This is the first in a series of articles by our third Guest Contributor Barry Tomalin.

Culture - the fifth language skill - culture article - guest writers

What do we mean by 'culture'?
Many teachers quote the Dutch psychologist Geert Hofstede’s maxim ‘Software of the Mind’, the subtitle of his 2005 book ‘Cultures and Organisations’. What culture covers is the commonly held traditions, values and ways of behaving of a particular community. It includes what we used to call ‘British and American life and institutions’, ‘daily life’ and also cultural artefacts, such as the arts or sports. This is all interesting and sometimes useful knowledge and it is often included in textbooks.

However, there is also another level of understanding, of culture. This is how you develop cultural sensitivity and cultural skill. This covers how you build cultural awareness, what qualities you need to deal successfully with other cultures, and how to operate successfully with people from other cultures. This is often considered to be a business skill for adults, such as international sales managers or explorers. But if you think about it there is a set of skills also needed by refugee kids, ‘third culture kids’ following their parents as they are posted around the world, and students going abroad on gap years before university or overseas study grants. Therefore we could argue that the teaching of culture in ELT should include these things:

  • Cultural knowledge
    The knowledge of the culture’s institutions, the Big C, as it’s described by Tomalin and Stempleski in their 1995 book ‘Cultural Awareness’.
  • Cultural values
    The ‘psyche’ of the country, what people think is important, it includes things like family, hospitality, patriotism, fairness etc.
  • Cultural behaviour
    The knowledge of daily routines and behaviour, the little c, as Tomalin and Stempleski describe it.
  • Cultural skills
    The development of intercultural sensitivity and awareness, using the English language as the medium of interaction.


Culture – the fifth language skill

Why should we consider the teaching of a cultural skills set as part of language teaching and why should we consider it a fifth language skill, in addition to listening, speaking, reading and writing? I think there are two reasons. One is the international role of the English language and the other is globalisation.

Many now argue that the role of the English language in the curriculum is a life skill and should be taught as a core curriculum subject like maths, and the mother tongue. The reason for this is globalisation and the fact that to operate internationally people will need to be able to use a lingua franca. For the next twenty to thirty years at least, that language is likely to be English. That means that English will be a core communicative skill and will need to be taught early in the school curriculum. Many countries now introduce English at eight years old and many parents introduce their children to English at an even younger age, using ‘early advantage’ programmes.

The second argument is globalisation itself. You could say, ‘We are all internationalists now’. We are or will be dealing with foreigners in our community, going abroad more, dealing at a distance with foreigners through outsourcing or email, phone and video-conferencing. And this isn’t just for adults. Kids are interchanging experience and information through travel, keypal schemes and networks like Facebook. This is the time to develop the intercultural skills that will serve them in adult life.

Up until recently, I assumed that if you learned the language, you learned the culture but actually it isn’t true. You can learn a lot of cultural features but it doesn’t teach you sensitivity and awareness or even how to behave in certain situations. What the fifth language skill teaches you is the mindset and techniques to adapt your use of English to learn about, understand and appreciate the values, ways of doing things and unique qualities of other cultures. It involves understanding how to use language to accept difference, to be flexible and tolerant of ways of doing things which might be different to yours.  It is an attitudinal change that is expressed through the use of language.


Conclusion
These are some of the big picture issues I would be delighted to exchange ideas on with you. In the next article we can look in more detail at some of the ‘nitty gritty’ operational issues that teachers and materials developers have to deal with in their daily lives.

I look forward to meeting you on the Net.

Next article > Making culture happen in the English classroom

Comments

Submitted by Daliamirela28 on Wed, 06/20/2018 - 18:19

I utterly agree with this article. Leaning the language is far beyond learning the structure, the vocabulary, it is actually to learn the ways of thinking, the costumes, the slang, the expressions, etc. But the question is how? For example, I am teaching kindergarten right now and how come I am going to introduce my students the culture if I have to make some examples according to our reality? In this case is Peru and furthermore, I am in a public school and many parents don't know even the English spoken countries. So that is challenge for me, but I tried to introduce the holidays and special days but It is a bit difficult. On the other hand, I also teach in an institute with adults, and yes, I use with them more vocabulary, we talk about the culture, maybe some readings related to ir and they are willing to learn and also, to travel there. In a nutshell, I would say that CULTURE is relevant but it depends on the level and how you teach them and also, as teachers, we should know about it because some students want to know more.

