Language and Intercultural Management in Prolonged Contact Situations : A case study of four Japanese long-term residents in the Czech Republic
Abstract
According to the Czech Statistical Office, there are approximately 1,500 Japanese nationals currently living in the Czech Republic. Whereas more than two thirds of them live in Prague, the others are scattered across the country.
In general, the adult members of the Japanese minority in the Czech Republic can be divided into two groups: (1) the Japanese company employees who were dispatched to work at the Czech branches of their companies for a definite period of time and their spouses if they came along, and (2) the individuals who came to the Czech Republic for a variety of reasons and decided to stay. Owing to the distinct motivation as well as the anticipated and actual length of stay, the people falling into the two categories can be expected to develop different personal networks and experience and manage linguistic and non-linguistic problems that might occur in intercultural contact situations differently.
The present study examines the processes of language and intercultural management in daily life interactions of four Japanese long-term residents in the Czech Republic who belong to the second of the above-mentioned groups. Throughout the analysis, special attention is paid to the instances of re-management (e.g., Muraoka 2000) and other processes that are enabled by the participants' prolonged engagement in certain types of contact situations.
The data for this study comes from semi-structured recall interviews and interaction interviews (e.g., Neustupný 2003), supplemented with participants' language biographical accounts (e.g., Nekvapil 2004). While the study is necessarily of a preliminary nature, it sheds some light on the linguistic, communicative, and socio-cultural management processes involved in long-term foreign residents' interactions in their host countries and can also serve as a starting point for further research on language and socio-cultural situation of the Japanese minority in the Czech Republic.