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Perspectives of Developing Intercultural

Communicative Competence:

Research on ICC in China

Xu Lisheng

Zhejiang University

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Competence for intercultural communication has become one of the major research areas in intercultural communication studies.

In the past fifty years or so, competence for intercultural communication has been conceptualized in a variety of ways by scholars according to their individual theoretical orientation or specific sample being studied.

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The term “intercultural communicative

competence”, ICC for short, appears to

be more widely used than others.

In the Chinese context, ICC seems to be

very closely related to the notion of

“communicative competence” (CC)

proposed by Hymes (1972) and some

other scholars.

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To Hymes, the notion of competence

should be extended to include the „rules

of use‟ as well as the „rules of

grammar‟, and it should describe the

knowledge and ability of individuals for

appropriate language use in the

communicative events in which they

find themselves in any particular speech

community.

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Over time there has been a shift away from an agenda for looking into what is actually happening in a community regarding language use to an attempt to find out what one should acquire in learning a second or foreign language, a shift from how people in a particular culture use language to what elements comprise appropriate communication between the native speaker and the nonnative speaker.

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It is natural that the concept of CC has

been gradually transformed into the

concept of ICC, though much of the

research efforts have been centered

round language use in intercultural

communication.

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When these concepts were first

introduced into China in 1980s, it was

very well received by people involved

in foreign language teaching (FLT),

especially those who were anxious to

bring about some fundamental changes

in our practice of language education.

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But our understanding of ICC was rather

narrow in scope at the time. EFL teaching,

then, was aimed at developing the learner‟s

communicative competence so that they will

be able to interact freely with native speakers

of English in various social situations.

In fact, what scholars and teachers often

talked about was not really ICC, but culture-

specific CC.

Great emphasis was placed on cultural

acquisition in FLT.

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However, this has been questioned (Xu, 2000;

Xu & Wu, 2006).

Whose culture or whose CC (in other words,

appropriateness for language use) should the

learner acquire?

Equating cultural acquisition to acquisition of

just the culture of native target language

speakers is rather problematic, for it may have

an effect of reducing intercultural

communication to intracultural

communication.

It seems impossible and infeasible for cultural

acquisition to include all cultures that might be

involved in intercultural communication.

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Cultural acquisition must concentrate

on acquisition of appropriateness in

using the language. However, this

appropriateness cannot be simply

assumed as the appropriateness of the

language use by native speakers from

any particular cultural group. Instead it

should be contextually, and therefore

interculturally, defined.

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Emphasis has been given to

distinguishing between (culture-

specific) CC and ICC and calls for

developing ICC of our learners.

Though CC may be closely related to

ICC, but we have to recognize that

some components of CC are closely

related to ICC while others are not.

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Using Canale and Swain‟s model of

CC, it has been suggested (Xu, 2000)

that, unlike sociolinguistic and

discourse competences, strategic

component of CC is not culture-specific

and therefore will be an important part

of ICC.

In intercultural communication, where

there are more differences and less

shared knowledge between participants,

strategic competence often plays a

crucial role.

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By taking ICC as the ultimate goal and

the central link between intercultural

education and English language

teaching, some scholars (Song, 2003;

2008; 2009) further propose that three

competence dimensions build up ICC:

1. communicative competence in

one‟s first lingualculture (LC1),

2. communicative competence in the

foreign or second lingualcutlure (LC2),

3. transcultural competence, which is

developed on the basis of LC1 and LC2.

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To attain ICC, the foreign language

learner will have to develop

communicative competence in LC2

(CC2), built up through its interaction

with learner‟s already fairly developed

communicative competence in his/her

LC1 (CC1). The two communicative

competences influence each other, with

CC1 as the basis and frame of reference

for CC2, which in turn counteracts upon

the learner‟s established ways of using

his/her first language.

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Originally, the concept of ICC was

probably introduced by American

researchers interested in overseas

technical assistants and Peace Corps

volunteers half a century ago. Studies

on ICC in the United States have been

chiefly driven by practical needs such

as sending personnel abroad to perform

various tasks.

