EXPLORING CULTURAL CONTENT OF THREE PROMINENT EFL TEXTBOOKS IN IRAN (A CASE STUDY OF AMERICAN ENGLISH FILES, TOP NOTCH AND FOUR CORNERS)

Abstract

Cultural content has become an important issue after the advent of intercultural communicative approach (ICC) in language teaching field. The current study analyzed cultural content of three mainstream intermediate level EFL textbooks. This study was carried out using Chen's (2004) and Lee's (2009) suggested themes for detecting big "C" and little "c" culture aspects. Big C represents series of statistics and facts such as art, geography, history, education, festivals, and customs of the target speech community; small c represents norms, beliefs, sociocultural variables such as age, sex, and social position (Lee, 2009). This study also analyzed the cultural categories including target culture, source culture and international culture based on Cortazzi and Jin's (1999) category and another category i.e. neutral culture based on Aliakbari's (2004) category. This was a qualitative-quantitative study and chi- square test was applied in it. It was found that generally both little "c" and big "C" are present in the textbooks. However, in all the three textbooks little "c" has gained higher frequency than big "C". It was also revealed that the percentage of little "c" in Top Notch is more than other books and little "c" percentage in Four Corners is the least.

Headnote

Abstract: Cultural content has become an important issue after the advent of intercultural communicative approach (ICC) in language teaching field. The current study analyzed cultural content of three mainstream intermediate level EFL textbooks. This study was carried out using Chen's (2004) and Lee's (2009) suggested themes for detecting big "C" and little "c" culture aspects. Big C represents series of statistics and facts such as art, geography, history, education, festivals, and customs of the target speech community; small c represents norms, beliefs, sociocultural variables such as age, sex, and social position (Lee, 2009). This study also analyzed the cultural categories including target culture, source culture and international culture based on Cortazzi and Jin's (1999) category and another category i.e. neutral culture based on Aliakbari's (2004) category. This was a qualitative-quantitative study and chi- square test was applied in it. It was found that generally both little "c" and big "C" are present in the textbooks. However, in all the three textbooks little "c" has gained higher frequency than big "C". It was also revealed that the percentage of little "c" in Top Notch is more than other books and little "c" percentage in Four Corners is the least.

Key words: Intercultural competence, Source culture, Target culture, International culture, big "C", little "c"

1. Introduction

A famous feature of modern foreign language education approach is that affluent foreign language learning and foreign culture learning go together (Hamers & Blanc, 1989). Peterson & Coltrane (2003) stated that a language learner cannot fully master a language without mastering the cultural contexts in which the language occurs. Thus, language and culture are entangled in a way that separating one from the other would adversely affect either the language or culture sense (Brown, 2001).

The existence of this relationship has led to some debate over which culture should be more focused; target culture, source culture, or both of them. Some believe that target culture needs to be highlighted, others insist on source culture and still there are others who think both cultures need to be emphasized while acquiring a new language. For instance, Stewart (1972) asserts that target culture is an indispensable part of foreign language instruction, while local culture reference in language teaching is absurd (Xiao, 2010). Méndez García (2005) proposes that familiarizing language learners with target language culture has five main necessities: (1) it enhances learners knowledge of world and foreign society, (2) culture learning acquaints learners with prominent behavior related patterns of target community, (3) it fosters their respect and tolerance attitude, (4) it promotes ones' concept of his/her culture, (5) it highlights ones' cultural assumption r ole or increases ones; intercultural communication competence. However, there are some other scholars who emphasize both target and source cultures, hence focusing on the intercultural competence. Acquiring the intercultural competence (ICC) in language learning is an important competence in today's world, resulting from the interaction between different cultures (Dervin, 2006). Hamilo?lu and Mendi (2010, p. 16) state that ICC is "one's awareness of others' cultures as well as his /her own culture".

Cortazzi and Jin (1991) categorize EFL textbooks to three types depending on their treatment of culture. These categories include: source, target and international. Respectively, the first type is produced at national level that is learners learn to talk about their own culture (C1) to visitors and is not made ready for encountering other cultures' speakers so they do not develop in tercultural awareness. The second type, target textbooks whose focal point is on target culture of countries such as the United Kingdom and United States. Aliakbari (2004) added another type to these which refers to textbooks with neutral cultural materials; these textbooks usually deal with school or university subject through the use of target language (TL).

