Vivien Xiaowei Zhou
vivien xiaowei zhou

Dr Vivien Xiaowei Zhou

Lecturer

 0131 455 4527

  V.Zhou@napier.ac.uk

  

Biography

I am a Lecturer in Intercultural Communication and Programme Leader for MSc Intercultural Business Communication. My academic speciality is based in Educational studies. My research interests primarily concern the intercultural dimension of human communication, relations and identity, particularly the narrativity of individuals’ lived experiences of interculturality. My empirical research projects to date have focused on university students’ reflective and dialogic practices in intercultural education settings. More currently, I am exploring existential and epistemic questions in intercultural communication, seeking answers that empirical research (particularly conducted within 'established' knowledge paradigms) often fails to offer as to important questions we face in the real world. Part of my endeavour is to create dialogue between different ways of knowing across epistemic, linguistic, and disciplinary traditions.

I am currently editing, with Prof. Hans Ladegaard (The Hong Kong Polytechnic University), a special issue entitled "Dialoguing inter-epistemically: intercultural knowing, knowing the intercultural" for the journal Language and Intercultural Communication (provisionally scheduled for publication in late 2024).

At the Business School, I lead postgraduate modules in intercultural communication and intercultural competence. I have also developed and delivered two popular undergraduate modules on intercultural competence through studies of Mandarin Chinese.

I hold a BA and an MA in English Language and Literature from Peking University, China. My PhD is in Intercultural Communication from the University of Manchester, UK. I was a committee member of the International Association for Languages and Intercultural Communication (IALIC) from 2014 to 2018. I have been the Book Reviews editor of the journal Language and Intercultural Communication since 2019.

School

Research Groups

Themes

Research Areas

Esteem

Conference Organising Activity

  • Conference organiser: for IALIC 2017 "Interrogating the 'Third Space': Negotiating meaning and performing 'culture'" https://staff.napier.ac.uk/ialic2017

 

Editorial Activity

  • Book reviews editor of the journal Language and Intercultural Communication
  • Guest Editor (Language and Intercultural Communication, Special Issue 19.1)

 

Fellowships and Awards

  • Fellow of the Higher Education Academy

 

Invited Speaker

  • 'Intercultural competence and intercultural training: a critical return to the basics', invited talk at the research seminar series, School of Foreign Languages, Huazhong University of Science and Technology (China), Dec 2022.
  • 'Betwixt East and West: teaching and researching intercultural communication in the field of Intercultural Communication', presented at the Academic Lecture Series, Aug 2022, School of Foreign Languages and Literatures, Hangzhou Dianzi University, China
  • 'Current trends in intercultural communication studies', presented at the Academic Forum Series, June 2021, Harbin Engineering University, China
  • 'But students don't interact - what do they learn?' Negotiating interculturality in internationalising higher education, presented at the 'Interculturality in a Precarious Future: Multiple Contexts, Multiple Voices' symposium (October 2018), University of Leeds

 

Research Degree External Examining

  • Ed.D. external examiner (Durham University, School of Education, 2019)
  • Ph.D. external examiner (Durham University, School of Education, 2018)
  • Ed.D. external examiner (Durham University, School of Education, 2016)
  • Ph.D. external examiner (UCL Institute of Education, 2015)

 

Reviewing

  • Reviewer for the Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development
  • Reviewer for Migration Studies
  • Reviewer for the Journal of Language and Education
  • Reviewer for the Journal of Hospitality, Leisure, Sport & Tourism Education
  • Reviewer for Language and Intercultural Communication

 

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Date


15 results

Developing critical intercultural competence through understanding the location, product and processes of dialogue

Book Chapter
Pilcher, N., & Zhou, V. X. (2022)
Developing critical intercultural competence through understanding the location, product and processes of dialogue. In M. Sommier, A. Roiha, & M. Lahti (Eds.), Interculturality in Higher Education: Putting Critical Approaches into Practice. Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003322702-3
The idea of ‘intercultural competence’ (ICC) has been beset by tension between training models presenting culture as understood through ‘nation’ based constructs, and countera...

