a

MULTILINGUALISM IN TOURISM

  • Andrea Žerajić The College for Applied Studies Belgrade, Department College for Hotel management, Belgrade
Keywords: communication in tourism, multilingualism, foreign languages, tour guides

Abstract

In tourism, communication and transparency are crucial to gain customer trust and expand business. All professional tour operators need qualified translators, who are essential in the tourism and hospitality sector. Hotel and restaurant owners, travel agents, tour operators and tourist guides, all require content in multiple languages to service their client’s needs. The language is indeed an issue in hotel reviews, but to varying degrees according to the language group of tourists.

By eliminating language barriers and cultural misunderstandings, the companies can also reach their target customers with effective marketing in their native language. In tourism, however, better language skills mean better quality of service. There is therefore no doubt that the employees in tourism must be multilingual. Therefore, the acquisition of languages, especially among the tour guides, is widely seen as useful and is believed to give students better access to their work. One of the most important foreign languages for the communication in tourism is German, followed by Italian, although English has become the lingua franca of international exchanges. The aim of this paper is to present which foreign languages tourism workers, including primarily tour guides, should be able to communicate with their guests, how we can become multilingual in tourism and how multilingualism is promoted in tourism.

Downloads

Download data is not yet available.

References

1. Bachleitner, R. (2001) Konturen einer Tourismusgesellschaft. In A. G. Keul, R. Bachleitner, H. J. Kagelmann, H. Allmer (Eds.), Gesund durch Erleben? Beiträge zur Erforschung der Tourismusgesellschaft (pp. 7-11), Profil Mchn, München.

2. Blažević, N. (2001). Mehrsprachigkeit im Tourismus. Tourism and hospitality management, Vol. 7, No. 1-2, 37-45.

3. Boorstin, D. J. (1961). From Traveler to Tourist: The Lost Art of Travel. In Boorstin D. J. (1992). The image, a guide to pseudo–events in America (pp. 77-117), The 25th Anniversary Edition, Vintage Books, New York.

4. Braun, O. (1993). (Urlaubs-)Reisemotive. In H. Hahn, H. J. Kagelmann (Eds.), Tourismuspsychologie und Tourismussoziologie (pp. 199-207), München.

5. Cameron, D. (2000a). Styling the worker: gender and the commodification of language in the globalized service economy. Journal of Sociolinguistics, Vol. 4, No. 3, 323-347.

6. Cameron, D. (2000b). Good to talk. Living and working in a communication culture, Sage, London.

7. Coray, R., Duchêne, A. (2017). Mehrsprachigkeit und Arbeitswelt (Literaturübersicht), Freiburg.

8. Coupland, N., Garrett, P., Bishop, H. (2005). Wales underground. Discursive frames and authenticities in Welsh mining heritage tourism events. In A. Jaworski, A. Pritchard (Eds.), Discourse, communication and tourism (pp. 199-222), Channel View Publications, Clevedon.

9. Duchene, A., Piller, I. (2009). Schlussbericht: Sprachen, Identitäten und Tourismus ein Beitrag zum Verständnis sozialer und sprachlicher Herausforderungen in der Schweiz im Kontext der Globalisierung [Final report: languages, identities and tourism: towards an understanding of social and linguistic challenges in Switzerland in the context of globalization], Macquarie University, Sydney.

10. Ellenberg, L., Beier, B., Scholz, M. (1997). Ökotourismus, Spektrum Akademischer Verlag, Heidelberg.

11. Freyer, W. (1998). Tourismus: Einführung in die Fremdenverkehrsökonomie, Auflage: 6., überarb. u. akt, De Gruyter Oldenbourg.

12. Freyer, W. (2011). Einführung in die Fremdenverkehrsökonomie, 10th edn, Oldenbourg Verlag, München.

13. Gao, S. (2012). Commodification of place, consumption of identity: The sociolinguistic construction of a ‘global village’ in rural China. Journal of Sociolinguistics, Vol. 16, No. 3, 336-357.

14. Gorsemann, S. (1995). Bildungsgut und touristische Gebrauchsanweisung. Produktion, Aufbau und Funktion von Reiseführern, Waxmann, Münster.

15. Gorter, D. (2006) Introduction: The Study of the Linguistic Landscape as a New Approach to Multilingualism. International Journal of Multilingualism, Vol. 3, No. 1, 1-6.

16. Gunnarson, B.-L. (2013). Multilingualism in the Workplace. Annual Review of Applied Linguistics, Vol. 33, 162-189.

17. Heller, M. (2014). The commodification of authenticity. In V. Lacoste, J. Leimgruber, T. Breyer (Eds.), Indexing authenticity: sociolinguistic perspectives (pp. 136-155), Walter de Gruyter, Berlin.

