The 28th International Conference of the International Association for Intercultural Communication Studies was successfully concluded on Friday at the Taipa campus of City University of Macau (CityU). The conference was jointly organized by CityU and the International Association for Intercultural Communication Studies (IAICS) with the aim of exploring synergies in intercultural communication. The two-day international conference featured 90 inspiring presentations, including four keynote speeches and two invited speeches.
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The conference continued the enthusiastic atmosphere of the previous day and stimulated comprehensive and in-depth discussions on intercultural issues in language education; communicating culture in the arts, museums, literary works, and cultural heritages; language learning, methods and identities; and intercultural competency of language learners.
Michael Minkov, Professor of Cross-Cultural Awareness and Organizational Behavior at Varna University of Management (Sofia campus) in Bulgaria, delivered a keynote presentation with the theme “The Revised Minkov-Hofstede Model of Culture and Its Implications.” Prof. Minkov identified problems in the widely-known Hofstede model through his co-workers’ interdisciplinary research and introduced the revised Minkov-Hofstede Model of Culture and its relations to models of the same kind. His presentation featured intriguing research-based cultural maps of regions around the world with examples and case studies to demonstrate the relevance of the revised model on business through the lens of cross-cultural studies.
Joanna Radwańska-Williams, Professor of English at Macao Polytechnic University and the previous President of IAICS, delivered a keynote speech with the theme of “A Sample of the Linguistic Landscape of Poland in 2022.” By examining the symbolic significance of the local public signs in Warsaw using different languages (Polish, English, Ukrainian among others), Prof. Williams unveiled how the Polish linguistic landscape reflects and shapes the power and status of different communities through the interaction of language and space. Her research is valuable for the analysis and application of sociolinguistics.
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Participants agreed that this international conference has embodied the essence of intercultural communication studies. The conference not only provided opportunities for established scholars to share research findings but also helped newer researchers to gain knowledge, insights and new ideas from others. The conference topics were impressive in range, and brought theorical concepts into real-life practices for different professions. We look forward to seeing selected papers of this conference published in the IAICS journal – Intercultural Communication Studies (ICS).
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At the conference closing ceremony, Chair Professor Lixian Jin, a renowned scholar in applied linguistics and intercultural communication studies, took up her elected position of the presidency of IAICS, taking over this international role from Prof Radwańska-Williams. During her two-year tenure (2023-2025), Prof. Jin hopes to continue to promote research and practices in intercultural communication world-wide, and between Macao, mainland China, Hong Kong, and Taiwan, and the Greater Bay Area. She announced that Poland will be the destination for the next conference.
Prof Jin commented, “The two-day international conference has successfully concluded with amazing presentations and discussions. However, this is not the end of these intercultural communication studies. Through sharing and exchange, participants have proposed new research ideas, fostered interdisciplinary scholarly dialogues and exchanges, promoted integrated approaches to complex problems of communication across cultures, and advanced research methodologies for intercultural studies.” The conference, she confirmed, had helped stimulate cross-cultural awareness worldwide, giving international educators, businessmen, students and other stakeholders the opportunity to engage in dialogues on diversity and cross-cultural communication issues.
Prof. Jin pointed out that scholars never stop exploring intercultural communication studies and professional practices. In the future, intercultural communication studies will continue to flourish with new vitality and vigor on the pathway through innovation to help resolve practical problems. Lastly, she thanked CityU for facilitating and supporting the success of this year's conference and looked forward to sharing the next academic event with many international participants in Poland.
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For more information, please visit https://iaics.cityu.edu.mo/home
Source: Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences
