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6th WU Symposium on International Business Communication

DISCOURSE AT/ON/AS WORK

December 11 - 13, 2013

WU Vienna, Welthandelsplatz 1, A-1020 Vienna, Building AD, Meeting Room AD.0.114

This symposium aims to explore work from a discourse perspective. Bringing together researchers with different theoretical backgrounds and methodological preferences, we are hoping to address a broad spectrum of issues related to workplace discourse, ranging from the micro-linguistic features of interaction to macro-level discursive patterns, and including both verbal and non-verbal dimensions. The three prepositions in the symposium title hint at the three different, if partly overlapping, thematic strands that we would like to see represented: discourse as it unfolds at work (whether in formal meetings or informally around the water cooler), discourse on (i.e. about) work (e.g., in media reports on unemployment) and discourse as work (cue 'emotional labour' in the service industries, for example).

Papers are by invitation only, but registrations are very welcome from anyone with an interest in language in workplace settings.


Programme

Wednesday, 11 December

15:30 - 16:00 Welcome & Registration
16:00 - 16:30 Opening
16:30 - 17:10 A. Koester: Discourse at work: What is it and how can we study it?
17:10 - 17:50 N. Ellis: Doing things with "work"
17:50 - 18:30 K. Harman: Learning at work as embodiment and activation of discourse
18:30 Reception


Thursday, 12 December

9:30 - 10:00 Welcome & Registration
10:00 - 10:40 A. Duchêne: The dark side of multilingualism at work: Language "factories" and the Taylorization of linguistic resources
10:40 - 11:20 C. Heath: Creating competition: The interactional accomplishment of the sale of fine art and antiques at auction
11:20 - 12:00 D. Cameron: Building workspace with words: Discourse on/of/at work in the design of a new university campus
12:00 - 13:30 Lunch
13:30 - 15:30 Guided Tour of Campus
15:30 - 16:10 S. Tietze: The translator as change agent: Translating the talent management discourse into a Slovak manufacturing setting
16:10 - 16:50 S. Risinzon: Cooperative strategies in communication with customers in small Russian companies
16:50 - 17:30 J. Thornborrow: "You've made our day!": University recruitment as an institutional encounter on Twitter
18:30 Dinner


Friday, 13 December

9:30 - 10:10 K. Pritchard: Weary women: Re-constructing retirement in the 21st century
10:10 - 10:50 R. Whiting: Baby boomers and the lost generation: On the discursive legitimacy of generations at work
10:50 - 11:10 Coffee
11:10 - 11:50 G. Mautner: Work in Progress Report: Discourse, Workspace and Identity
11:50 - 12:30 J. Angouri: "We are a small team pretending to be a big one": Problem solving in family businesses
12:30 - 13:30 Lunch
13:30 - 14:10 B. Thörle: Carnival in the company: Organisational norms and their subversion in team meetings
14:10 - 14:50 I. Clarke and R. Wodak: Micro-level discursive strategies for constructing shared views around strategic issues in team meetings
14:50 - 15:10 Closing Remarks & Summing-up

Programme (pdf)

 

Organisation:Gerlinde Mautner (Institute for English Business Communication)
Martin Stegu (Institute for Romance Languages)
Renate Rathmayr (Institute for Slavic Languages)
Elisabeth Peters (Department of Foreign Language Business Communication)


Contact:

Elisabeth Peters

elisabeth.peters@wu.ac.at

+431 31336 5117

Practical information