18. Heller, M., Bell, L. (2012). Frontiers and Frenchness: pride and profit in the production of Canada. In A. Duchêne, M. Heller (Eds.), Language in late capitalism. Pride and profit (pp. 161-182), Routledge, New York.

19. Heller, M., Jaworski, A., Thurlow, C. (2014a). Introduction: sociolinguistics and tourism – mobilities, markets, multilingualism. Journal of Sociolinguistics, Vol. 18, No. 4, 425-458.

20. Heller, M., Pujolar, J., Duchêne, A. (2014b). Linguistic commodification in tourism. Journal of Sociolinguistics, Vol. 18, No. 4, 539-566.

21. Hlavin-Schulze, K. (1998). Alles schon mal dageswesen? Reisen in der Postmoderne. Tourismus Journal, Vol. 2, 273-282.

22. Kelly-Holmes, H., Pietikäinen, S. (2014). Commodifying Sámi culture in an indigenous tourism site. Journal of Sociolinguistics, Vol. 18, No. 4, 518-538.

23. MacCannell, D. (1989). The Tourist: A New Theory of the Leisure Class, Schocken Books Inc., New York.

24. Moïse, C., McLaughin, M., Roy, S., White, C. (2006). Le tourisme patrimonial: la commercialisation de l’identité franco-canadienne et ses enjeux langagiers. Langage et société, Vol. 118, No. 4, 85-108.

25. Moïse, C., Roy, S. (2009). Valeurs identitaires et linguistiques dans l’industrie touristique patrimoniale (Ontario et Alberta). Francophonies d’Amérique, Vol. 27, 53-75.

26. Müller, S. (2012). Die Welt des Baedekers. Eine Medienkulturgeschichte des Reiseführers 1830-1845, Campus Verlag GmbH, Frankfurt.

27. Mundt, J. W. (1998). Einführung in den Tourismus, München.

28. Muth, S. (2015). Russian as a commodity: medical tourism and the healthcare industry in post-Soviet Lithuania. International Journal of Bilingual Education and Bilingualism, Vol. 20, No. 4, 404-416.

29. Pagenstecher, C. (2003). Der bundesdeutsche Tourismus. Ansätze zu einer Visual History: Urlaubsprospekte, Reiseführer, Fotoalben, 1950-1990, Hamburg.

30. Pietikäinen, S. (2013). Heteroglossic authenticity in Sámi heritage tourism. In S. Pietikäinen, H. Kelly-Holmes (Eds.), Multilingualism and the periphery (pp. 77-94), Oxford University Press, Oxford.

31. Piller, I., Takahashi, K. (2006). A passion for English: desire and the language market. In A. Pavlenko (Ed.), Bilingual minds: emotional experience, expression and representation (pp. 59-83), Multilingual Matters, Clevedon.

32. Pujolar, J., Jones, K. (2012). Literary tourism. New appropriations of landscape and territory in Catalonia. In A. Duchêne, M. Heller (Eds.), Language in late capitalism. Pride and profit (pp. 93-115), Routledge, New York.

33. Richards, J. C., Platt, J., Platt, H. (1998). Longman Dictionary of Language Teaching & Applied Linguistics, Longman, London.
34. Swarbrooke, J., Horner, S. (1999). Consumer behaviour in tourism, Butterworth-Heinemann, Oxford.

35. Trim, J., North, B., Coste, D. (2001). Gemeinsamer Europäischer Referenzrahmen für Sprachen: Lernen, Lehren, Beurteilen, Langenscheidt, Berlin, München, Wien, Zürich, New York.

36. Žerajić, A. (2018). German for special purposes (GSP) in tourism: learning objectives and didactic consequences. The Third International Scientific Conference "Tourism in function of development of the Republic of Serbia – Tourism in the Era of Digital Transformation", Vrnjačka Banja, 3(1), 740-759.

37. Žerajić, A. (2019a). Reforma stranih jezika u Srbiji – paradoks plurilingvalnosti, Zadužbina Andrejević, Beograd.

38. Žerajić, A. (2019b). Intercultural management and the importance of foreign languages in modern hotel industry. The Fourth International Scientific Conference "Tourism in function of development of the Republic of Serbia – Tourism as a Generator of Employment", Vrnjačka Banja, 4(1), 360-377.
Published
2020-09-05
How to Cite
Žerajić, A. (2020). MULTILINGUALISM IN TOURISM. Tourism International Scientific Conference Vrnjačka Banja - TISC, 5(1), 518-535. Retrieved from https://tisc.rs/proceedings/index.php/hitmc/article/view/356