论文总字数：37714字

摘 要

本文以霍尔理论为基础，首先从从高低语境文化角度出发，采用对比分析法，对中美商务谈判风格进行了比较研究。比较包括谈判的最终目的、言语的表达风格、协议的行文风格、谈判的中心内容和对待沉默的态度。其次，从社会历史根源、宗教根源、修辞哲学根源以及不同的语言观等方面探讨了语境文化差异产生的原因。然后，笔者列举了解决中美商务谈判冲突的三种一般方法，包括深入了解两种文化，用法律解决纠纷，消除误解和偏见。最后，作者对全文进行了总结。本研究有助于提高跨文化谈判者的跨文化谈判意识和能力，对跨文化谈判具有实际指导意义。

关键词：高语境；低语境；跨文化；商务谈判

Contents

1.Introduction 1

2.Literature Review 1

2.1 Context 1

2.2 Hall’s high-context and low-context theory 2

3.A Comparative Study of Business Negotiation Styles Between Chinese HC and American LC Cultures 4

3.1 The goal of negotiation: agreement vs. relationship 5

3.2 The style of expression: directness vs. indirectness 5

3.3 The style of agreement: explicitness vs. implicitness 6

3.4 The focus of negotiation: disagreement vs. consensus 7

3.5 The attitude towards silence: disapproval vs. approval 7

4.The Main Reasons for Chinese HC and American LC Cultures 8

4.1 Society 8

4.2 Religions 9

4.3 Rhetoric 10

4.4 Tradition 11

5.Solutions to Sino-American Business Negotiation Conflict 12

5.1 Understanding both cultures deeply 12

5.2 Resolving disputes with law 12

5.3 Eliminating misunderstandings and prejudices 13

6. Conclusion 14

Works Cited 15

1.Introduction

Since the 21st century, the trend of globalization has become more and more intense, and business contacts between countries with high and low context cultures have become increasingly frequent. How to achieve effective communication with people from other cultural backgrounds in business negotiations has become the focus of many scholars in the field of cross-cultural communication. International business negotiation refers to the behavior and process of parties involved in business activities in different countries or regions to seek consensus through information exchange and consultation to meet their own needs. In international business negotiation, the two parties may be divided into high-context culture represented by Chinese and low-context culture by American. The huge difference in culture makes it possible for the two sides to have cultural conflicts. In order to promote the final success of the negotiation, it is necessary to understand the specific performance of high and low context culture in business negotiation. Based mainly on Edward T. Hall’s theory about HC and LC, the thesis focuses on the embodiment of cultural differences between high and low context cultures in business negotiations and explores root causes for the differences and solutions to the conflicts.

2.Literature Review

2.1 Context

Context refers to the background environment of language output. The theory of context was previously put forward by Polish anthropologist Malinowski who held that there is a kind of inseparable connection between language and communication background and environment does a great help in having a good understanding of connotation of language.

In 1950, the American linguist Firth extended and developed this view. From his point of view, context includes not only the linguistic environment, but also the situation of language output, that is, the relationship between language and society.

Functional linguists, represented by Halliday, have analyzed the factors that influence the context, and put forward the concept of "register" based on the social, historical and cultural background. He believes that the content and form of spoken and written language will change with the change of social and cultural environment, and situation factors that influence context include: field, tenor and mode. The language field refers to the situation in which the language occurs; the language tenor refers to the relationship between the two sides of the dialogue; the language mode refers to the way the language is output. Each of the three elements of the register is essential.

2.2 Hall’s high-context and low-context theory

In the book Beyond Culture, American cultural anthropologist Edward T. Hall pointed that contextual charateristics exist in all cultures, and context can be divided into high context and low context.

