Business English teaching has become an integral part of many English language courses. It is successfully taught at schools and colleges specializing in economics and at all economic faculties of universities. As long as bookshops in Saint-Petersburg offer a wide range of original books on BE, universities generally use them as course books, although they do not contain a single word of Russian. The following course books are known to be popular: John Thomas French, YOU ARE IN BUSINESS; David Cotton, KEYS TO MANAGEMENT; Gerald Lees & Tony Thorne, Nick Brieger & Jeremy Comfort, EARLY BUSINESS CONTACTS and DEVELOPING BUSINESS CONTACTS; Roger Owen, BBC BUSINESS ENGLISH and some others.

The main advantage of these very substantial and highly professionally set up courses is that they effectively combine listening comprehension practice and exposure to the Western manner of doing business. Such course books are focused on the communicative approach; they are aimed not so much at memorizing business terminology, as at practicing the use of conversational formulas for stating opinions, expressing agreement or disagreement, giving recommendations, holding business meetings and presentations (see L.F. Sheetova, How to Teach Business English / / “Issues and Perspectives of Higher Humanitarian Education at the Time of Social Reform”, Nauchno-Metodicheskaya Mezhvuzovskaya Konferentsiya 17-19 Feb. 1998. Abstracts. SPb. 1998). In other words, they prepare students for independent participation in business communication.

It is largely the above-mentioned features that account for the popularity of authentic books. At the same time, they are beyond the means of the majority of students, for their high prices make them accessible only to private schools or those that charge a tuition fee. Moreover, BE course objectives could be somewhat more comprehensive than Business English teaching through deep immersion into language. We believe that systematic translation practice and acquisition of English-Russian equivalents could be highly useful, as they prepare students for real life situations in the Russian business environment and not only in Anglo-American business context.

Russian course designers traditionally give prominence to selecting appropriate English-Russian equivalents. They have elaborated their own methodology of, and approach to, teaching BE vocabulary. Such books as, for example, N.A.Lukianova’s “Nastolnaya kniga biznesmena” M., 1998 (5 th edition) contain original texts along with lists of English-Russian equivalents, as well as numerous translation exercises that meet the needs of various categories of students.

Many students are under the false impression that all they are required to do is produce a word-for-word translation without regard to its quality. Methodologically, therefore, the main objective of translation exercises is not so much to check the students’ comprehension of the text as to teach them to be articulate and express their ideas clearly. Finding correct equivalents is a creative procedure that makes the learning process more interesting. However, one can meet with serious difficulties where Russian equivalents are lacking, if only because certain business notions do not exist in Russian business context. If that is the case, course-book writers themselves should supply adequate equivalents.

The course book by N.V. Popova, A.Y. Feodorova and Yatunina SMALL BUSINESS (SPb., SPBGTU, 1997, 1998) can serve as an example of a course book that combines original American texts with translation exercises, vocabulary practice and grammar patterns. It consists of 23 texts for classroom activities and home reading. The texts are arranged in the order of increasing difficulty. One section is designed for practicing general business vocabulary, while the other one includes revision and introduces the more specific economic terminology. Both sections contain translation tests. Each text is followed by a discussion assignment aimed at developing students’ speaking skills. The authors consider that the number of translation exercises is in the right proportion to the total number of exercises in the book.

Topics selected for the course book are relevant especially to Russian business context. Students can focus on a vast range of problems and issues connected with starting up a small business as outlined by an American expert, Dr. G. Howard Poteet, in his book STARTING UP YOUR OWN BUSINESS (1991). It is significant that learners are thus exposed to American business practices, which rank among the most prestigious in Russia, according to many surveys. Moreover, linguists have shown that Business Russian is strongly influenced by American English (see V.G. Kostomarov, YAZYKOVOI VKUS EPOKHI, SPb., 1999). There is now an inflow of borrowings from American BE. Dr. Poteet is giving professional advice on how to avoid frustrations, to find ways out, to predict prospects, to identify the most crucial points and so on. The Russian course based on Dr. Poteet’s book is written in a lively manner, in contrast to the boring academic style of some other books which contain only a small proportion of communicative exercises (e.g. SMALL BUSINESS by G.I.Sidorenko and V.F. Tolstoukhova, Minsk, 1995). What we mean to emphasize here is that the above principles of course book writing have proved to be highly effective. Students of economics like to work with the kind of course book that contributes to the development of both language skills and professional background.

It should be pointed out that thoroughly designed sets of English-Russian equivalents are useful not only for the average student of economics, but also for the growing numbers of students in technical colleges and universities who take an optional course so as to qualify as interpreters/translators in the sphere of professional communication. EFL teaching at what is known as ‘minor faculties of philology’ is centered on BE instruction. This necessarily requires a lot of translation materials. We find that the type of course books described above can be used in these two-year intensive foreign language training programmes.

To sum up, we can conclude that bilingual course books should not be neglected, for they are a useful resource supplementing the authentic books available.

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