Engaging non-essentialism as lived wisdom: a dialogue between intercultural communication and Buddhism

Journal Article
Zhou, V. (2022)
Engaging non-essentialism as lived wisdom: a dialogue between intercultural communication and Buddhism. Language and Intercultural Communication, 22(3), 294-311. https://doi.org/10.1080/14708477.2022.2046768
This paper examines some philosophical groundwork underlying intercultural studies through an inter-epistemic dialogue with Buddhism. This dialogue joins resonating developmen...

Researching multilingually and inter-epistemically: constructing a ‘cross-cultural dialogue’ between intercultural communication and Buddhism

Presentation / Conference
Zhou, V. X. (2021, November)
Researching multilingually and inter-epistemically: constructing a ‘cross-cultural dialogue’ between intercultural communication and Buddhism. Paper presented at IALIC 2021 'Language, culture and interculturality: Global debates, local challenges', Bogota, Colombia (online
In this talk, I discuss how I identified points of dialogue between intercultural communication theories and the Buddhist Middle Way by traversing linguistic and epistemic lan...

Intercultural business education: The role of critical theory and experiential learning

Book Chapter
Holmes, P., & Zhou, V. X. (2020)
Intercultural business education: The role of critical theory and experiential learning. In J. Jackson (Ed.), Routledge Handbook of Language and Intercultural Communication. Abingdon: Routledge
Workplaces, both locally and globally, are increasingly characterised by complexity, ambiguity, and diversity, but also by individual distinctiveness and local relations. Peop...

Revisiting the ‘third space’ in language and intercultural studies

Journal Article
Xiaowei Zhou, V., & Pilcher, N. (2019)
Revisiting the ‘third space’ in language and intercultural studies. Language and Intercultural Communication, 19(1), 1-8. doi:10.1080/14708477.2018.1553363
No abstract available.

Tapping the thirdness in the intercultural space of dialogue

Journal Article
Zhou, V. X., & Pilcher, N. (2018)
Tapping the thirdness in the intercultural space of dialogue. Language and Intercultural Communication, 19(1), 23-37. https://doi.org/10.1080/14708477.2018.1545025
In this paper, we explore intercultural communication as dialogue occurring in a third space. Through seven students' reflective essays on group-based intercultural learning, ...

‘Intercultural competence’ as an intersubjective process: a reply to ‘essentialism’

Journal Article
Zhou, V. X., & Pilcher, N. (2018)
‘Intercultural competence’ as an intersubjective process: a reply to ‘essentialism’. Language and Intercultural Communication, 18(1), 125-143. https://doi.org/10.1080/14708477.2017.1400510
In this paper, we problematise a competence-oriented reflective approach to intercultural education by drawing on four students’ reflective essays about their experiential lea...

A 'third space' perspective on intercultural dialogue

Presentation / Conference
Zhou, V. X., & Pilcher, N. (2017, June)
A 'third space' perspective on intercultural dialogue. Paper presented at 17th International Association for Languages and Intercultural Communication (IALIC) annual conference - Interrogating the 'Third Space': Negotiating meaning and performing 'culture', Edinburgh Napier University
No abstract available.

Interdisciplinary methodologies in different cultures of learning: Apples and Pears?

Conference Proceeding
Macdonald, I., Firth, R., Foster, M., & Zhou, V. (2014)
Interdisciplinary methodologies in different cultures of learning: Apples and Pears?
This paper explores the reception and analysis of different methodologies in an inter-disciplinary pedagogical collaboration involving Design and Business academics and their ...

Re-constructing “culture of learning” – international student experiences in China and the UK.

Conference Proceeding
Foster, M., Macdonald, I., Firth, R., & Zhou, V. (2014)
Re-constructing “culture of learning” – international student experiences in China and the UK
Following previous Teaching Fellows funding to undertake a joint research project between Business School and the School of Arts & Creative Industries we would like to present...

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