Exploring Intercultural Interactions in Multicultural Contexts: Proposal and Research Suggestions.

A discussion examines the importance of communication between non-native speakers (NNS/NNS), reviews relevant theories and issues in intercultural interactions and NNS/NNS interactions, and explores methodological issues in interpreting linguistic and interactional data. The intent is to explore features of communication between NNSs from different linguistic backgrounds by reviewing theories and research concerning native-speaker/non-native speaker (NS/NNS) intercultural interactions. Inferencing theory and communication accommodation theory are examined for their descriptions and generalizations about interactive processes from sociolinguistic and pragmatic/discursive perspectives, and to suggest research questions and hypotheses for further study. Contains 59 references. (MSE)