Linguistic and Cultural Variations in British and American Business Communication

Abstract

Background: Global business conveys the importance of effective written communication but in even such nations where a native language is English, there are many cultural differences that may affect tone, structure, and rhetorical style. The whole country and the United States, even though sharing a common language, can demonstrate different business writing standards that depend on the historic, social or cultural values. The misunderstandings, decreased efficiency and negative working relationships may arise in multinational situations due to these variations.

Objectives: This study aims to: (1) compare the linguistic, rhetorical, stylistic characteristics of both British and American business writing, (2) to analyze the role of cultural values based on the Cultural Dimension Theory by Hofstede and High - and Low-Context Communication model by Hall, and (3) deliver practical recommendations concerning the effectiveness of cross-cultural business communication.

Methods: The analysis was carried out based on the authentic business documents- applications, reports, and emails- of British and American organizations, and also the pertinent scholarly literature through a qualitative comparative analysis of the secondary data. Examples of analytical frameworks were a discourse analysis, stylistic, and rhetorical analysis, and application of cultural theory. Thematic coding of data was done to find out commonalities in tones and structures and language usage.

Results: These results indicate that the British business writings are rather formal, polite, and indirect and that they may also be very complex, involving hedges and framing. American business writing is direct and to the point with a small amount of action oriented and also simple syntaxes, clear calls to actions supported and organized around the bottom line. Such differences come to agreement with the cultural dimensions including individualism, power distance, uncertainty avoidance, context dependability differences.

Conclusion: Professional writing styles are greatly influenced by culture values, even in situations of shared languages. Knowledge of these differences may help to minimise misunderstanding, increase efficiency and promote professional relationship within the multinational settings. The paper is relevant to the academic theory as well as to the practice of academic writing through the culturally based comparison between the British and the American business writing.