Language Studies: Comparative English

THE ROLE OF CULTURE TWO IN THE PROCESS OF TEACHING AND LEARNING ENGLISH AS
A FOREIGN LANGUAGE

THE CONTENTS OF THIS PAGE

An uncorrected contribution from Marlene Sanabria - a non-native speaker of English from Colombia (please scroll to the next box)
Bibi's comment

Ringing the changes (article)
COMPARATIVE LANGUAGE STUDIES: General overview by Bibi Baxter
Grammar pages:

AUTHOR: Marlene Sanabria, lives in Bogota, Columbia (Master of arts in applied linguistics)

English is a means of communication, instruction and culture. Aware of the relevance of English language learning nowadays, it is important to look for new topics which allow to teach and to learn a most effective, a most attractive and useful English, an English presented as a something real, nice with a function in the society, with meaning in the real life, and which provides new knowledge about the world, which provides culture.

English is a language, language is a culture part, man uses language to communicate his own culture, man reflects culture through the language. It can be summarized in that language can not be separated from culture or vice versa. Culture reflects a man's community or society or place.

The total set of beliefs, attitudes, customs, behaviors, social habits of the members of a particular society are known as culture and it is important to take into account it in the language teaching and learning process. Tomalin and Stempleski takes into account cultural elements such as: literature, folklore, art, music, beliefs, values, customs, habits, dress, foods and leisure.

Above cultural aspects can be taught through the foreign language, however it is important to have in mind the social environment where it is going to be taught, teacher and learner can share their opinions in order to choose those cultural aspects that can be the most useful according to their needs, for example: historical, geographical, art aspects, etc. can enrich learners, complement and improve their knowledge.

Culture in the classroom has theoretical supports that lean its promotion with those bases, many kinds of carrying out this new way of teaching could be developed, it implies to design a new syllabus for English classes.

Brown (1994) states that "whenever you teach a language you also teach a complex system of cultural customs, and ways of thinking, feeling and acting", this statement is so important because language and culture are joined, so they must be integrated in the process of teaching and learning a language, a learner of a language needs to learn culture of the speakers and of the places where that language is spoken.

It can be said that it is impossible to maintain culture, language, teaching and learning one far from the other, “Although the inclusion of culture in the foreign language curriculum has become more prevalent in recent years, gaining both popularity and respectability, there are still those who ignore the concept or deny its validity....There is no way to avoid teaching culture when teaching language.” (Joyce Valdes p.20 in Culture and the language classroom).

“In the classroom; the goals and objectives of culture learning should be carefully selected and honed to the needs and desires of the learner”. (Barnlun 1975). So, it is important taking into account learner’s environment age, likes and dislikes, beliefs, preferences, and those things that get his attention, in order to get a successful foreign language and culture learning.

Lado reinforces the relationship between language and culture, there are many things to do in the classroom in order to learn a foreign language with the language forms and with aspects that can complete the learning. “We can not teach a language well without coming to grips with its cultural content. There can not be real learning of a language without understanding something of patterns and values of the culture of which it is part ... Much can be done to understand the target culture through the study of the language” (Lado, 1964),

It is important to prove if the learners can improve their English knowledge by means of culture into English classes, also teachers must be in a continuous change process in order to create new methods and methodologies and offer the learner the opportunity to find a real, dynamic, creative and communicative English.

The ideal setting for teaching a language is, of course, the country where it is spoken natively. By residing in that community and being force to use the language for communication, the full impact of a language as the chief means of communication in a culture is brought out.

Lacking this setting, the next best thing is to create the atmosphere of the second culture through proper decoration of a classroom, a language and/or , when possible a house. Agreements to speak only the second language and to be active in language clubs can be made with varying degrees of success.

In the foreign language class culture is created and enacted through the dialogue between students and between teacher and students. Through these dialogue, participants not only replicate a given context of culture, but, because it takes place in a foreign language, it also has the potential of shaping new culture.

“Language without culture can degenerate into a study of forms and vocabulary; in short, it can become completely boring for most of the students in the class” (Scarcella and Oxford 1992), the process of teaching and learning a foreign language has felt in a monotonous way that must be changed, cultures is a form of giving motivation and waking up the interest of the learner in a foreign language.

Language is seen as a means through which interaction between human beings takes place, and human interaction is equated with communication. But, further the communication and interaction goes on only in the matrix of the total cultural surroundings of the communicants. Language itself is a system of human culture, in fact the most important system, the system through which the others are principally reflected and transmitted.

The organization and perpetuation of culture is not dependent upon any person, but upon a complex interaction among many. The maintenance mechanism are not within the individual; they are outside him in society. Consonant with this is a view of the social contract as one where by men agree to communicate and of culture as the code by which they communicate.

