An Intercultural Approach To Company English Training: Proposing A Course Syllabus

The number of multinationals in China is ever increasing as a result of the open market and economic integration. In this background, it is important to develop employees'intercultural communication competence. Most multinationals pay great attention to the English training in order to improve employees'language skills. However, improvement of language skills alone can not guarantee effective intercultural communication. On the other hand, the existing intercultural business communication training programs focus on cultural and intercultural knowledge, and emphasize case analysis, leaving out the training of language competence. This kind of training is based on the assumption that trainees'language competence can reach the level that is required in the intercultural communication process. The thesis intends to integrate intercultural communication training into company English training and propose a 12-unit-course syllabus, which develops trainees'intercultural communication competence as well as language competence.The thesis introduces relevant concepts and theories which underlie the practice of foreign language teaching and intercultural training including communicative competence, intercultural communication competence, intercultural approach to foreign language teaching and methods for foreign language teaching and intercultural training. On the basis of the literature review and drawing on the frameworks and models constructed by other scholars, the thesis proposes a new multi-dimensional competence model, which is then applied to the design of a 12-unit-course syllabus for an intercultural approach to company English Training. Each of the 12 units is presented with a detailed explanation of teaching objectives, contents and activities. One unit is used as a demonstration to illustrate how the intercultural approach to company English training can be implemented in actual teaching. The concluding section summarizes the thesis, explains its limitations and makes suggestions for future studies.