Pre-Service Teachers’ Views on the Presentation of Culture in EFL Coursebooks

Abstract

Along with the suitable methodoloy to teach English as a foreign language, social and cultural domains have become prominent as well and now they constitute a very significant part of English language education. Considering that culture is an inseparable part of a language, the concept of culture and its use in EFL classes have become an important means for mediating the learner and the target language. However, culture, is not considered as the culture of the target language only but also culture of the learner and the other communities in the world, that is, international culture today. The reciprocal and complex relationship between culture and language is now a source for further discussions and it concerns teachers of EFL regarding to its exploitation, benefits and harms, both as an input and output in their classes. That is why it is very significant how teachers view culture and how they exploit it in their teaching contexts. This present study aims to explore the perceptions and views of year 4 (senior) pre-service (PTs) at the department of English Language Teaching in a state university in İstanbul, Turkey, as the prospective teachers, on the representations of target language, local and international culture in EFL coursebooks. A content analysis and a structured interview served as the instruments of the study. The results indicated that majority of the participants desire and prefer to see cultural presentations in EFL coursebooks and similarly they prefer international culture elements instead of purely target or local ones to take place

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