Hall believes that: “According to cultural differences, communication can be divided into high context, medium context, and low context.”(Hall 87). High context cultural interaction features less message and more implicit information. Low context cultural interaction is a communication with many explicit messages and less hidden information. That is to say, when people with high-context culture communicate, most of the information exists in the environment and personal background, and non-verbal behavior is used to convey information. When people in low-context are communicating, they express their ideas and thoughts quite directly and clearly in words with explicit information. From this we can make a conclusion that semantics means not only language but also context in the high-context culture. Semantics comes primarily from non-verbal behavior and storage context. In the low-context culture, the literal meaning of the language expression is very prominent, and language has always been the center of people"s communication. The true meaning of the information expressed in the high-context culture depends more on the cultural customs and communication scenarios shared by both sides. The information expressed in the low-context culture is mainly in the literal meaning of words, and it is almost independent of communication scenarios and cultural environments. In the high-context culture, people pay more attention to “context” rather than “content.” In the process of communication, they focus on building mutual trust, highly cooperative relationships and friendships, and maintaining a relatively long-term cooperative and friendly relationship. People need to be highly sensitive to implicit information in communication and learn to understand the true meaning of these implicit information.

According to the relevant definition of high and low context theory, China"s high context culture is a typical representative of eastern culture. The US, the UK, and most Nordic cultures tend to be low-context. He believes that the differences in communication between China and the United States are mainly focused on euphemistic or direct language preferences. Americans like to be outspoken. The Chinese emphasize social harmony, often not good at revealing feelings, and do not like aggressive speech. Since high-context culture values the exchange of implicit information, the recipient"s ability to understand implied meaning seems especially important. In the West, people use formal and fierce debates and public speech to improve the efficiency of communication; while the Orientals try to improve the recipient"s sensitivity to the intrinsic meaning of the language. When people rule out all the preconceived impressions in the brain and make their minds clear like rivers, they reach the highest stage of sensitivity. When you are connected with each other in mind, you don"t need to communicate in words. Hall"s concept of high-low context culture shows that people"s approach to uncertainty in the first contact will be different. He pointed out that in high-context culture, the number of verbal communication is not important, but the type of verbal communication is very important. In particular, people with high-context culture will seek background information (such as occupations, religious beliefs) to reduce uncertainty. High context culture is often referred to as a “non-direct contact” culture, which has less direct contact and gazing than a low-context "contact" culture. In addition, high-context cultures cannot tolerate vague situations, and in any occasion, even social gatherings, people must establish behavioral norms that must be observed.

There is a huge difference in the expression of high-context culture and low-context culture. The main reason is that the information source of high-context culture is too dependent on the shared customs and habits that people have experienced together. For historical reasons and traditional social factors, high-context culture has not changed much over time. Many words do not need to be clearly explained and understood, because the context contains most of the information in the communicative content. Through the analysis of the reasons for the formation of high-context cultural characteristics, we can infer the reasons for the formation of low-context culture. Due to geographical and social history, people lack the common life background and life experience. In order to communicate smoothly and save time, both parties need to provide more detailed background information to each other, which needs a lot of input of spoken information.

Communication between different cultures depends on the language environment differently. Chinese culture is a high-context culture. The communication style is more euphemistic, pursuing the overall harmonious unity; Western culture is a low-context culture, which shows a more explicit and direct communication style. It is clear that in Chinese society, people try their best to hold a good understanding of connotation of words and sentences through observing the tone and body language cautiously. In the contrary, people from Western countries are likely to understand the communication contents in a more literal way. For example, the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, Sweden, Germany and other countries belong to the typical low-context culture; while France, Italy, and Spain are closer to the high-context culture, but not the high-context culture in the full sense; Japan belongs to the high one, but in recent years it has gradually transformed into a low-context culture.

3.A Comparative Study of Business Negotiation Styles Between Chinese HC and American LC Cultures

Culture and communication are interrelated. People from different cultural backgrounds talk and communicate with each other in quite different ways. Business negotiation absolutely belongs to communication and it is also influenced by culture to great extent. In business negotiations, people with high-context culture and those with low-context culture express and receive ideas in their unique way. As mentioned above, Chinese people belong to high context culture while American ones belong to low context culture. Therefore, people from China and the United States often show different styles in business negotiations. In the following part, a comparative study on business negotiation styles between Chinese and Americans will be conducted from the angle of the high verse low context distinction.