Submitted by oromero1 on Thu, 04/16/2015 - 16:46

I love this summary and the comment: "It involves understanding how to use language to accept difference" cannot be more right---I am a fairly new ESL teacher and let me tell you--that is one of the hardest things to teach---How can we make the students look at themselves and say: I need to be more willing to accept other people---when in some cultures that is not the norm and /or have built in barriers in order to do so. Thank you Barry--I will definitely use your article to emphasize this unique point of view.

Submitted by Khuraman Safarova on Tue, 02/11/2014 - 15:03

It is a very interesting article for me. Each culture has its own values and people value their own culture. You consider after listening, speaking, reading,writing CULTURE is the next language skill. I think there will be smth. to change the awareness, understanding.You are right Culture should be taught as other subjects. Thank you for this thought much.

Submitted by ibtissem19 on Fri, 05/24/2013 - 11:48

 Good morning,  

   Well I just wanted to thank you a lot for this interesting article,I found it very helpful since it has just came in the right time when I need these information because I have an exam in few days concerning the teaching of culture as a fifth skill in EFL classrooms.

   So I thank you again sir 

                             Ibtissem

Submitted by Butterfly Princess on Sun, 11/04/2012 - 22:58

It is really important to have this culture awareness after all learning language is not only learning grammar, phonetics, the lexical, it is learning the culture of the countries too and also to become a whole different person as a consequence as we also absorb this culture.

Submitted by Gulshan Huseynli on Wed, 05/25/2011 - 15:40

. I am  a language teacher but for 6 month I worked as a laguage and cultural facilitator for Americans. From my experence i can say that it was even diffucult to teach my own culture. Every region has its own pecularities and traditions .Albeit I live in this country I was challenged a lot by questios coming from foreighners. Sometimes I think that may be it is impossible to teach culture you just need to live in that country preferable travel to different regions in order to form a full picture in your mind.

Submitted by JohnBrown on Thu, 11/18/2010 - 23:21

Thank you very much for introducing this topic.

Submitted by Pete35 on Thu, 01/21/2010 - 16:26

Excellent article and feedback. I would just like to comment that based on my own experience, I have found that it is just as important to have as deep a knowledge as possible about the students' own culture as it is to impart cultural knowledge of my own. It is, perhaps, the only way to provoke easier understanding of the various Englishes as well as spark student motivation.

Submitted by halasalih on Sun, 10/12/2008 - 21:14

 Mr. Barry

I would like to make the following points;

1. I think a native English language teacher must and need to teach culture in the ELT classroom, but does the second language teacher need to do the same with his students?

2. In Sudan, a policy of Arabization was widely enforced in higher education institutes early in 1990. English as a medium of instruction was replaced with Arabic. English language teaching was very much harmed by these policies. These policies were mainly a political reaction against the US influence in Sudan. Why was this? because at the time decision makers saw English language as very much related to the culture of the United States. They never saw it as the first language in the 21th century. They never saw the future. So is it logical to relate English to a certain culture?

Isn’t it more logical  to see English language as a global language rather than a language of a certain country?

3. Now everyone after 18 years realize the great harm that was done in the teaching of English language in Sudan. Who are the victims? Graduates who are unable to get employed or pursuit higher studies because they do not master a very important 21 century skill which is English Language.

4. With the signing of the peace treaty between south and north in 2004, English became the first language of south and a second language in the north. Suddenly English became a very important language in Sudan. Decision makers now see English as a global language, a must for any future advancement.

 4. I think we one day will have two brands of English language one as a lingua franca and the other an English closely related to a certain culture.

5. I saw a video on You Tube called “Shift happens”. The predications say that within the few coming years China will be number one English language speaking country. So are we going to teach Chinese culture?

6. Now with the financial crises facing the US and Europe is it logical to say who is the leader of the world now?

7. As an English language teacher I do want to see English language suffering due to politics. So it is safer to teach English without culture and to teach culture, tolerance and peace as  separate subjects.

Submitted by Oxford Di on Sun, 10/12/2008 - 09:15

Well, Barry, you're echoing what I think myself, although I couldn't have put it in such sophisticated language, not being a paid-up language expert.

Just a couple more examples:

a) Having lived in a small German town since my marriage to a German, I was quite unable to decode the message I received in response to an invitation to our Silver Wedding from a British lady, which was "I'll put it in my diary". Did that mean she was coming or even considering coming? Would she be sending us a telegramme or flowers instead? Anyway, I asked all the people I could think of what they thought it meant and the only one who said "She's coming" was not an ex-pat like me, but a NS with close links to the U.K.  But he was right, she turned up!

b) I was teaching my group of German employees of a car parts supplier (at B2 level) Discourse Markers recently and was proud to include some really idiomatic and up-to-date ones like whatever, awesome and so on. However, I was pulled up short when a young IT engineer said to me, "It's all very well your teaching us these expressions. But if I say to my opposite member in Tunisia on the phone "That's toast!" or " Spot on!" he won't understand me." Reluctantly I have had to go back to teaching BSE  - or almost. It's sometimes actually a liability to be a native speaker, or at any rate one who speaks RP and has a large vocabulary...

