A Curriculum for the
Research and Practice of
International Technical Communication

Abstract

Given that businesses are increasingly requiring technical communicators to deal with language, culture, and technology, a need for a formal curriculum in international technical communication truly exists.

International technical communication is the development of technical information that can be understood by a linguistically, culturally, and technologically diverse audience. In a global economy, there is a real need to create effective international technical communication that considers the diverse needs of users and balances them with the often contradictory needs of business. But technical communicators worldwide currently lack the skills and the opportunities for obtaining them that address these needs at all or at least efficiently. These skills should incorporate a practical knowledge of linguistics, cultural anthropology, semiotics, international standards, quality assessment, and international business in addition to those skills we already know are necessary for creating effective technical communication.

Business Context

A typical business environment for international technical communication has the following dictum: deliver an information product or set of information products simultaneously to many culturally and linguistically diverse countries before the competition while satisfying all international and national legal requirements in a cost effective manner. This is not a job description for the omnipotent. It is a real business context for technical communicators worldwide.

To get this job done, technical communicators need to know how to perform an international-user analysis to determine the linguistic, cultural, and legal issues for each information product in each target country. To cull this information, technical communicators need to know how to use new information sources: standards bodies, models of culture, and subject matter experts whose language, cultural backgrounds, and physical locations may be different from those of the technical communicators. Technical communicators then need to know how to process, make recommendations, and finally implement a plan based on the results of this international-user analysis.

What makes all of this so complicated is the addition of conflicting cultural data, legal requirements, and language issues. Add to this the time and management pressures of coordinating many language variants, translators, and target country reviewers all within a schedule that has not budged to accommodate all of this extra work. It's a difficult job, but more and more companies are asking their technical communicators to own these responsibilities in addition to their current responsibilities.

Budgets are an additional concern. Translation is expensive and legally required, and companies worldwide have applied a variety of strategies in a effort to reduce the cost of translation. Machine translation, controlled languages, increasingly graphical documentation, the Standard Generalized Markup Language (SGML), object-oriented documentation, and minimalism are all strategies and tools that companies are trying to reduce the volume of words to be translated and hence the cost of translation. But few technical communicators know anything about these strategies and tools. How, for example, do you write in a controlled English for eventual machine processing and translation?

And finally is the topic of quality. Companies are seeking ways of ensuring that the international technical communication that they export are high in quality. There are two reasons for this. One reason is because of international standards, like the ISO 9000 series, that are forcing companies to develop and document processes ensuring the quality of international technical communication. The other reason for this is liability. More than ever, liability is a legislated possibility in an increasing number of countries. But how do you measure quality in a cost and time effective manner for possibly 20 language variants of a publications package? How do you measure usability across 20 national cultures?

A Curriculum to Meet the Need

A curriculum for international technical communication needs to teach technical communicators practical skills that can prepare them 1) to address the needs of a linguistically and culturally diverse audience, and 2) for a global business climate that is fiercely competitive.

Technical communicators need to learn how to work with new partners, translators. A theoretical program introducing technical communicators to linguistic theory and its branches is a good way to instill an understanding of the issues involved when working with these new partners.

Practical skills include learning how to choose and work with translators, a skill which many technical communicators today learn through a costly trial and error process. A closely related skill is how to write for translation. In most instances, translation is done by only professional translators, but increasingly there is an interest in using machine translation software to do some preliminary translation that is then post-edited by professional translators.

Knowing how to write for translation, whether it is performed by professional translators or machine translation software, is a practical skill that is known to reduce the cost of translation and improve its quality. In addition, technical communicators need to know how to choose and use tools that facilitate the creation and maintenance of multilingual and multicultural information. Being familiar with document databases, for example, is a useful skill. And, technical communicators using these tools need to know how to design information with translation and cultural adaptation in mind.

Certainly traditional audience analysis training and needs assessment skills must include international-user analysis. Such a practical skill can be used to find ways to render an information product globally acceptable or to render it locally acceptable by an audience of a particular cultural context. Such practical skills require knowledge of cultural models and ways to identify cultural bias. A theoretical program should include cultural anthropology basics and cross-cultural communication theory and practice.

Online information for international use requires an understanding of non-intuitive technical issues. For example, technical communicators today need to ensure that character sets, fonts, and software products are available for the target languages across computing platforms and that navigation buttons address different text orientations as in Arabic, which is read from right to left.

International graphics and icons are also a concern. Multimedia objects like voice audio introduces cultural issues requiring some research. For example, is a male or female voice more appropriate, and if so, is there a particular accent or dialect that users find more appealing if these are options in the target country? A theoretical program exploring semiotics, popular and traditional culture, and their applications in technology across national borders to a target audience might prove quite useful here.

An increasingly necessary skill is how to research international standards (de jure and de facto) in any given country in the world that affect technical communication, and how to create processes that ensure their compliance. These standards might be international standards as listed by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO), or they might be national standards as listed by the American National Standards Institute (ANSI). Few people in most businesses are aware of how to do this at all, let alone thoroughly. Large companies with the money to be active in standards committees are typically the only ones with this know-how, and yet it is an important skill.

A related topic is that of quality assurance, since it is often a legal requirement or a condition of export (e.g., ISO 9000 registration, CE mark, UL listed). Technical communicators need to know how to assess the quality of translated and customized information products. They must also know how to document this information in the event of a quality audit by a third party or a law suit. A theoretical program in human factors research methods and findings, usability testing techniques, and in creating and documenting quality systems certainly offers a well rounded and thorough curriculum in international technical communication.

Technical communicators also need to possess skills for managing international publications projects, which consist of a complex, schedule- and budget-aware set of processes. A valuable theoretical program would introduce technical communicators to international business fundamentals and international project management techniques.

Academic Context

This is such an exciting, intellectually challenging, and open arena! There is so little research on international technical communication. An increasing number of business case studies are published annually, but little in the way of traditional research with its valuable quantitative data and conclusions supports or offers guidance for these business realities. International businesses need access to this data and these conclusions. Some universities, like Eindhoven University in The Netherlands, are doing research on cultural rewriting and its affect on readability. Others, like Carnegie Mellon, are doing research in controlled English and machine translation. There are other universities that are investigating international technical communication, but these are few.

The study of international technical communication, too, is necessarily multidisciplinary. Linguistics and cultural anthropology, for example, are mandatory subject areas. Language arts and international business are also useful. Collaborative research across these disciplines is certain to offer a wealth of information to the business community and benefit students of international technical communication as well.

Research projects across national borders, cultures, and languages, which is commonplace in academia, can only enhance these efforts.

A Toast

The door is open, the banquet spread before you. It is time to feast on the ultimate challenge: global communication. Opportunities abound in the area of international technical communication.

References

Hoft, Nancy L, International Technical Communication: How to Export Information about High Technology, New York: John Wiley and Sons Publishers, 1995.

Thrush, Emily A, "Bridging the Gaps: Technical Communication in an International and Multicultural Society," Technical Communication Quarterly, Summer 1993, vol. 2, no. 3, pp. 271-283.

Ulijn, Jan M. and Judith B. Strother, Communicating in Business and Technology: From Psycholinguistic Theory to International Practice, New York: Peter Lang, 1995.