It’s not always enough to learn how international businesses operate. It’s important to also understand the nuances of workplace language and culture.
The GW Center for International Business Education and Research (GW-CIBER) showcased its leadership in the field of business language studies by hosting the 7th International Symposium on Language for Specific Purposes (ISLSP). While the two-day conference in May looked at specialized language used in a number of areas — from the medical field to the legal arena to the technology sector — business-specific language was repeatedly under the spotlight.
“We’ve pushed the frontier for business languages. Hosting the international symposium for Language for Specific Purposes caps nearly two decades of work building the field of business language education,” said GW-CIBER Director Anna Helm.
Under the theme of “LSP Making Connections Within and Beyond the Classroom,” the symposium drew the participation of some 200 educators and researchers from across the United States, Europe, and Asia. Helm said it may have constituted the largest conference ever held on business languages.
The conference sessions covered an ambitious spectrum, from the use of virtual reality in LSP learning to the business language of startup companies to the terminology used by global finance markets. One keynote speaker, Jessica E. Deckinger, offered insight into the language used in international marketing and branding. Deckinger is an operating partner for global private investment firm Clearhaven Partners and founder and president of Mint Marketing Group.
“Businesses do not just operate in English. So, what we have done since 2006, when we began GW-CIBER, is to develop business language curricula,” Helm said. “We have Business Arabic, Business Chinese... Korean, Russian, German, Italian, and other languages in which students learn both the terminology and the culture of business in that language.”
In addition to designing business language courses, GW-CIBER has developed multimedia teaching materials, inserted real-client consulting projects into GW’s business language courses, and launched short-term study abroad courses that bring together language students and international business students to work across disciplines.
“An important aspect of our work is business language learning and distance language learning capacities,” Helm explained. “There is a whole academic field of business language studies. We’re really on the map with this. We are boosting our own capacity for business language learning at GW, but we’re also a leading national resource center.”
The center operates the Study Abroad @ Home program, which matches business language students with internships at global institutions that have a presence in D.C. The interns have the opportunity to use their language proficiency and business skills in a real-world context. Since no travel is required, the program gives students in international business an affordable experiential learning option.
In 2020, GW-CIBER took over and revived the dormant Global Business Languages Journal, a peer-reviewed academic publication that takes a broad definition of business language, including language used in the arts, law, health sciences, engineering, and other fields. Each year, the center hosts a professional development workshop — an immersive event focused on a single language. The workshop during the 2023-2024 academic year concentrated on Korean.
Among the center’s other innovative initiatives are its Business Language Case Clearinghouse and its fellowship program to train faculty at GW and elsewhere to write business language cases. Within GW’s business language curriculum, students also learn how to write short business cases in languages beyond English.
“We use long, in-depth scenarios where you take an issue in a business setting and students have to put themselves in the role of protagonist and come up with solutions and recommendations,” Helm said. The business-case writing dovetails with overseas consulting projects that students do through GW-CIBER. Recent projects have involved sustainable businesses in Sweden that want to work in the United States.
GW-CIBER is a national resource center funded by the U.S. Department of Education with a broad mandate to increase the competitiveness of businesses in the United States. GW is home to one of only16 CIBERS in the country.
“We do outreach and research. We connect academia to practice. And we advance educational efforts to boost our students’ capacity to work internationally... through case competitions, through trade treks, through our international boot camp,” Helm said.