On The Role Of Western History And Culture In Foreign Language Teaching

The teaching of culture is required as our countiry's policy in foreign language education. However, this issue has long been widely ignored in the foreign language teaching practice in our country. In 2003, China's Ministry of Education published National English Curricula Standards, which includes cultural-awareness cultivating and Western history and culture. This paper is concerned with why and how to practice the teaching of Western history and culture in the English language teaching.The paper includes three parts. One is the relationship between Western culture and English teaching. The second is about the status of Western history and culture in the English curricula in high schools.The last part brings forth the stratigies and methods about the teaching of Western history and culture. The author holds that more attention should be paid to the teaching of Western history and culture in the English teaching based on the National English Curricula Standards, and measures should be taken to reform the organization of English teaching in the classroom by learning from the cream of Western culture, and we should combine the teaching of Western history and culture with the teaching practice of the English language. Lots of practical suggestions are proposed in the paper.The value of the paper is that it draws the attention of foreign language teachers and education departments concerned to the issue of cultural-awareness cultivatation in English teaching, helps them understand better the significance and practical measures of the teaching of Western history and culture, thus helps guarantee the full inplementation of the National English Standards.