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Article published In: Pragmatics and Society
Vol. 16:4 (2025) ► pp.590–617

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“Our group was by far the coolest”

Multimodal team-building practices and English as a lingua franca in a virtual intercultural game

ORCiD logo with link | European University Viadrina | University of Potsdam
 | University of Oulu
 | University of Jyväskylä
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Available under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) 4.0 license.

For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at rights@benjamins.nl.

This article was made Open Access under a CC BY 4.0 license through payment of an APC by or on behalf of the authors.

Published online: 17 October 2024
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https://doi.org/10.1075/ps.23025.men
Abstract
Virtual collaborations via video-conferencing applications may enable international groups to develop ideas and explore synergies in creative ways. This article presents a case study that unveils how students in a group involved in a virtual simulation game, in which English as a lingua franca was used, navigate a highly intercultural environment, orient to team building through cooperative practices, and gradually develop their own team culture. The game was inserted in two online university courses in tertiary institutions in Germany and Finland. In the game, students performed several tasks that require collaborative work in the development plan of a fictitious city. The data for the study comprise video-recorded game interactions and students’ learning journal entries. This article is centered on the multimodal analysis of the interactions taking place during the kick-off session of the game and showcases successful multimodal strategies that aided the development of an inclusive and positive atmosphere in the group.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Interculturality, transient groups, and team culture
  • 3.Multimodal strategies and interactional mechanisms of team building in technology-mediated ELF interaction
  • 4.Research design
    • 4.1The intercultural game Megacities
    • 4.2Participants, moderators, and dataset
  • 5.Findings
    • 5.1Initial moments of team building
    • 5.2Establishing roles and responsibilities through ‘joint seeing jokes’
    • 5.3Displaying team membership with inside joke and showing sequences
  • 6.Discussion
  • 7.Concluding remarks
  • Notes
  • References
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