3.1 The goal of negotiation: agreement vs. relationship

For the purpose of business negotiation, people from high-context culture and low-context culture may have different opinions. For example, for many American negotiators, the goal is to reach and sign an agreement. After all, business is business. Americans believe that a signed agreement establishes rights and obligations that bind both parties and determine their next interactions. Most French and Spanish negotiators agree that the most important goal in negotiations is to sign an agreement.

The Chinese and Japanese often believe that the ultimate goal of negotiations is not to sign an agreement, but to build a relationship between the two sides. In their view, signing an agreement not only means a deal, but also a bond established between the two sides. In the extensive interpersonal network, the negotiation is not only based on the exchange of interests, but attaches more importance to the human relationship of non-economic resources. High-context culture, which emphasizes "human touch" and human relationship, is a typical emotion-driven culture.

3.2 The style of expression: directness vs. indirectness

“The direct and indirect styles differ in the extent to which speakers convey their intentions through their tone of voice and the straightforwardness of their content messages”(Ting-Toomy 103). According to Hall, the differences between Americans and Chinese in communication behaviors are mainly reflected in their preference for frankness and euphemism. Americans do things neatly and without beating around the bush. At the negotiating table, they are energetic and quick-witted, unconsciously leading general conversation quickly to substantive negotiations, and discussing fact after fact, directly, without formality, and always in high spirits, ready to pursue their own interests in a positive manner. In pursuit of material benefits, they are good at using strategies and methods. Because they are good at it themselves, they appreciate people who are straightforward and clean, who are good at bargaining and who use tactics for financial gain. If the terms and conditions proposed by the American negotiators are unacceptable, they must be made clear that they are unacceptable and must not be vague in order to give the counterpart hope. Some people think, in order not to lose the opportunity to continue to negotiate, they should pretend to accept the appearance of ambiguous answer, or delay answer. This practice is actually counterproductive, and will not only give each other a bad impression, but also easy to lead to disputes.

People with high-context cultural background often make guesses on the knowledge level and identity background of the other party in the negotiation, and tend to talk about problems in a roundabout way with indirect speech. In the conversation, they often use some rhetoric, to euphemistically express their views, and are good at using facial expressions, gestures and other body language. People from high-context cultures try to avoid outright rejection. In negotiations, they tend to express this attitude in a more euphemistic way when it is needed. For example, they might say, this is a little difficult. Then they will say a lot of reasons to show their embarrassment and sorry. In contrast, Americans from low-context cultures, who value direct communication, tend to respond clearly to proposals and questions.

3.3 The style of agreement: explicitness vs. implicitness

In general, Americans tend to make severely specific description of each term in agreements, which means the agreement should make explanation and response to all possible situations that may happen. The essence of the transaction is the agreement itself. Participants should be able to explain the probable actions toward any factor change according to the agreement, and pay attention to the rigor and integrity of the terms of the agreement. Americans want to be able to include all possible things or possible outcomes in the terms of the agreement, even if it is unlikely.

In contrast, Chinese from a high-contextual cultural background tends to deal with only general principles, not specific ones. The Chinese believe that the essence of the agreement is the relationship established between the two parties to leave the two sides in touch with each other even though the negotiation may fail. In the event of an unexpected situation, the parties should rely on the established relationship rather than the specific details of the agreement to resolve the issue. One of the old sayings in China is that everything is easy to discuss.

3.4 The focus of negotiation: disagreement vs. consensus

In order to accomplish all the original goals, the negotiators from the low-context cultural background pay great attention to the specific goal of the negotiation through language. They consider negotiation as the process of solving a series of unresolved issues. Therefore, the focus of their negotiations has always focused on issues that have not yet reached consensus on both sides, that is, controversial issues. For example, in negotiations, Americans sometimes ask: Are you dissatisfied with the design details of the product? Americans like to go straight to the table and spread problem to the table for discussion and seeking solutions.

