Intercultural Language Teaching and Learning [Hardcover]

This wide-ranging survey of issues in intercultural language teaching and learning covers everything from core concepts to program evaluation, and advocates a fluid, responsive approach to teaching language that reflects its central role in fostering intercultural understanding.

• Includes coverage of theoretical issues defining language, culture, and communication, as well as practice-driven issues such as classroom interactions, technologies, programs, and language assessment
• Examines systematically the components of language teaching: language itself, meaning, culture, learning, communicating, and assessments, and puts them in social and cultural context
• Features numerous examples throughout, drawn from various languages, international contexts, and frameworks
• Incorporates a decade of in-depth research and detailed documentation from the authors’ collaborative work with practicing teachers
• Provides a much-needed addition to the sparse literature on intercultural aspects of language education

 

1 Introduction 1

Language, Culture, and Language Education 1

The Concept of Method 2

Critiques of Method 3

Moving beyond Methods 4

About this Book 7

2 Languages, Cultures, and the Intercultural 11

Understanding Language 11

Language as a structural system 12

Language as a communicative system 13

Language as social practice 13

Concluding comments 16

Understanding Culture 17

Cultures as national attributes 18

Cultures as societal norms 19

Cultures as symbolic systems 20