Chastain (1988), Tomalin & Stempleski (1993), Pulverness (1995) and Paige et al. (1999) separated culture in to big "C" and small "c" (Xiao, 2010). According to Xiao (2010), big "C" culture highlights products, achievements and individuals of a society, while little "c" culture is about lifestyles, daily lives and routine aspects of a society. She also, asserts that in EFL classes more attention should be assigned to little "c". Since, this culture aspect is the one which will acquaint language learners with beliefs, ideas, and values of another society.

In any language classroom, textbook is seen as the main teaching material. Hinkel (1999) marked the general agreement over the idea that textbooks are used as the main materials in language classes. As Tomlinson (1998) states textbooks provide a basis for language input and practice which takes place in class.

Although cultural-content analysis of EFL textbooks is a fertile ground for research, there has been scarce research on EFL textbooks that are widely in use in Iran. Sharif and Yarmohammadi (2013) asserted that few studies have probed cultural content of EFL textbooks (for instance Aliakbari, 2004 , Khajavi & Abbasian, 2011) or investigated cultural portrayal in various textbook series employed at language institutes in Iran (such as Rashidi & Najafi, 2010, Ziaei, 2012).

2. Role of Culture in Language Teaching

Culture as a rule for routine lifestyle of people began to be stressed in the field of language education in 1960s (Bateman & Mattos, 2006). In 60s "cross cultural communication and understanding" as a goal for language education came into the picture (Lessard-Clouston, 1997). Appearance of Communicative approaches in language education field furthers the incorporation of language and culture (Canale and Swain, 1980).

According to communicative competence (CC) introduced by Hymes (1972) to language teaching domain, language learners or speakers need more than grammatical competence to communicate effectively in a target language. Furthermore, Culture can impact language teaching linguistically and pedagogically (McKay, 2003). Linguistically, culture influences the meaning, discourse and pragmatic. Pedagogically, it affects language material selection for its cultural content and cultural foundation of instruction method.

Moran (2001) clarifies that language is the means to adapt and use different cultural products and it is also a tool to name and comprehend perceptions and values which control one's lifestyle. So, the two should be taught at the same time. Politzer (1959) states: "[i]f we teach language without teaching at the same time the culture in which it operates, we are teaching meaningless symbols to which the students attach the wrong meaning".

Another fact which makes culture an inseparable part of language education is that "cultural knowledge is crucial in achieving linguistic proficiency, and the culture of a society can be changed depending upon the language used" (Kuo & Lai, 2006).

Taking into account the universality aspect of English or Englishes (i.e. different accents of English spoken in Australia, India, etc.) as a world language, Wandel (2003) maintains that using English as a lingua franca also means that English learners must be interculturaly sensitive. Kramsch (2002) explains that an intercultural speaker is someone who can interact with speakers of other cultures considering cultural otherness and having some level of endurance. A language learner is considered as "intercultural speaker" (Byram, 1997; Kramsch, 1993; Risager, 1998) when he/she obtains the competency to interpret values, behaviors and beliefs of their own and of speakers of the other culture with different language and cultural background (Byram, 2006). Generally, it can be stated that "the acquisition of cultural knowledge in language learning is defined as intercultural competence" (Turkan & Servet, 2007, p. 23).

Baker (2012) notices that cultural understanding is not only limited to target language culture understanding but also to understanding one's own culture. According to McKay (2004), the aim of learning a lingua franca is to express one's own culture and interest in others culture. For this end, there are a number of models which serve as a tool for integrating culture into language teaching. As Abdullah and Chandran (2009) put it intercultural understanding is exposing learners to target culture, which is English and somewhat American, and also introducing them to their own culture. One advantage of intercultural competence and cultural focus is its communicative ends; it encourages the maturation of identity and awareness toward other identities as well (Cortazzi & Jin, 1999).

3. A Model of Culture Incorporation in Language Teaching

Paige et al. (1999, 2003) envisioned a model to incorporate language and culture teaching (Figure 1). According to Paige et al. (1999, p. 50) "culture learning is the process of acquiring the culture specific and culture-general knowledge, skills, and attitudes required for effective communication and interaction with individuals from other cultures. They further defined culture general and culture specific learning. "culture-general learning, i.e., learning about universal, cross-cultural phenomena such as cultural adjustment" (Paige et al. 2003, p. 5). "Culture-specific learning, i.e., learning about a particular culture, includes its language" (Paige et al. 2003, p.5). This culture learning is a dynamic, developmental, and ongoing process which engages the learner cognitively, behaviorally, and affectively".

In Paige et al.'s model, achieving these two aspects (Figure 1) are necessary as learning outcomes (Lee, 2009). These two aspects must be actualized in terms of: 1.Cognitive (knowledge), 2, Behavior (acting), and 3. Effective (attitudes) in a dynamic process, not a simple memorization (Lee, 2009).

