectors in the syntactic and semantic organization of business texts (Z. Zhambulatov); lexical and semantic means of communicants in business communication (Z.K. Omarov); syntactic features of business correspondence (A.S. Tolengutov); issues of cross-cultural communication (K.K. Shokhayeva, M.T. Sabitova, G.I. Isina), etc.
One of large-scale works on studying of a business discourse is the dissertation research by G.G. Burkitbayeva today. According to the scientist, the business discourse, taking into account rather wide sphere of the professional relations, should be understood as subspecies of the professional discourse used in the sphere of business. According to her, the concept "business" covers the communicative sphere in which the business discourse [40, p. 13]. According to this understanding, G.G. Burkitbayeva gives the following definition of a business discourse: "… the concrete embodiment of invariant model of a discourse in the concrete communicative business situation created by a certain group of the people having this or that relation to business. The texts expressed in the form of various genres of a business discourse" [40, p. 59] will be concrete realization of activity of these people in a business situation. And the essential characteristic defining specifics of a business discourse is restriction of a circle of the subjects and the purposes of such communication directed to achievement of mutually advantageous agreements on the discussed business matters [40, p. 7].
Having summed up the above, we came to a conclusion that the business discourse in modern linguistics is the difficult communicative phenomenon including, on the one hand, set of all speech acts representing purposeful mental and speech activity which common characteristic feature are business relations, and with another – all sum of knowledge of surrounding reality necessary for understanding of the specified speech acts, the so-called socio-cultural context of communication characterizing its participants, processes of producing and perceptions of the speech taking into account the background knowledge which is based on the norms, values and rules of communication adopted in business community.
In the real dissertation research after modern scientists we use the term "business correspondence" which, in our opinion, is to the most acceptable and corresponding current trends in the field of business communication. It is known that scientists allocate two modes of existence of a business discourse – oral and written [41, p. 27; 42, p. 18]. Regular use of these or those types of business contacts in practice of cross-cultural business communication led to fixing of the developed speech forms functioning in the form of different genres of an oral and written business discourse [42, p. 21]. Business correspondence represents one of modes of a business discourse which belongs to written business texts. Studying of texts of business correspondence is of special interest as in them characteristics the socio-cognitive and the communicative and pragmatic processes proceeding in consciousness of the business communicants by drawing up the business text reflecting both traditional characteristics, and progressive trends of cultural development of the business letter in modern conditions of formation of the market relations are brightly shown. Sentences belong to business correspondence, marketing letters, letters requests, letters are inquiries, commercial letters invitations, cover letters and also the types of business letters allocated on transmission media of business correspondence, for example, electronic messages, facsimile messages, telex, the meme, etc. Also carry reports, contracts (contracts), the summary, the short biography, protocols, statements, petitions, orders, orders, charters, analytical notes, press releases, packages of proposals to written genres of a business discourse, etc. In turn, oral genres of a business discourse are business negotiations, interviews, telephone conversations, business meetings, meetings and meetings, the presentations, videoconferences, oral reports, etc.
As showed the analysis of linguistic works of the last years, the majority of works was devoted to a research of written genres of a business discourse, such as business reports (L. Yeung, O.V. Dovbysh, A.A. Moiseenko, etc.), business letters (P. Maier, L.P. Ayres, V.B. dos Santos, G.G. Burkitbayeva, I.V. Drabkina, V.V. Radchenko, A.O. Stebletsova, S.Y. Fedyurko and etc.), business contracts (G. Gоvеrnаtоri, Z. Milosevic, S. Sadiq, I.V. Drabkina, Y.A. Chernousova), letters on calculation of taxes (J. Flowerdew, A. Wan), faxes (L. Louhiala-Salminen, D. Akar, Y. Zhu, C. Cobanoglu, B. Warde, P.J. Moreo, etc.) and e-mails (T. Mulholland, J. Gimenez, S. Evans, A.G. Avramova, G.G. Burkitbayeva, E.A. Vishnyakova, etc.). A number of researches are devoted to studying of oral genres of a business discourse, in most cases, of business meetings and negotiations (G. Poncini, M. Handford, J. Amgouri, M. Marra, etc.).
Thus, the review of modern researches on this subject shows that the analysis of a business discourse draws the increasing attention of linguists. On the basis of these works it is obviously possible to mark out the following main signs of a research of business communication and a business discourse:
• interdisciplinarity: in studying of business communication and a discourse essentially integrated, cross-disciplinary approach including researches in the field of a socio-pragmatics, cognitive linguistics, cross-cultural pragmatics, contrastive rhetoric, hermeneutics, critical anthropology, cultural sociology, cultural psychology, the theory of business and management, etc. is necessary;
• set of several research methods: combination quantitative and qualitative methods, discourse analysis, konversatsionny analysis, ethnomethodology, ethnography, multimodal analysis, etc.;
• explanatory: the aspiration to reveal signs (most often national and cultural character) designing of business messages of both an oral, and written mode, in particular, of texts of business correspondence, and to find it an explanation.
However, despite existence of a large number of researches on the considered problem, insufficiently studied there are questions connected with a cognitive component of a business discourse, interlingual communicative and pragmatic and cross-cultural features of business correspondence that is caused by internationalization processes, the globalization and integration factors characteristic of the modern business world.
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