浅谈商务英语函电在对外贸易中的作用_英语论文P17.docVIP

1 Introduction The early years of our new century have been a period of unprecedented technological advancement. From cell-phones to 3G online, from test massaging to PC faxing, our communications tools and techniques are becoming ever more sophisticated. Today we are able to organize, transmit, and use information at speeds unimaginable only a few years ago and we anticipate future developments that are equally unimaginable today. Nevertheless, the “information superhighway” notwithstanding, communications technology has not supplanted communications know-how. We still require information and ideas to be expressed in clear, completely, and the person who can compose such information is a part of business organization. Therefore, business correspondence language still continues to be a highly marketable skill in today’s workplace. From the perspective of linguistic carrier, business correspondence should be used in a business environment. It belongs to ESP① (English for special purposes, the English need by a particular group of learners could be identified by analyzing the linguistic characteristics of their specialist of work or study.), and emphasizes the special communication in the specific circumstances. It is a comprehensive discipline which is combined with English writing and foreign trade practice with content, difficulty and practicability of nature. It has a very difference from the nature of ordinary English or other specialized English in content or formally. It involves foreign trade practices each part. Mainly includes: Establishing business relations; Enquiries and Replies; Quotations, Sales Letters, Offers and Counter Offers; Orders, Acceptances; Sales confirmation and Purchase contract; Payment; Packing; Transport and Insurance; Complaint, Claim and Settlement etc. Thus it can be seen although the business correspondence is not the foreign trade practice lesson, but involves the operational method in the foreign trade. This paper will from the lin