Paige et al. (1999, 2003) states the necessity of this learning, since it gives learners a basic starting point in culture learning. Paige et al. (1999, 2003) further divided culture-specific aspect into both Big "C" and small "c". The Big "C" shows a series of statistics and facts about art, geography, histo ry, education, festivals, and customs of the target speech community. On the contrary, the small "c" represents that sense of target culture society which is invisible and deeper; such as: norms, beliefs, sociocultural variables like age, sex, and social position (Lee, 2009).

4. Role of Textbooks in Language Teaching

Risager (1991) states that before 1950s, a mainly linguistic role was assigned to language teaching texts; however after 1970s, these texts usually included the social context of the related foreign countries (Servet and Sakire, 2013). When the functional and communicative proficiency approaches emerged in the 1970s-1980s, the textbooks were viewed as snapshots by which the culture could be illustrated, described and understood (Kramsch & McConnell-Ginet, 1992). So, course books possibly exert the most effective as a cultural bearer (Joiner, 1974). Moreover, since the growth of English as an international language, cultural content was incorporated in language instruction programs (Pulverness, 2003). In the process of selecting textbooks one of the concerns is its cultural content, which is hoped to be included in "process of textbook decision making" (Hermawan and Noerkhasanah, 2012, p.53). Hence, textbooks can introduce students to the culture of different countries and regions.

Benahnia (2012) believed that beginner EFL learners should be mostly exposed to their L1 or mother tongue culture, since it gives them self-confidence and ability to talk to others about their own culture. When learners move ahead towards next level of their FL (foreign language) learning, they should be exposed to a wider scope of TL culture which in turn gives learners the chance to become familiar with a wider range of the cultural element in TL.

The research fails to find any study that tries to compare and contrast some of the mainstream English textbook used in Iran regarding the cultural presentation. So to fill the existing gap of such studies in Iran this study attempts to compare and contrast three mainstream textbooks in Iran in terms of cultural categories and types and Chen's/ Lee's themes in order to establish their cultural presentation.

5. Methodology of The Study

The materials of the present study were three popular and in use series of English textbooks entitled Top Notch, Four Corners and English Files series. For the purpose of this study, intermediate level was chosen. Among four levels of books, i.e. elementary, pre-intermediate, intermediate, and upper intermediate, this level has been chosen, due to the fact that in elementary and pre-intermediate levels main focus of textbooks is on developing students' basic language skills. So, in elementary level, culture and cultural aspect learning have a very slight role. However, it is in intermediate level that English language teachers start to familiarize learners with different aspects of target culture. The chosen books are generally designed for young-adult EFL learners' use.

In this study, dialogues, pictures and activities presented in each unit of the books were analyzed based on the little "c" and big "C" types of culture. Also, categories of culture, i.e. source, target, international and free culture were identified in each aspect. These three aspects were defined as follow:

Pictures (P): all the photographs and images included in each unit.

Dialogues (D): conversations and interactions which are included in each unit as a real life situation communication. In English files books since there is no conversation or dialogues, the reading sections will be examined (some of the readings, are in the form of conversation or interview).

Activities (A): speaking and discussion tasks which are incorporated to enhance learners' communication abilities.

For the purpose of this study the cultural categories which include the target culture, source culture and international culture were studied mostly based on categories proposed by Cortazzi and Jin's (1999) and another category i.e. neutral culture based on what is introduced by Aliakbari (2004).The themes related to big C and little c are the modified version of Chen's (2004) and Lee's (2009) concepts on the themes. For the present study, final draft of Xiao's (2010) analysis criteria of cultural content was used.

The criteria used for cultural content in this study were categorized in terms of target culture, source culture, international culture or culture free with big "C" and little "c" under target culture, source culture and international culture. Moreover, for each category, pictures, dialogues and activities included in each unit are considered. The purpose of this kind of categorization is to provide a comprehensive picture of how culture is portrayed in each textbook. In his study, Xiao (2010) examined the distribution of cultural details under big "C" and little "c" types of culture and designed 16 themes to carry out his examination. This study has used the same themes.

1. Big "c" cultures are (9 themes): politics, history, economy, geography, literature/art, social norms, education, architectures, and music. ( Appendix 1)

2. Little "c" cultures are (7 themes): food, holiday, lifestyle, customs, values, hobbies and gestures/ body languages. (Appendix 2)

6. Procedure of The Study

The textbook analysis was carried out in two different phases.

