Intercultural Communication & Ideology
- Adrian Holliday - Canterbury Christ Church University, UK
Intercultural Communication | International Business & Management (General) | Sociolinguistics
- Molefi Kete Asante, Temple University
"Adrian Holliday’s highly readable and thought provoking volume is a welcome addition to the existing body of work on intercultural communication and ideology... With its comprehensive coverage of studies in the field and critical discussion of dominant theoretical paradigms, this refreshing book provides a valuable resource for both students and experienced researchers but also everyone interested in intercultural communication. An authoritative and open minded book the field will embrace."
- Jo Angouri, University of the West of England
Although communication is central to the humanities and social sciences, the inter-cultural level is often, peculiarly, left out of accounts. So what is intercultural communication? How does it relate to global processes and questions of identity? This comprehensive book examines the main features of intercultural communication. It critically examines the main positions in the field. It addresses intercultural communication within the context of global politics, both addressing the specific problems that derive from Western ideology and setting out an agenda for research.
The book investigates categories of cultural action and itemizes the machinery for the illumination of inter-cultural processes. Holliday shows how a dialogue between national structures and creative universal cultural skills can be carried on in new locations, relating intercultural communication to theories of multiculturalism, cosmopolitanism and globalization, while also exploring how ideology permeates inter-cultural processes and develops an alternative 'grammar' of culture.
Taking on issues normally left in the margins, the author of Intercultural Communication and Ideology has revised the way we think of intercultural communication by insisting that we consider its ideological component. In this brilliant and engaging book about culture and the interstices that comprise the grounds for our interactions, Adrian Holliday shows us the necessity for a cosmopolitan process that expands the basis of our intercultural work. This is a compelling book that should be read by scholars and the general public alike. It is accessible, factual, and clear
Molefi Kete Asante
Professor, Department of African American Studies at Temple University and author of 'Erasing Racism: The Survival of the American Nation'
Adrian Holliday’s highly readable and thought provoking volume is a welcome addition to the existing body of work on Intercultural Communication and Ideology. The rich dataset and analysis of well selected excerpts challenge essentialistic understandings of the notion of culture and linguistic behaviour. With its comprehensive coverage of studies in the field and critical discussion of dominant theoretical paradigms, this refreshing book provides a valuable resource for both students and experienced researchers but also everyone interested in Intercultural Communication. An authoritative and open minded book the field will embrace
Jo Angouri
Senior Lecturer in Linguistics and Intercultural Communication, University of the West of England, Bristol
For interculturalists who feel limited by the essentialistic constraints of the individualismllectivism divide and by the West's propensity to define culture as nationality, Intercultural Communication and Ideology offers a refreshing and more complex frame for analyzing and theorizing intercultural communication. Advocating a critical cosmopolitan approach as analytical frame, Holliday attends to the influence of ideology and the marginalization of non-Western cultural realities typical within traditional schools of thought in intercultural communication studies. A must read for those interested in understanding and analyzing intercultural interactions in more complex ways than offered by traditional Western perspectives
Dreama G. Moon
Professor, California State University, San Marcos, CA, USA
It's a valuable guide for graduate students.
It engages with theoretical issues not central to the course. It will however be recommended for library purchase to benefit research students in the broader field.
This book is going to be adopted as recommended reading on a year-long course on intercultural communication where it fits in well with the other reading and aims of the module. Some of the content is relatively advanced for lower undergraduate level, but more able students could benefit greatly from some of chapters, especially the discussion of critical cultural awareness.
This text does an excellent job of covering the selected material, but unfortunately does not cover enough of the course objectives to warrant adoption as a text. An option I continue to consider is incorporation of key chapters in a bundle of readings.
Excellent publication for advanced students in intercultural communication and education, great source for developing critical awareness and general reflexivity on how to cope with otherness, preferably recommended to students at master level and above.
Students use this book to explore diverse communications
Engaging book with a challenging understanding of the ideological component of communication. However, it is perhaps too critical in emphasis for the course I had considered it for. As an extension reader or to help with dissertations excellent.
This is an excellent resource for students studying intercultural communication and wanting to acquire and/or teaching intercultural competence
I appreciated this text's contents and clarity in exposition, and I will be adopting it for use. On a theoretical level, I'm not completely convinced by Holliday's use of Geertz's "thick description" as a methodology: as an anthropologist, it seems to me to be a bit too formulaic, but for the rest I am very much in agreement with his epistemological stance. The book is quite thought-provoking and appears to be user-friendly. We'll see how it goes in actual use.
