Editor’s introduction to special issue on intercultural methodology

Intercultural professional communication (IPC) is a burgeoning research area. New venues have been created to publish work in IPC, including this journal, Rhetoric, Professional Communication, and Globalization, in 2010 and connexions international professional communication journal in 2013. More broadly scoped venues in technical and professional communication also recognize the importance of intercultural work. See, for example, Ding and Savage’s special issue of Technical Communication Quarterly on new directions in intercultural professional communication (2013) and the topics of interest for the ATTW Book Series in Technical and Professional Communication, topics which include the globalization of technical and professional communication, intercultural communication, and translation of technical and professional communication (ATTW, 2012). Within IPC, some topics that have garnered recent scholarly attention include technology design and use (McCool, 2010; Sun, 2013; Walton, Yaaqoubi, & Kolko, 2012), risk communication (Ding 2013; Ding, 2012; Frost, 2013), and health communication (Antón, Connor, Lauten, & Balunda, 2013; St. Germaine, 2013; Thatcher, 2013). These topics and others within IPC are important, but to investigate them properly, researchers must be well trained and well equipped with research methods appropriate for intercultural contexts. This special issue of RPCG focuses on intercultural research methods, a timely topic for our field