Reader: Practicum in culture of verbal communication. Karpenko T.E.

Kazakh University of International Relations and World Languages

Translation Faculty

English Department

for 2nd-year students

Field of study: 050207 – translation studies

Almaty 2009

Table of contents

1. Introduction

2. Communication

3. Intercultural communication

4. Verbal communication

5. Telephoning

6. Applying for a job

7. Interpersonal communication

8. Meetings

9. Negotiations

10. Presentations

Introduction

Dear student!

You are now at university and have chosen your future profession. You think about your future careers and how to be more professional and successful, how to improve your linguistic and communicative competence.

The course “Practicum in Culture of Verbal Communication” is one of significant theoretical and practical importance for students-translators. The subject of this course is the way in which human beings communicate with one another in words and actions. The main purpose of the course is to help students, future translators, in mastering the skills of communication and improving their knowledge of the ways in which communication functions in social and business spheres.

To communicate with others, to convince and to find the compromise, to listen and speak – those are what the life consists of, and the business life especially. It is no matter who are you – the manager of a giant corporation or the translator in an office – you are compelled to have a deal with others, you can’t stand out from the communication. The communication skills are necessary if you wish to succeed in your studies, in business activity or in any other sphere of life. To make a progress in culture of verbal and non-verbal communication means success.

Theme 1 communication

1. Communication Structure. How do people communicate?

Communication is the process of exchanging information between people by several methods. During communication, members of a group share information or express their thoughts and feelings. In a simplistic form, information is transmitted from a sender to a receiver.

The process of communication includes the following basic elements:

• The Process of Communication Sender → Encoding: Message creation → Channel → Decoding → Receiver→ Feedback → Sender

  Sender is a person who sends information (source).

• R eceiver is a person who receives the information sent (destination).

• Message is a spoken or written piece of information sent by sender to another person (content).

• Feedback is response from a receiver.

• Encoding is putting a message or other information into code (in words or other symbols).

• Decoding is discovering the meaning of a message written in a code.

• Code is a system of symbols giving information (form; language).

• Channel is a method of sending or obtaining information (medium).

Language is the main means of human communication.

If, as a manager, I say ‘Come to my office, please’ I am the sender; the message is that I want the person spoken to to come to my office; the system is my voice; the language is spoken English, and the context the office in which it is said. The receiver is the person I am speaking to.

In writing this book, I am the sender; the message is what I believe will help you to communicate more effectively; the system is a complex one involving my hands, my word processor, the publisher, the printer and distributor; the language is written English; the context is the present day world of business; and the receiver is you, the reader.

The basic process of communication begins when a fact is observed or an idea is formulated by one person. That person (the sender) decides to translate the observation into a message, and then transmits the message through some communication medium to another person (the receiver). The receiver then must interpret the message and provide feedback to the sender indicating that the message has been understood and appropriate action taken. Effective communication occurs only if the receiver understands the exact information or idea that the sender intended to transmit.

Messages are sent towards a destination. The receiver can be oneself (intrapersonal communication), another person (interpersonal communication) or another entity (cooperation or group).

During the transmitting of the message, two processes will be received by the receiver: content and context. Content is the message expressed in the actual words or symbols, which is known as Language – the spoken and written words combined into phrases that make grammatical and semantic sense. Context is the way the message is delivered; it is known as Paralanguage – it includes the tone of voice, the look in the sender’s eye’s, body language, hand gestures, and state of emotions (fear, uncertainty, confidence, etc.).

Types of communication. Communication can be verbal and non-verbal, spoken and written, interpersonal and intrapersonal (diaries, self-talk), interlingual and intralingual, formal and informal, social and organizational (business), global and intercultural.