Phase 1: Determining the object of each unit

In this phase, the general objective of each unit has been determined. For instance, the general goal of unit one in Four Corners (volume 3) was education; to make learners familiar with school subjects and different modes of education. Thus, based on this "object" the investigator could make a general conclusion that all the pictures, dialogues and activities probably contained target culture, source culture, international culture, or even culture free concepts and "education" theme under big "C" culture.

Phase 2: textbook analysis, classifying pictures, dialogues and activities into categories and types of culture

After making an approximate prediction in phase one, the investigator carried out the second phase to examine main ideas of dialogues, activities and pictures. Then she coded them with the categories and types of cultures. This analysis could make the examiner able to count different categories and types of culture and themes.

In order to determine the culture categories, the name of countries mentioned in each part was noted and then coded. For the purpose of theme classification under types of culture, main ideas of each section were determined. Then each part was coded with the corresponding theme according to the coding guidelines (Appendixes 1 and 2).

7. Results of The Study

Table 4.1 shows comparison of cultural categories among the three books using chi-square test. The data reveals that with chi square rate of 8.832 and significance of 0.138, there is no statistically significant difference among the three books in terms of their cultural categories.

To conclude the above findings, in books Four Corners 3 and Top Notch 2, the target culture is highlighted over the other three categories of culture since it has gained the highest frequency. However, in American English files, source culture has gained the highest frequency of the other three, thus being more focused. Table 4.7 has showed that there is no statistically significant difference among the three books under study in terms of cultural categories. Moreover, the cultural content presented in the chosen textbooks includes both the target culture and source culture. Therefore, they are basically designed with the aim of enhancing learners' intercultural competence.

Having investigated the distribution of the sixteen themes in the three books, the researcher presents the frequencies and percentages of all themes in the three books in Table 4. 2.

Table 4.2 shows that, there is statistically significant difference among the themes in the three books. In all the three books, the highest frequency belongs to the lifestyle. In Four Corners 3 and Top Notch 2 after lifestyle, the highest frequency is related to the social norms of big "C" and values of little "c". In American English Files, themes values, hobbies and social norms have the highest frequency.

To examine the percentages and types of culture, the proportions of the big "C" and little "c" culture in the three books are shown in table 4.3. As far as the types of culture are concerned, the percentage of big "C" and little "c" cultures are 42.42% versus 57.58% in Four Corners volume 3, 28.33% versus 71.67% in American English Files volume 3, and 21.43% versus 78.57% in Top Notch 2.

Data demonstrated in Table 4.3 reveals the significance of 0.037 with 95% certainty that there is a statistically significant difference among the three books in terms of big "C" and little "c" themes. It has also revealed that the percentage of little "c" in Top Notch is more than that of in other books and little "c" percentage in Four Corners is the least.

Therefore, it can be concluded that all three textbooks include little "c" and big "C" aspects of culture learning. In all three textbooks, higher percentage is given to the little "c" aspect of culture learning. However, the percentage of little "c" in Top Notch is found to be the highest, so it can better acqu aint language learners with beliefs, values and ideas of the target society.

8. Conclusion

The result of the study indicates that target culture is highlighted over the other categories of culture in Four Corners (volume3) and Top Notch (volume 2). This finding is in agreement with Liu and Laohawiriyanon (2013), Herman and Noerkhasnah (2012), and Mahmood, Asghar & Hussain (2012) findings. Liu and Laohawiriyanon (2013) reported that more percentage of EFL college English textbooks for Chinese non-English major students, belonged to target culture. Herman and Noerkhasnah (2012) concluded prominent target culture focus in the data collected from textbooks "Grow with English". Mahmood, Asghar & Hussain (2012), in their theory based content analysis found out that the textbooks majorly focused on non-native culture.

Nonetheless, in American English files source culture had the highest frequency. This study produced results which contradicts with Ziaei (2012). The purpose of his study was to determine the scope of global consideration in four levels of American English files textbooks. The outcome of the study showed frequent reference to UK and USA in the reading texts. Moreover, he found no reference to Iran. However, since this study was set out to analyze pictures, dialogues and speaking activities, it can be concluded that the contradiction is due to the difference in data collection method.

