Learning to Write for an International Audience through Cross-cultural Collaboration and Text-negotiation

Abstract

The international project described in this paper has been inspired by the Trans-Atlantic and Pacific Projects (TAPP). By 2013, the TAPP network had connected classes in writing, usability testing and/or translation at three universities in the US and several partner universities in Europe, Africa and China. The pedagogical import of these forms of collaboration has been emphasised in studies that analysed the dynamics of cross-cultural virtual teams. The goal of our study was to have first-year undergraduate students in the US learn what is at stake when they write a text for an ‘alien’ audience. At the Italian end, we wanted students to enhance English as a lingua franca (ELF) reading and writing skills as well as to raise their cross-cultural language awareness. Another goal for both groups of students was to communicate via email, Facebook and other online environments using ELF.