Investigation And Research On Language Services In The Catering Industry

The catering industry,a service trade with a large customer base,receives guests from home and abroad.Examing the language used in this business offers a glimpse into the overall language proficiency of the city.The author of this paper,selected a number of restaurants in Suzhou,Yangzhou and Suqian to conduct a questionnaire-based survey among the restaurant servers and customers in regards to language service.Methods including interviews and observations were adopted for the investigation of language use in the catering industry.Customers' comments from Dianping(an online platform where customers share feedbacks on service of restaurants)and texts related to consumers' reviews of restaurants were also examined to analyze the problems in language use of the catering industry and the potential values that could be achieved by providing a better language service.Surveys on restaurant servers reveal that Mandarin is the most widely used language in their daily work.Geographical factors have a great impact on their choice of the language.Taking courtesy into consideration,polite expressions and impolite ones are both seen in the catering industry.According to the survey,polite language is generally adopted by the servers.Young attendants pay more attention to polite expressions,and the better-educated ones are less inclined to use uncivilized terms.Most attendants believe that they have a strong sense of using professional language and marketing language.But the fact is they don't really use those languages in service.In terms of body language,most attendants tend to attach importance to their facial expressions and body moves while communicating with customers.Attendants with technical secondary school and junior college diplomas show a stronger awareness of physical language in service.Most attendants put it that the restaurant has explicit regulations on language use and provides language training.However,problems in the implementation of the language standardization system do exist in the catering industry.For example,qualities of language trainings vary,and the standardization of the service language training remains to be strengthened.Surveys targeting the customers show that customers are in great demand of Mandarin and polite language service,yet the majority of them choose to put up with impolite expressions when they occur,with only a few trying to talk back.Female customers are more inclined to give in.The vast majority of customers believe that uncivilized language used in the restaurants will affect their choice of comsumption next time.For professional language,elderly customers show a higher demand.Most of them are satisfied with the overall situation of the language service in restaurants,but they think that it still needs to be improved and they have great expectations for the results of servers' language training.By examining customers' comments collected from Dianping and related data,the author finds there is a difference in customers'perceptions of attendants'service language.Customers are also less satisfied with the language used for apology and with facial expressions.Customers are more sensitive to and concerned about unfriendly language than ordinary communications.Textual analysis also shows that with increasing emphasis on language service,the economic value behind it is being noticed as poor language service turns away customers and cuts economic benefits.The actual condition of language service in the catering industry is affected by many factors,the improvement which demands joint efforts from service providers,restaurant managers,and customers.First of all,attendants are supposed to take the initiative to establish a correct awareness of language service and cultivate their own language service capabilities.Second,managers of the catering industry should be devoted to the implementation of the standardization system in language service and take a variety of measures to encourage attendants to have a thorough understanding of language service and polish their language service capabilities.What's more,they are also required to attach importance to the economic value behind language service,so as to increase investment in this respect,to offer more training opportunities to employees and provide more incentives.As consumers of language service,customers need to establish their awareness of language consumption,safeguard their rights,and give related feedbacks to restaurants and people involved,in a civilized and effective way,fulfilling their responsibility as a supervisor for the catering industry.