 

Submitted by halasalih on Wed, 10/08/2008 - 20:04

Your article is quiet interesting because for sometime now I though that teaching the culture of the English language is no longer important as English language is no longer the language of Britain or America it is a lingua franc. I thought that learning English as lingua franca doesn't pertain that we must teach the culture of English language. To teach culture as a separate skill is quiet important and I think  teaching our students to be aware, sensitive and respectful to other cultures will lead to greater world peace. But to teach culture as part of ELT is no longer plausible as English has become an international language, it has become the property of the whole world.
Hala Salih

Submitted by cherrymp on Mon, 10/06/2008 - 13:38

The issue of "culture awareness raising" is a very interesting one. I was made to think about the issues involved in this case. A "good morning" mean nothing much to a foreign user of the language other than that it's a form of greeting. But the moment s/he understands that there is lot more to it like the vagaries of the European weather and an English person's sense of relief in finding a sunny morning can bring in a new level of meaning to the language. Suddenly the greeting becomes personal. A teacher who can bring out these fine details of the language does a big service to the students.

But the question is, "How many teachers are aware of these details?". In India there existed a time where people learned English directly from a native speaker. The standard of English learning, many old-block learners recollect, was quite different at that time. But now that luxury is limited to some international schools. Rest of the learners are at the mercy of the local teachers who may or may not know about the culture of the target language. This points at the need to train teachers first. 

Moreover there is this question of owning English. It's no more "the English"; but Englishes. Users of English across the spectrum have adopted and adapted it in more than many ways. I agree that wherever there are points of intersection the language and its culture need to go hand in hand. But think about the possibility of a learner remaining in his/her country without an opportunity of meeting native speakers. I'm not so sure how relevant will the issue of teaching culture for such type of learners. 

All languages do have their cultural roots. The range of words for snow in an Eskimo's language can be many. An Eskimo can make out the different types of snow and can use a separate word for each. But for a learner from the rest of the world "snow means snow". That's all.

Thus, my points are:

  1. Teachers ought to be prepared in order to talk or bring in culture wherever it's relevant.
  2. Also, such teachers should decide whether their learners require cultural input or not and if required to what extent and how to impart such knowledge.
Prescriptive methods won't work here.  

Submitted by hilaryross on Tue, 10/07/2008 - 12:52

In reply to by cherrymp

This is a very interesting debate, and particularly interesting to me as a (very) mature, third year English undergraduate completing a final year project about second language acquisition.  My focus is international post-graduate students, studying for masters degrees, particularly in Business, at an English university, and the difficulties they face in moving from learning English to learning in English.

In the course of my research I have noted that cultural issues add an extra dimension to the challenge that some international students face when studying in English.  For example, I have observed Business lectures where students have to discuss, present and are tasked to write about such things as 'family-friendly policies, 'empowerment' and 'work-life balance' - not just vocabulary items but also heavily culturally-laden terms that take some unpacking! 

In my opinion, therefore, especially for those students intending to study at English speaking universities, culture must be taught as the fifth language skill.  Outisde the lecture room too, cultural awareness should improve integration into university life.

It is correct that culture plays an important role in language and sometimes the difference between cultural and linguistic interpretation is hard to define. For example, it is customary to use "I'm afraid..." in English to transmit bad news, more often than in many cultures/languages (?) In Germany where I teach the use of "müssen" does not have the same hint of impatience which the English use of the word "must" tends to imply.

There is no good reason why culture and language should or could be separated. Languages develop after all in a cultural milieu. Esperanto failed in part at least because of its cultural sterility. Now that English has established itself as a the global lingua franca, the problem arises, as one contributor has already pointed out, to what extent does one "teach" the culture of the language, and if one does, then  which culture? Indian? British? English? Irish? American?

Part of the answer is surely that it depends on what the customer actually needs and wants. Someone learning English in order to conduct an export business with China does not need the same sensitivity to the cultural elements of the English language as someone who will be an insurance rep. in communication with English insurance companies.

