Chapter 1 Introduction
1.1 Brief Introduction of the Study
In 1982, Hammerly claimed that the foreign language learners who want tocommunicate with native speakers, must get a sense of the world view native speakers haveof themselves and their own country. In others words, language learning and culturelearning cannot realistically be separated. So it is now generally accepted that learning aforeign language is not simply mastering the language and its culture, but moreappropriately focused on learners’ native language and native culture. Thus Chinesetraditional focused purely on linguistic issues is not scientific.In 1995, Cunningsworth stated that Textbooks are main resource in achieving aimsand objectives that have been already set in terms of learner need. Especially, in China,Chinese educational textbooks are regarded as authorities, teachers and students rely ontextbooks very much, so textbooks are the most significant channel of 1anguage andculture input in EFL classroom teaching of junior high schools, and they are powerfulinstructional tools for conveying culture knowledge and play a vital role in teaching orlearning process.In the aspect of culture teaching, in 1996, Saussure stated that textbooks are the mostcommonly used teaching resources and most of the teachers are not trained sociologists oranthropologists, so they have to rely heavily on the textbook; In the aspect of culturelearning, textbooks are the most significant channel of 1anguage and culture input in EFLclassroom teaching of junior high schools, so they are powerful instructional tools forconveying culture knowledge and play a vital role in learning process.
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1.2 Significance of the Research
In China, EFL teaching is conducted under one national syllabus, the quality of EFLteaching depend on the content of the textbook, textbooks become the main resource oflanguage and culture teaching and learning. What’s more, due to the reality, students areimpossible to contact with the target culture enough, so native culture is more important atthis time. However, compared with the increasing number of studies on linguistic contentevaluation in textbook, there are few studies on culture-related content in Chinese Middleschool EFL textbooks. To address this unbalanced situation the present author embarks onworthwhile endeavor to explore the culture-related content in Chinese middle school EFLtextbooks.We all know that although EFL teaching is conducted under one national syllabus inour country, but there still exist many versions’ textbook in junior high school. It is notsensible and possible to put all the course books into the present study, so the authorchooses the junior high school’s English textbooks published by People’s Education Press(2007) as study subject conducted. The result of the evaluation will be matched andelaborated to address the question: Whether there exists the native culture’s fatiguephenomenon in “English (go for it)”? If have or not, what suggestions could be made? Bydoing the research, the author hopes that it helps teachers examine the effectiveness of theculture •related content in the textbooks already in use, and identify their particularadvantages and disadvantages so that optimum use can be made of their strong pointswhile their weakness can be got rid of through adaptation.
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Chapter 2 Literature Review
2.1 Overview of Native Culture Studies
We all know that language and culture have a close relationship, they are inseparable.In real life, people often use language to express culture. In the process of foreign languagelearning, so we cannot too conducive to target culture, should pay more attention to nativeculture.According to Cortazzi and Jin’s theory (2001) on culture in English textbooks, thereshould have native culture, target culture and international culture. In addition, Hall (2005)assumes, culture is communication and communication is culture. Sometimes, for theforeign language learners, the culture learning needs to learn concerns target culture andnative culture. So talking about communication must involve culture: native culture andtarget culture. Target culture refers to the culture belonging to the target language; nativeculture means that the culture of foreign language learners’ own country. The native culture refers to learners’ own culture (Cortazzi & Jin, 2001), for exampleChinese culture in EFL textbooks in China, such as food, history and weather and so on arealso native．Liu Zhanzi (2000), native culture is deeply rooted in the lives of native people.Comprehending the system of knowledge is quite essential for FL learners. According toLiu Changjiang(2003), the native culture is passed on by the native people as the time goeson. It is the basis of living of the local people and the source of condensation of the socialpower.
