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Jessica Hates Her New Job - Fresh Off the Boat

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The context of this text occurs in the phase of "Intercultural Business Communication 2.0", which is at the stage of exploring actual communicative practices in the workplace (Piller, 2017). The focus of intercultural communication shifted from the nation to the company (Piller, 2017, p.118). Although the concepts of cosmopolitanism and globalisation drive the idea of positive egalitarianism to thrive, individuals still face significant difficulties when entering the workplace (Kirilova & Angouri, 2018, p.347). In the video, Jessica joins the US company as an Asian, reflecting the diversity of the workplace and the presence of transcultural communication in the context of globalisation. It can be assumed that workplace diversity increases the advantages of international collaboration, competitive advantage, job opportunities and cultural exchange. Although a diverse workplace offers opportunities, adaptation and acceptance are still a challenging process. This difficulty is related to language barriers, culture clashes, prejudice and discrimination.

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Through analysis of this clip text from  <Fresh off the Boat>, it can be found that many immigrants face difficulties not because of a lack of skills or language proficiency, but rather due to unfamiliarity with local norms and the presence of implicit xenophobic ideologies. Jessica's experiences in the workplace exemplify this, as her colleagues judge her based on subjective criteria, automatically labeling her as an outsider who cannot fit into the company's culture (Kirilova & Angouri, 2018, p. 350).

- Furthermore, the lack of attention to Jessica's ideas and opinions during meetings is not solely attributable to language barriers. She proficiently communicates in English, but her ideas are still disregarded. This highlights the hidden cultural demands of institutional communication, as discussed by Robert (2013), where cultural constructs and communication styles play a significant role in how individuals are perceived and received in a corporate setting.

-Ultimately, Jessica's struggle to integrate into her new work environment, despite her efforts to adapt and contribute positively, underscores the persistence of implicit biases and stereotypes in the workplace. While diversity and inclusion initiatives are crucial, they must go beyond surface-level representation to address the deeper cultural and ideological issues that hinder the true acceptance of individuals from diverse backgrounds.

Further Meaning -In the broader context, this analysis serves as a reminder that creating a genuinely inclusive workplace requires a commitment to dismantling implicit biases, fostering cultural awareness, and valuing the unique perspectives that individuals from diverse backgrounds bring. Only through such efforts can companies truly harness the benefits of a diverse and transcultural workforce while ensuring that everyone has an equal opportunity to contribute and thrive in their pursuit of the "American Dream" or any other dream in a globalized world.

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Definition
"The actual immigrants face a great difficulty in accessing the workplace. This does not happen for lack of skills or language knowledge but because of  lack of knowledge of local rules and norms and/or explicit or implicit xenophobic ideologies" (Kirilova & Angouri, 2018, p.347).

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Our text clip selected from <Fresh off the Boat>, an American sitcom. Set in the 90's, it focuses on an Asian American Eddie Huang and his family who move from Washington D.C. to Orlando to realise their "American Dream". The series shows how an Asian-American family adapts, survives and pursues the American Dream in a new environment, while also exploring themes of culture clash, identity, family relationships and race(IMDb,2015). The Clip focuses on Jessica entering a new work environment. her opinions were neither listened to nor considered at the meeting, while the employee who came up with the same idea as her is praised and rewarded for just changing the wording, Jessica believes that her presence is just a way for the company to show its cultural diversity. Besides that, the reason we chose this clip is that it fully demonstrates the barriers to integrating into a new community, and the role that Asian culture can only play in demonstrating cultural diversity in European and American culture.

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1. What factors do you think contributed to Jessica’s inability to integrate into the new workplace? How do culture and identity affect people's careers in the workplace?

2. What challenges do you think immigrants will face in the process of fitting into their new environment? What strategies can the immigrants adopt to actively integrate into the new work culture while maintaining their unique identity and contributions?

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IMDb. (n.d.).  Fresh off the boat(2015) - IMDb. Retrieved September 30, 2023, from https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3551096/

Kirilova, M., & Angouri, J. (2018). You Are Now One of Us – Negotiating ‘Fitting in’ in the Workplace. In A. Creese & A. Blackledge (Eds.), The Routledge Handbook of Language and Superdiversity (pp. 345–360). London: Routledge.

Piller, I. (2017). Intercultural communication: A critical introduction (pp. 120–141). Edinburgh University Press.

Roberts, C. (2013). The gatekeeping of Babel: Job interviews and the linguistic penalty. In A. Duchêne, M. Moyer & C. Roberts (eds.), Language, Migration and Social Inequalities: A Critical Sociolinguistic Perspective on Institutions and Work. Bristol (pp. 81–94). Multilingual Matters.

Roberts, C. & Campbell, S. (2007). Fitting stories into boxes: Rhetorical and textual constraints on candidates’ performances in British job interviews (pp.45–73). Journal of Applied Linguistics and Professional Practice.

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When Jessica expressed her thoughts in the workplace, the white employees and leaders around her did not listen carefully. This reflects the challenges of integrating employees with different cultural backgrounds in a transcultural work environment. Roberts and Campbell’s study argues that in the workplace, company management often expects employees to understand and adapt to a particular organisational culture to establish a common understanding and cultural norms. It creates a disadvantage for foreign-born, young, and inexperienced employees in terms of cultural adaptation (Kirilova & Angouri, 2018, p.347; Roberts and Campbell, 2007). Jessica's cultural identity, as a young Asian woman joining the company as a newcomer, contains almost all the disadvantages including the multiple challenges of cultural background, gender and age. This led to her not being given a voice and sense of belonging in the company community, thus remaining in a marginalised position and struggling to integrate into the work community properly.

Jessica actively contributes ideas during meetings to ‘fit in’ in the company community and opportunities for recognition. She tries to prove her worth and capabilities by demonstrating her adaptability and hard work performance. This positive expression of emotion contrasts with the task-oriented professional discourse. Jessica places herself in a subordinate position, which constructs a typically irrational, emotionally driven 'other' (Kirilova & Angouri, 2018, p.349). This also leads to her ideas being ignored.

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Besides, the leader shows opposed attitudes to the same idea - ignoring the former and praising the latter, simply because of the identity of the speaker.

All the colleagues considered Jane as a part of the work community, so her idea was highly appreciated. At the same time, they perceived Jessica as a foreign immigrant who was separate from the workgroup, so they ignored or even rejected all her ideas even when she made good ones.

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It is worth noting that Jessica's lack of attention was not due to a language problem.  Instead, she crossed the language barrier and was able to express herself fluently in English. Robert (2013) suggests that foreign-born people are 'linguistically penalised' not because of a lack of fluency in English but because of the hidden cultural demands of institutional communication. It reflected in misunderstandings, interaction difficulties and individual differences in communication styles. (Kirilova & Angouri, 2018, p.350). This proves that language is not only a medium of communication and interaction, but is also culturally relevant, identifying the cultural groups to which people belong and their cultural constructs.

During this process, their behaviour that automatically ascribes Jessica to an “outsider” identity and the so-called inexplicit fitting-in criteria targeting Jessica are concrete manifestations of implicit xenophobic ideologies.

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