1. Internationalizing a Business Communication Course. Draft.
- Author
-
Davis, Ken
- Abstract
An instructor's effort to internationalize a business communication course taught him much about the relationships between cognitive egocentrism and cognitive ethnocentrism. Cognitive egocentrism is the chief obstacle to be overcome in learning to write, even within a culture, while cognitive ethnocentrism is the chief obstacle to be overcome in learning to communicate interculturally. Business writing students at Indiana University-Purdue University at Indianapolis exchange simulated job application letters and resumes with business communication and business English students at the Antwerp Business School in Antwerp, Belgium. Students at both institutions read the documents from their counterparts and decide which applicants to "interview" and which to reject. The Indianapolis students write personal, student-to-student critiques of the Belgian applications, and the Antwerp students present videotaped oral evaluations of the American applications. Four subjective outcomes of the internationalizing of this business communication course are: (1) students seem to find the course even more authentic than earlier, noninternational versions; (2) students seem more motivated than their earlier counterparts; (3) as students worked to overcome cognitive egocentrism, they began to overcome cognitive ethnocentrism as well; and (4) in an increasingly international and intercultural communication environment, egocentrism and ethnocentrism are the same thing. (RS)
- Published
- 1993