This is the first monograph to examine mediated business interaction in Spanish. It focuses on communication between native speakers of Spanish from different Spanish-speaking countries with a view to informing our understanding of intercultural communication in a contemporary business environment. Using elements of pragmatics with tools from conversation analysis, the book examines the various activities that telephone conversationalists engage in to supply and demand a service over the phone through the mediational means of Spanish by addressing the following questions. * Do speakers of Spanish display similar communicative practices as those observed in other languages when requesting and being offered a service over the phone? * Do specifically located activities such as the call openings and closings display similar coordination and ritualisation as that observed in other languages?* Does the language seen as a cultural tool reflect a different orientation towards such activities? * What strategies do telephone agents and (prospective) clients employ to obtain a sale and either procure the best value for money or obviate it, respectively? And, what role does intercultural communication play in the construction of these practices?

An excellent resource for anybody interested in what really happens during service calls. The book canbe useful to business managers interested in improving the quality of their call centres, researchers on spanish socio-cultural interactions, as well as students and faculty looking for a well-developed and detail-oriented example of excellent ethnographic and conversational analysis research. -- Marta Gonzalez Loret, University of Hawai'i * Spanish in Context *
Mediated Business Interactions is a richly detailed account of institutional transactions between Spanish speakers from varied cultural backgrounds. It offers a unique perspective on the intersection of dialect with culture, and provides sophisticated insight into conversational dynamics as a site for intercultural communication. -- Kristine Fitch, Professor of Communication Studies, University of Iowa

Rosina Márquez Reiter is Senior Lecturer and Programme Director, MA in Intercultural Communication with International Business and MA in Communication and International Marketing, University of Surrey.