The idea for this special issue stemmed from the 2017 New Horizons in the Ethnography of Communication Conference, where the keynote address by Donal Carbaugh encouraged a re-examination of the kinds of communication scholars can study to understand culture and intercultural difference. Conference participants discussed ways to “stretch the boundaries” surrounding our definitions of intercultural and international communication (IIC). These discussions aligned with aims outlined by the current JIIC editor, Dr. Todd Sandel, who in his editor’s statement (2017) not only encouraged scholars to keep with the tradition of diversity in terms of approaches and methodologies to the study of IIC, but also to expand themes and topics covered in our scholarship, including the burgeoning role of technology in the field. As such, in this special issue we ask, given the current globalized, transnational, and technology driven context, has IIC changed at all? If so, how? In what new ways has it shifted given our current times of change and discord? What is the significance of these changes? This special issue highlights the utility of ethnography of communication (EC) – and more broadly language and social interaction (LSI) approaches, of which EC is part – to address the above questions. LSI encompasses a diversity of approaches, all of which foreground how everyday communication such as text, talk, language use, and other forms of online and in person social interaction play an important role in constituting identities, relationships, cultures, and communities (Tracy, 2015). Instead of analyzing interaction solely for its content, we analyze social actions participants accomplish (e.g., identity construction, performing as a competent member of a culture, taking stances towards cultural difference) through using specific discursive strategies (e.g., person referencing, speech acts, cultural terms) (Tracy & Robles, 2013). LSI studies, therefore, illustrate ways people participate in various forms of IIC and not, for example how people reflect on, report about, or perceive that IIC occurs. In addition, we highlight how participants’ understandings of discursive strategies and social actions are community-and-interactionally specific yet also have broader consequences for the constitution of social life. LSI studies inductively build theories about IIC that closely reflect participants’ situated use of communication practices and illustrate how these practices create, recreate, and are formative of current states of social institutions such as education, law, medicine, economics, religion, and politics.

中文翻译：

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拓展国际和跨文化传播研究的界限

本期特刊的想法源于2017年通讯民族志会议的新视野，在该会议上，多纳·卡尔博（Donal Carbaugh）的主旨演讲鼓励人们重新研究可以研究了解文化和跨文化差异的各种交流学者。与会者讨论了围绕我们的跨文化和国际交流（IIC）定义“扩展边界”的方法。这些讨论符合JIIC当前编辑Todd Sandel博士概述的目标，Todd Sandel博士在其编辑声明（2017）中不仅鼓励学者在研究IIC的方法和方法上遵循多样性的传统，而且扩大我们奖学金涵盖的主题和主题，包括技术在该领域的新兴作用。因此，在本期特刊中，我们问：在当前全球化，跨国化和技术驱动的背景下，IIC是否发生了根本变化？如果是这样，怎么办？鉴于我们当前的变化与不和谐时代，它以什么新方式发生了变化？这些变化的意义何在？本期专刊着重介绍了通讯人种志（EC）的效用–以及更广泛的语言和社交互动（LSI）方法，EC是其中的一部分–解决上述问题。LSI涵盖了多种方法，所有这些方法都强调了日常交流（例如文本，谈话，语言使用以及其他形式的在线和面对面的社交互动）如何在构成身份，关系，文化和社区（Tracy， 2015）。我们不仅分析互动的内容，还分析参与者完成的社交活动（例如，通过使用特定的话语策略（例如，人称，言语举止，文化术语）来构建身份，作为文化的胜任成员，采取立场对待文化差异（Tracy＆Robles，2013）。因此，LSI研究说明了人们参与各种形式的IIC的方式，而不是例如人们对IIC发生的反思，报告或感知方式。此外，我们强调参与者对话语策略和社会行为的理解是如何在社区和互动中特定的，同时又会对社会生活的构成产生更广泛的影响。LSI的研究归纳地建立了有关IIC的理论，这些理论紧密反映了参与者对通信实践的实际使用，并说明了这些实践如何创建，重新创建，