 Before I start with a group and as a course progresses I try to be sensitive to the extent to which learners need and want to be aware of the cultural element, which is not just a question of culture as such but also of language. A Chinese person will hardly care if a learner said "to whom should we deliver the goods?" instead of the more usual and more modern "who should we deliver the goods to?" but for native speaker ears the choice of "posher" English with the use of whom and initial preposition carries a deal of cultural baggage with it, whether good or bad is another question.

 Then there is the question of formal and informal English which itself has a cultural history and element to it-the French root words (receive(/enter) being more formal and the German root words more colloquial, more intimate  (get/come in). In terms of learning priorities this affects for example how much time and weight a trainer will give to phrasal verbs, which are the colloquial backbone of the language but distinctly Anglo-Saxon-Germanic.

 Enough said by me for now on a very ("really" interesting not "very" if you want to be culturally sensitive to the way young people speak) interesting subject!

 

 

Submitted by Ajit Singh Nagpal on Mon, 10/06/2008 - 13:32

Under normal circumstances I agree that when you learn a language you should also learn the culture.  There is a direct correlation between these 2.  However in the case of the English language I am not sure.  Firstly the English language is an anglo-saxon language.  Secondly it is spoken as the native language in many countries.  Whose culture are you going to learn?  Who is going to claim ownership.  

The Canadians, Americans, Australians, Scottish, Irish and the English claim ownership of the English language. 

To me the English language is a global language.  It is recognized as the language of progress, development, science & technology, and being infomed of what is happening in the world.            

Submitted by giganick on Sat, 10/04/2008 - 05:38

Context based, meaningful, language learning is likely to contain a lot of cultural instruction. From novels to nature discussions, cultural items will continuously come through. I worry purposeful cultural instruction could be a new breed of grammar based translation, over focusing in L2 on skills which in L1 are not purposefully studied.

Of course, my perspective is that of a British teacher teaching Japanese 15 to 18 year olds English in Japan, and the big question for me would be which culture to teach? International cultural awareness is taught by parents, media (analytical and entertainment, from Japanese and foreign sources), teachers of any subject, and just about anyone with a voice. By age 15, the students have been buried in parochial, distorted, unreliable and out dated cultural knowledge and their language skills are certainly inadequate to study the misunderstandings through English. I teach "culture" as it comes up, and I am very careful to point out this is my perspective; that I have never been to America; that within Britain, there is great variety; and that I advise them not to have expectations, but to develop flexibility and perception, instead*.

Indeed, the school had me lecture the 200 students who are about to go to Australia, to prepare them. First, the lecture was in their L1. Secondly, rather than telling them what to expect, I tried to dispel their false beliefs and prepare them to be flexible and open minded. Well, having never been to the area they are visiting, I couldn't really tell them that much about the cultural norms there.

Extra-curricular, if I have time, I produce and print cultural worksheets for distribution to the whole school, usually in a mix of Japanese and English. In lessons, occasionally I'll do a halloween or christmas special, but usually I restrict cultural exposition and discussion to what arises and I deem necessary for the students knowledge, and their motivation.

Basically, I believe cultural teaching should be restricted to what naturally arises in the lesson - an inductive approach.

However, my attitude has been coloured by the results of unconsidered or overly-deductive cultural teaching. I am very interested in Mr Tomalin's investigation and cannot wait to hear advice on teaching "the mindset and techniques to adapt your use of English to learn about, understand and appreciate the values, ways of doing things and unique qualities of other cultures."

Thank you very much for introducing this topic.

Giganick. 

*The four skills are part of a two by two matrix, oral production, oral interpretation, written production, and written interpretation. Surely Culture would have to be two skills: Cultural production (flexibility) and Cultural interpretation (perception)? (And hopefully not four: Written cultural production, Oral cultural interpretation, etc??)

 

 

high school teacher, Japan

Submitted by Astral on Thu, 10/02/2008 - 18:00

Hi! It is very interesting the article I read from you. It is true that English language has been necessary to communicate in a society that it's been changed in many ways by globalization. It implies to understand different points of view about how we perceive life. We have to adapt and tolerate other behaviour styles. And language is the mean to manage it. I'm an English teacher and I agree about teaching the language in a funny way and everything is ok, but it's our responsibility to update our knowledge as a part of our preparation as teachers. We need to be informed about what is going on in the world. To know as much as possible about other behaviours and traditions so we can teach students to receive and give the infirmation just as they want. If we manage to do that, we and they will be able to use English language in an objective way, with no misunderstandings. We could communicate without disrespecting in any way people from other cultures.

Thanks a lot !!

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