REFERENCES

1. BAUMGRAPZ, Gangl (1989). Discourse and Culture. Oxford University Press. USA.

2. BRYRAM, Michael (1988). Cultural Studies in foreign Language. W.B.C. Print Ltd.

3. BROWN, Douglas (1994). Principles of Language Learning and Teaching . Prentice Hall Regents. USA.

4. BROWN, Douglas (1994). Teaching by Principles. Prentice Hall Regents. USA.

5. BRUMFIT, C.J. (1984). General English Syllabus Design. Pergamon Press. Oxford.

6. DAMEN, Louise (1987). Culture Learning : The fifth dimension in the language classroom. Adisson-Wesley Publishing Company. United States of America.

7. DEAN, Brown James (1988). Understanding Research in Second Language Learning. Cambridge University Press. New York.

8. DUBIN, Fraida and OLSTHAIN Elite (1990). Course design. Cambridge University Press. New York.

9. FORUM, “Teaching for Communication” (1978), Sandra Savignon.

10. FORUM, “Culture clash in the classroom: How to minimise cheating in a face - saving culture” (1995), Bruce Sidebotham.

11. HARRISON, Brian (1990). Culture and the Language Classroom. Modern English Publications and the British Council. Hong Kong.

12. HILL, Archibald (1970). Linguistics. Voice of America Forum Lecturers. USA .

13. HOEY, Michael (1993). Data, Description, Discourse. Harper Collins Publish Ltd. Great Britain.

14. HOLLIDAY, Adrian (1994). Appropriate Methodology and Social Context. Cambridge University Press. USA.

15. KRAMSH, Claire (1993). Context and Culture in the language Teaching. Oxford University Press. USA

16. LADO, Robert (1964). Language Teaching A Scientific Approach. McGraw Hill, Inc. United States of America.

17. LARSEN, Diane and LONG Michael (1991). An Introduction to Second Language Acquisition Research. Longman Group. New York.

18. MCCARTHY, Michael (1991). Discourse Analysis for Language Teachers. Cambridge University Press. Great Britain.

19. MARKMAN, Roberta and Peter (1989). 10 Steps in Writing Research Paper. Barron’s Educational Series. USA :

20. NOLASCO, Robert and LOUIS Arthur (1987). Conversation. Oxford University Press. Hong Kong.

21. OMAGGIO, HADLEY Alice (1993). Teaching Language in a context. Heinle & Heinle Publishers. USA :

22. PENNYCOOK, Alastair ( 1994). The cultural politics of English as an International Language. Longman Group. New York.

23. RICHARDS, Jack C. (1990). The Language Teaching Matrix. Cambridge University Press. New York.

24. SCARCELLA, Robin and OXFORD Rebecca (1992). The Tapestry of Language Learning . Heinle & Heinle Publishers. Boston, Massachusetts. USA.

25. SMOLINSKI, Frank (1993). Landmarks of American Language & Linguistics Vol. 1. Materials Development and Review Branch. English Language Programs Division. USA. Information Agency Washington.

26. STERN, H.H. (1992). Issues and Options in Language Teaching. Oxford University Press. Great Britain.

27. TESOL QUARTERLY Vol. 28, Number 3. “Expanding Middle School Horizons : Integration Language, Culture and Social Studies (1994). Teachers of English to Speakers of other Languages, inc.

31. TOMALIN, Barry & STEMPLESKI, Susan. Cultural Awareness (1993). Oxford University Press. Hong Kong.

32. WILBERT, Johannes (1976). Enculturation in Latin America An Anthology. UCLA Latin American Center Publications. Los Angeles.

Bibi's Comment:

OVERVIEW

Marlene's English language skills are good, however, she has translated the logic of her own language. This means that there are some errors, the meaning is not always clear and there are more words than necessary. Other errors are the incorrect use of vocabulary (e.g. place/region), linking words and punctuation. Where Marlene has quoted other authors, there is a marked difference which illustrates the difference between English produced by a native-speaker and that of a non-native speaker.

EXAMPLES FOR COMPARISON

(Please note that other examples are also possible)

MARLENE WROTE: English is a language, language is a culture part, man uses language to communicate his own culture, man reflects culture through the language. This can be reworded as follows: Language cannot be separated from culture or vice versa. Culture reflects one's community, society or region.
ADVANCED WRITTEN ENGLISH: Man projects his regional culture through language; it is so interwoven within his language, the two are inseparable and cannot be parted. (These 22 words convey everything Marlene has said in her paragraph of 48 words.)
CANNOT should be written as one word, not two.

NOTE: Not every native speaker (even well-educated ones) can produce advanced written English