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2.2 Importance of Integrating Native Culture in English Teaching
Chinese long history and profound tradition culture maintains the cultural andspiritual lifeline of Chinese people. It is the outcome of the long time development ofChina. So integrating native culture in English teaching can help students set up anappropriate attitude to culture and culture learning.Chinese students accept education mainly through Chinese, so the education ofChinese culture is to cultivate the native affection of Chinese students. Meanwhile, Chinais an integral member in the world. Therefore, Chinese junior high school should pay moreattention to native culture in teaching, namely, should appropriately introduce and integrateChinese culture in English teaching. It is helpful for students to take pride in the nativeculture, cultivate patriotism spirit and set up self-esteem. The integration of Chinese culture in English teaching is helpfully to improvestudents’ communication competence.Communication practices shape culture 1ife in some extent. Meanwhile, cultureworks through communication. The success and failure of communication depends oncommunicative competence of EFL learners in certain extent. We all know that the aims ofEnglish teaching in China is to develop students’ listening, speaking, reading andtranslating capacities, so that they can freely exchange information with foreigners inEnglish. In others words, it can improve students’ intercultural communicativecompetence.
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Chapter 3 Investigation into Chinese Culture in Go for It...... 12
3.1 Research Questions ....... 12
3.2 Research Objectives ...... 12
3.3 Research Methodology........ 12
3.4 Procedures of the Study....... 13
3.5 Data Analysis..... 21
Chapter 4 Results of the Study and Discussion .... 26
4.1 Results ......... 26
4.2 Discussion ......... 28
Chapter 5 Conclusion........ 32
5.1 Main Findings of the Study ....... 32
5.2 Limitation of This Study ..... 33
5.3 Suggestions........ 33
Chapter 4 Results of the Study and Discussion
4.1 Results
The author bases the Cortazzi and Jin’s theory on culture in English textbooks andByram’s criteria for textbook evaluation theory, put the cultural content in these textbooksinto three groups, namely the target culture, the source culture and the international culture.The textbook Go for it contains 5 books in a11. For the convenience of the software ofSPSS 13.0 for Windows making relevant statistics and analysis, the five books were1abeled corresponding as five variables, namely, Book1A, Book1B, Book 2A, Book 2Band Book3. Similarly, numbers1, 2.and 3 have values of native culture, target culture andothers respectively. Finally, generated such results, we can see Table4.1 & Table4.2. Table4.1 is concerned with the percentage of three categories of culture in the textbooks, thestatistics in Table4.1 is in unit unites; the statistics in Table4.2 is in number units.
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Conclusion
Analysis of the culture al content of Go for It at junior high schools, students’ abilityto express the cultural content, students’ and teachers’ attitudes to native culture in Englishtextbooks, finally we can make some conclusionsFirstly, through analysis the text and illustration contents of Go for It, we can find outthe native culture percentage is lower than the foreign culture percentage in the textbook.Merely, the significance of Chinese culture is ignored. These English textbooks are mostlybased on the materials from the target culture, for example American and Britain, whichmakes a certain negative influence on communicative competence of EFI learners.Sometimes, the learners can not be proud of their native culture, which leads the learnersdifficultly build their social identity.Secondly, in the term of the content of Chinese culture, certain themes are quitedeficiency. For example, in the textbook, religion and political system are rarely mentioned;the proportion of traditional Chinese culture is quite lower; most selected material in thecontents of the mainstream is from the city culture, for example tourism culture whichappears frequently; Minority Culture often be ignored. First, religions have a greatinfluence upon the way of living. The learners can not understand Christmas Day,Thanksgiving Day and Easter fully if the religion is not mentioned. The textbook shouldnot avoid it. They should provide the right opinions about them. Second, the traditionalculture is quite useful to learn special traditional cultural knowledge in promoting theeffective cross-cultural communication. Third, when we mention the education, what is thefirst thing you think? It is fair and equal. So the teaching material also should reflect fairand equal, this is to say, the teaching materials not only reflects urban culture, but alsoreflects rural culture. Students who come from different cultural background can learn andappreciate other excellent culture. Finally, In China, there are 55 peoples except of Hannationality. In the long historical development process, 56 nationalities create the rich andcolorful Chinese culture. Humans’ long historical culture is very precious, the education isthe best way to protect and inheritance it.#p#分页标题#e#
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Reference (omitted)
