Cahiers de l‘ILSL 48, 2016, 53-77. ENGLISH IN THE WORKPLACE IN SWITZERLAND BETWEEN IDEOLOGIES AND PRACTICES Georges Lüdi University of Basel [email protected] Interviewer: Okay. Could you tell to us something about the meaning of the languages in the company? As well as you see this now? From your point of view. MM: Well, this is relatively easy, with us it is English only. (...) so who doesn't speak English, has no future here. Nowhere. (...) and, I'm now speaking about the Headquarter (...) so here it's English (...) there is a dominance of English almost up to arrogance (MM <Agro A>, translated from German) Abstract A widely shared opinion states that English in its international form is particularly suited for the economy. Consequently, a shift from national languages to English as corporate language has been observed in many countries. However, this choice is not based on the results of scientific research, but rather on ideologies. In many cases, the real practices can differ quite significantly from what people think and/or tell they do. This calls for empirical research. In this paper, we will analyse the demolinguistic situation of Switzerland with a special focus on English at work, have a look at the public debate about English and national languages at school and acknowledge the actual linguistic practices in several types of economic environments, in order to answer the question whether English and/or any other language dominates communication at work in Switzerland. Key-words Workplace, English, mixed teams, plurilingualism, language management, communication strategies, language ideologies, plurilingual speech, vocational training 1. THE 'DOXA' ABOUT ENGLISH AS GLOBAL LANGUAGE OF BUSINESS This quotation from an interview with a HR manager at a global agro-business company based in Switzerland seems to confirm the widely shared opinion that English in its international form is particularly suited for the economy. Consequently, a shift from national languages to English as corporate language has been observed in many countries as for example in the case of Airbus, Daimler-Chrysler, Fast Retailing, Nokia, Renault, Samsung, SAP, Technicolor, and Aventis “in an attempt to facilitate communication and performance across geographically diverse functions and business endeavors” (Neeley 2012). 54 Cahiers de l‘ILSL 48, 2016 This choice results from the international weight of the English language. In a widely quoted paper, Weber (1997) developed a formula that used six criteria to judge the worldwide significance of each language, i. e. number of primary speakers, number of secondary speakers, number and population of countries using the language, number of major areas of human activity in which the language is important, economic power of countries using the language, and socio-literary prestige of the language. In his ranking, English was by far the most influential before French, Spanish and Russian.1 Concerning the move toward “English only” as corporate language of the economy, three primary reasons are often invoked: Competitive pressure. (...) Companies that fail to devise a language strategy are essentially limiting their growth opportunities • Communicationto the markets where in theira lingua language franca is spoken learnt, asclearly a foreign putting language themselves may at a be disadvantage accompanied to by a lackcompetitors of emotiona that havel involvement adopted English (Fine-only 1996, policies. 494). • SpeakingGlobalization a FL of maytasks leadand resources. to less precise formulation and thus to a loss of information. Since the winter issue of the ACTFLLanguage Newsletter differenceseditor, can Geoffrey cause a bottleneckKingscott. The(...) articleBetter appearedlanguage undercomprehension gives employees more appeared reporting in a brief paragraphIchfirsthand a rederanking in info meinerof rmation, Sprachethe whichrubric anders, "Geolinguistics."is vital freier, to goodoffener, decision We selbstbewusster, decided making. to reprint Swiss sicherer. the food (...) giant Da gehenNestlé also saw wirklich great the world's "ten most influential languages,"vieleefficiency weIdeen have eigentlichimprovementsarticle verloren, in itspurchasing wenn entirety, man despite andsich hiringeinfach its length, thanks für becausedas to Englische its enforcement its den- entscheidet of English in einer as solchen a company repeatedly seen the same paragraph appearSituation,standard. in state weil dann nichtsity and alle its gleich, complexity sich gleich make wohlit difficult fühlen. to summarize (Maurice M., or Agro A) and local foreign language newsletters. 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(...) that’s why when Germany’s Hoechst and France’s Rhône-Poulenc merged in 1998 searching we were able to find the British4. publicationPractices of security or smugness about the second place of Language Today (Vol. 2, Dec. 1997) andto thecreate specific Aventis, theFrench fifth afterlargest English. worldwide pharmaceutical company, the new firm chose English as article reprinted here, with the kind permissionits operating of the language over French or German to avoid playing favorites. An important part of the DYLAN-project consisted in a fine-grained examination of numerous interactions in business contexts in order to understand how the very diverse linguistic repertoires(Global of speakers Business operating Speaks English, in increasingly Tsedal, Harvard multilingual Business environments Review, May develop2012) and how TOPactors LANGUAGES make the best use of their repertoires and adapt them skilfully to different objectives and conditions. 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