People with a high contextual cultural background pay attention to maintaining a harmonious relationship between the two parties during negotiations, ensuring comprehensiveness and developing long-term relationships. For example, Chinese, Japanese, and other Asian countries tend to summarize and emphasize the consensus reached between the two sides in the negotiations, that is, the positive side of the so-called negotiation, rather than the negative side of the negotiation, that is disagreement. Because in their view, as long as the two sides establish a relationship, both parties have the responsibility and obligation to consider each other" s needs. In this case, the remaining differences or problems will be solved. At the beginning of the negotiations, they will first talk about some general terms and strive to reach a consensus with the other party on the overall objectives of the negotiations. They believe that as long as the two sides form a consensus on this, regardless of the details of the issues that remain to be resolved, the consensus on the overall goal will help to establish a partnership between the two parties.

3.5 The attitude towards silence: disapproval vs. approval

In low-context culture, interpersonal communication is mainly realized through language. Silence is a space to be filled. People from low-context cultures are embarrassed by silence in conversation. For example, in North American countries, silence is considered dark and full of "emptiness". The English word dumb means "silent" or "dumb"; Jews, Italians and Arabs do not like silence and solitude(Samovar,Porteramp;Stefani 171). Italians value relationships with friends and family and believe that "even in paradise, one should not be alone". The Greeks believe that a life lived with company is a good life. Some western scholars even regard the silence as "lack of confidence" and "communicative phobia" in interpersonal communication.(Bi 47) The Americans are willing to talk eloquently, advocating eloquence and trying to avoid silence. Once it appears, people will try their best to fill it with words.

People with high-context culture think that silence has communicative function and is not a vacancy in conversation. The Chinese attach great importance to the role of silence in conversations, and believe that pauses and silences have rich meanings. “It can either express silent approval, or it can be a ready acquiescence, or it can be a reservation; it can be an expression of attachment, or it can be determination. Just the right pause can produce amazing results, with the artistic charm, so some people call it "silent language", which is considered to be a catch-up conversion method beyond the power of language.”(Li 81) In addition, in China, because of the influence of Confucian culture, silence does not mean weakness, stupidity, and it is not a matter of reason, but a virtue.

4.The Main Reasons for Chinese HC and American LC Cultures

Each context culture has its own unique system for guiding people"s words and deeds in daily life. It is so deeply ingrained in shaping people"s minds that people form a conditional reflection in value. The author believes that the formation of high and low context culture between China and the United States originates from their own society, religion, rhetoric and traditional view of language.

4.1 Society

The formation of China"s high linguistic environment can also be seen from the ruling policies of the past. In the history of China, in order to maintain its dominant position, the ruling classes of the past dynasties adopted the cultural authoritarian policy of “burning books and burying the Confucianism” and “stopping the 100 families and honoring Confucianism alone”. In addition, almost every dynasty in China has created a "literary prison." The so-called "literary prison" is the prison that the ruler raised by picking up the improbability of words. Its main target is the scholar and the purpose is to control thoughts and consolidate political power. Under this kind of high-pressure rule, even complaining the emperor privately needs great courage, let alone publishing heretical ideas in public. Under the influence of these social and historical environments, the accuracy of information is not entirely expressed by language, but more by non-verbal behavior or implicit code communication(Huangamp;Qin 89).

According to Hall"s division, the United States holds typical characteristics of low-context culture. The United States was established just two hundred years ago. As a "melting pot", the USA owns quite a number of out-comers. Due to the lack of common experiences among different cultural communities, people are forced to rely on the message of communication in the communication, and communicate clearly to ensure that the information they express does not produce ambiguity or misunderstanding. In addition, since the ancient Greek era, Westerners have used language as a tool for exploring and expressing truth, and a tool for extending themselves and influencing others. Ancient Greek citizens have the right to speak for their own benefit, and ancient Roman speakers and politicians even used this art to defend their city-states(Hu 13). In the contemporary United States, which advocates freedom and democracy, people"s political remarks are quite free and sloppy. Newspapers and magazines often see articles criticizing the government. Some news media even expose the president"s scandal, and there is no worry about trouble caused by expressions.

