Finds (1) that corporate use of certainty in public business discourse is not affected by organizational profitability status or industry type; (2) a significant difference in the use of certainty exists between corporate oral and written communications; and (3) the use of certainty in corporate public business discourse does not differ…

Contributes to scholarship on the relationship between workplace documents and workplace practices by examining the history and practice associated with one volunteer ambulance squad's preprinted report forms. Argues that preprinted forms that enable workers to reflect on their actions play a crucial role in their development as professionals and…

Examines how metadiscourse is used to create a positive corporate image in 137 CEOs' letters, showing how CEOs use nonpropositional material to realize rational, credible, and affective appeals. Reveals the essentially rhetorical nature of CEOs' letters by comparing the frequency and distribution of metadiscourse in their letters and directors'…

Analyzes negative letters from companies in response to customer complaints. Find striking differences between real letters and textbook examples and instruction. Discusses implications for teaching and research. (SR)

Analyzes differences and conflicts in intercultural business communication between Israeli and Indian businesspeople, also analyzing their communication sources and strategies. Finds that communication problems between international managers are better explained by focusing on differences between their discourse systems rather than global…

Some language features are described that could account for feelings of people from different cultures not being on the same "wave length" when they communicate with each other in business negotiations. Candlin's explanatory approach involving a "top-down, bottom-up" methodology is used. It views language as being indeterminate…

A corporate employee newsletter offers an ideal opportunity to discover how literacy functions as a means of assimilating individuals into a social structure. Underlying the corporate newsletter's assimilative function are the assumptions: (1) that in reading, employees rely on attitudes toward types of texts evolved within society as a whole; and…

Provides an examination of management and employee values as influential for organizational rule formation. Demonstrates that management values are directly related to employee values but indirectly influence the evolution of organization rules. Supports a view of rule emergence based on management and employee values. (HB)

Employs interaction analysis to examine communicative behaviors displayed by management versus labor negotiators at various phases of the collective bargaining process. Finds that administration and teacher negotiators were surprisingly similar in communicative bargaining behaviors exhibited but that communication strategies were different at the…

Analyzes faxes sent and received during one week by a Finnish company involved in international operations. Suggests that the business fax is a distinct, dynamic genre constituted by and constitutive of the social practices within which it is situated, with five specific subgenres: specific information, specific requests, "for your…

Analyzes an annual executive letter written by the director of a small New Zealand business which focuses on problems. Shows how these problems serve three functions: to distract attention from more serious issues, to undermine the credibility of potential challengers, and to provide a context in which the writer can present himself and company…

Suggests that narrative discourse helped a management team resolve conflict, influence corporate decisions, and unify the group. Argues managers' preference for collectively constructed narrative reasoning reflected their beliefs that narrative conveyed contextual complexities and helped interpret other types of evidence. Shows how through…

Explores how "Fortune" (a popular media periodical that helps shape popular management discourse) articulates preferred interpretations of the new information-based economy and its relationship to globalization. Compares this with an alternative and dissenting point of view that directly contradicts "Fortune's" celebratory…