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Many researchers in the U.S.A. tend to define the interculturally and communicatively competent individual as having a particular set of personal characteristics (McCroskey, 1982; Pavitt & Haight, 1985; Spitzberg, 1983). This person is said to be able to establish an interpersonal relationship with a foreigner through an effective exchange of both verbal and nonverbal behaviors.

There has been a growing consensus on the conceptualization of ICC within the United States that ICC involves the knowledge, motivation, and skills to interact effectively and appropriately with members of different cultures.

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Instead of presenting ICC as a number of personal traits and characteristics, Jia (1997) holds a systemic view of ICC.

According to Jia, ICC consists of four systems of competence:

1. the system of basic communication competence, which includes verbal and nonverbal competence, cultural competence, interactional competence, and cognitive competence (description, interpretation, and evaluation);

2. the system of affective and relational competences, which includes affective competence (empathy) and relational competence;

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3. the episodic competence system (the

ability to comply with or deviate from the

norms of conventional communication

sequence for achieving specific goals in

particular context) ;

4. the strategic competence system ( the

ability to employ various communication

strategies to compensate for breakdowns in

communication due to limiting conditions in

actual situations or to insufficient verbal

competence to enhance the effectiveness of

communication).

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Jia‟s model can be seen as an effort to

integrate different approaches to ICC. This is

mainly based on those American views and

looks somewhat similar to the model for ICC

established by Spitzberg (2000), but Jia‟s

scope seems to be wider, for he also borrows

very much from the theories of

sociolinguitics, pragmatics, and applied

linguistics in his conceptualization of ICC.

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Gao (1999) finds that the American

approach to ICC has largely been

effectiveness-centered and such an

approach suffers from a number of

problems including a lack of integrated

system, overstress on outcome, and

priority of utilitarian values.

So she proposes a Tao-qi distinction

of ICC, drawing on Chinese

philosophical traditions.

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The Tao of ICC refers to the personal and

relational orientation of the communicating

subject; the qi of ICC refers to knowledge,

skills and effects of communication.

The literal meaning of Tao is “road” or

“way”. As the road or way has a direction,

the meaning of Tao is extended to “guiding

principle.” The literal meaning of qi is

“container”…. The extended meaning is

“tool” or “instrument” (Meaning of Words

and Characters).

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The Tao of interpersonal communication, including intercultural communication, is the communication subject‟s orientation of realizing his or her own potential through the understanding of other human beings. At this level of Tao, or the final state, various cultures demonstrate great consistency. What differs is the qi that manifests Tao, or that is used as means to reach Dao.

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Current researches view ICC as describable, dividable, and measurable entities.

The Tao of ICC is essentially beyond accurate linguistic description. In intercultural communication, those that can be accurately described by language reside at the level of qi.

Tao is more essential than qi, so for pedagogical purposes, the development of Tao has priority over that of qi. Focus should be put on basic personality orientation, rather than specific information, strategies and skills. Different ways of shaping ICC at qi level have been widely adopted in the West, yet cultivation of the Tao of ICC does not seem to have attained enough attention.

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Later, Gao (2002) goes further to call for

“going beyond cultures” which she considers

as more important than “going across

cultures” in ICC development.

“Going across” cultures and “going beyond”

cultures are taken as two levels of ICC, with

the former focusing on the increase of target

culture proficiency and the latter on the

gaining of cultural awareness and reflective,

tolerant attitudes. While “going across” has

been the major concern of FLT, “going

beyond” cultures should be considered more

important in pedagogical objective.

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The researchers in this field are mostly

foreign language teachers. However, the

study of ICC should be an

interdisciplinary effort involving people

of various disciplinary backgrounds,

which would hopefully extend our

current understanding of what it means

to be interculturally communicatively

competent.

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Although there has been some positive

development in conceptualizing ICC,

so far its measurement seems to have

made little progress. The researches

have generally focused on what ICC is,

with very few on how to assess the ICC

level of a person.

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The term ICC may sound very popular

in China today, but the number of

scholars whose research focus is

chiefly on ICC is surprisingly small.

The domain of ICC is in dire need of

more research attention.

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Thank you!