4.2 Religions

The author believes that the formation of China"s high-context culture is deeply influenced by Buddhism. The Zen Buddhism in China advocates the use of sedentary meditation to understand the true meaning of Buddhism, so "enlightenment" is one of the important ways of spiritual practice. Buddhism believes that clear and precise logical language cannot describe the intuition, which is fundamentally indescribable. The Chinese Zen Buddhism advocates "self-enlightenment" and believes that "the mind is pure, the Buddha has the consciousness to be arrogant, not to read the scriptures, not to worship the Buddha, not to write the text". The Buddha nature must be achieved by meditation, not through the language(Guan 335). Although Confucianism still uses language as an imperfect vehicle, Zen believes that it cannot be carried at all. For the Zen masters, language is a cry from the heart. Therefore, the language performance itself has no meaning, and the meaning is to be found in our own heart.

The formation of low context also has something to do with Western religion. The worship of God by Westerners has a strong influence on their emphasis on language. Westerners firmly believe that God used the magical power of language to make the world born in chaos. There is such a record in the New Testament: "Language is with God, and language is God." The philosophical extension of this language creation shows something special between language and existence. As far as the influence is concerned, Western culture sees language as the lofty things, and Judaism and Christianity are also essentially confirmed as ‘religions of language’(Xiao and Ye 204). It can be seen that God created the world with the power of language. The truth in the hands of God also needs to be explored and studied in language.

4.3 Rhetoric

As early as Aristotle period, rhetoric has developed into an independent discipline, with continuous development and improvement later, and it is regarded as "an art of using language to persuade and influence others in spoken or written mode". Two thousand years, westerners believe that rhetoric is a major education tools, advocating the oral expression skills. American rhetoric, in this sense, is basically argumentative and logical in nature(Condon 163). "Seven arts" of school education in ancient Rome are rhetoric, grammar, logic, geometry, arithmetic, music, and astronomy. Chinese Confucius taught his students six courses, "six arts", which are "etiquette, music, archery, equestrianism, calligraphy, and mathematics " (Gong 7), without speech.

China"s rhetorical tradition is very different from that of the west. Rhetoric has long been used as an effective means or technique of communication, but as a discipline it is only a modern thing, and its focus is mostly on the micro-study of writing and literary works . In the east, eloquence is often regarded as superfluous or untrustworthy, and people who are considered as talkative are often regarded as "boastful and insincere". The rhetoric of the Chinese traditional philosophy is "more eating, less talking". In ancient times, the spread of knowledge was always developed by Confucius and other scholars, without considering the speech as a reasonable means for education of politics and rhetoric effect of speeches. The Chinese bureaucracy loves traditional manners, and all manners have a common overriding function, which prevents free debate. They reject the kind of unhelpful and extreme arguments as useless. Those arguments, they argued, were a cause for bad changes and should be eliminated. (Max 394)."

4.4 Tradition

Different Chinese and American traditional views on the role of language in communication also influence the formation of high and low context. China focuses more on self-communication and understanding, while the United States focuses less on self-communication and communication. In traditional Chinese culture, Confucianism, Taoism and Buddhism all agree with the above opinion. They believe that the human language is not credible, it can not truly and completely reflect the exact nature of the speaker. In Tao Te Ching, Lao Tzu taught the world:“he who knows does not speak, and he who speaks does not know.” “True words do not sound good, good words are not true; One who does well does not quibble, and chicanery is not kind; A truly knowledgeable person knows that there is no limit to learning, for he always asks others for advice with an open mind; A person with little knowledge thinks he knows everything, showing off everywhere.”In addition, speech and virtue are inseparable. Confucius believed that a man who pretends to be pleasant when he says nice things could not have much benevolence and virtue. In a word, the negative attitude of the ancient philosophers towards language has bred the cultural atmosphere with high context.

In stark contrast to Chinese culture, Americans emphasize and encourage oral expression skills. Many scholars in the USA hold the opinion that eloquence is not only stealing ideas, but also drawing attention, evoking feelings, and often changing the most stubborn decisions in the end in pleasing ways. An old Arabian saying goes that a man’s tongue is his sword. The saying emphasizes the importance of words and language, and it encourages people to use words as a kind of great power to protect themselves.(Akira 121). Children in western countries are always asked to play a more active role in class in an assertive way and employees are expected to verbalize their ideas and views in meetings and to give oral presentations(Beamer and Varner 63).

5.Solutions to Sino-American Business Negotiation Conflict

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