Corbett (2003) asserts that one of the main goals of language teaching is to enhance learners' understanding and tolerance of two different cultures, i.e. source culture and target culture. With respect to source culture and target culture, observed from the results of textbooks analysis, source culture occurred 35.8% (in Four Corners), 35.0% (in American English Files) and 34.5% (in Top Notch). Source culture majorly occupied the speaking activities, i.e. there was almost no reference to source culture other than in speaking activities. Target culture covered 47.8% (Four Corners), 31.7% (American English Files), and 37.9% (Top Notch). Target culture majorly occurred in dialogues and following that in pictures, there was almost no reference to target culture in speaking activities. International culture followed target and source culture and occupied 14.9% (Four Corners), 33.3% (American English Files) and 24.1% (Top Notch). The least frequency belonged to free culture which is a neutral category; 1.5% (Four Corners), 0% (American English Files), and 3.4% (Top Notch). Totally, the highest frequency belonged to target culture (39.5%), followed by source culture (35.1%) and international culture (23.8%), respectively. The least frequency was occupied by free culture (1.6%).

Since the textbooks were chosen from intermediate levels, target culture higher frequency is consistent with Benahnia (2012) diagram. According to him when beginner EFL learners are exposed to their mother tongue culture, it gives them self-confidence and the ability to talk to others about their own culture. When learners move to next level of their foreign language learning process, they should be exposed to a wider scope of target culture which in turn gives learners the chance to become familiar with a wider range of the cultural elements in target language. Furthermore, another positive effect of target inclusion in cultural content is motivation. According to Gardner and Lambert (1972) and Adaskou, Britten, and Fahsi (1990), integration of cultural components in language teaching materials motivates learners.

This accords with our earlier observations of the shift from traditional trends of EFL to intercultural. Kramsch (1993) states that inter-cultural competence refers to this idea that EFL learners must enjoy the ability of understanding both source culture and foreign/ target culture. Intercultural communicative competence (ICC) can be defined as "ability to ensure a shared understanding by people of different social identities, and [the] ability to interact with people as complex human beings with multiple identities and their own individuality" (Byra m, Gribkova & Starkey, 2002, p. 10). Hence, these books are designed to develop intercultural competent speakers since they include both target culture and source culture.

In all three books, the highest frequency belonged to life styles. Liu and Laohawiri yanon's (2013), in their analysis of an EFL college textbook found out that the widespread theme is "value" of little "c". These findings show a strong agreement with many scholars' idea that little "c" plays a prominent role in promoting language learners intercultural communicative competence (Lee, 2009 and Wintergerst & Mcveigh, 2010). They maintain that little "c" culture has a more prominent role in everyday communications than big "C" culture, for via little "c" language learners acquire the ability to communicate in everyday situations and hence, become intercultural competent learners.

These findings further support the idea of Paige et al. (1999, 2003) and Lee (2009). According to Paige et al. (1999, 2003), big "C" shows a series of statistics and facts about art, geography, history, education, festivals, and customs of the target speech community. On the contrary, the small "c" represents that sense of target culture society which is invisible and deeper; such as: norms, beliefs, sociocultural variables like age, sex, and social position (Lee, 2009). According to Lee (2009), learners easily memorize the Big "C" domain of culture specific aspect and what is particularly important is the small "c", since thought process, beliefs and language use are all results of socio- cultural ethics, norms, values and beliefs. Moreover, Knowledge of small "c" can help learners understand how target society members use their language to function appropriately (Lee, 2009).

Another interesting fact about this study is, that of all the 16 themes for little "c" and big "C" the lifestyle (40.5 %) and values (15.7%) of little "c" and social norms (22.2%) of big "C" have gained highest frequency of other themes. Moreover, there is no trace of some themes such as politics, history and holidays in any of the books. The present findings seem to be consistent with Szyma?ska - Czaplak's (2009) research which found that EFL textbooks present a picture of people in routine situations, usual places, festivals and lifestyle, whereas multicultural aspects are occurred less frequently.

This study has found that generally both little "c" and big "C" were present in the textbooks. However, in all the three textbooks, little "c" has gained higher frequency than big "C". Lee (2009) mentione d that learners memorize the Big "C" easily and it is the small "c" which is more important.

The evidence from this study also suggested that since there was no significant difference among the three books in terms of their presentation of target and source culture, Top Notch (volume 2), Four Corners (volume 3), English Files (volume 3) are to some extent equally appropriate for developing intercultural English speakers as EFL's. Regarding big "C" and little "c" types of culture, there is statistically significant difference among the themes in the three books. In all three books, the highest frequency belonged to the lifestyle. In Four Corners 3 and Top Notch 2 after lifestyle, the highest frequency was related to the social norms of big "C" and values of little "c". In American English Files themes values, hobbies and social norms have the highest frequency.

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Appendix

(ProQuest: Appendix omitted.)