Culture Teaching In English Teaching For Non-English Major Postgraduates And Intercultural Communicative Competence Development

The development of science and technology, popularity of advanced communication, and economic globalization—all this makes the intercultural communication more frequent than ever before. The increasing intercultural communication calls for the foreign language learners with not only language abilities but also intercultural communicative competence (ICC). Nowadays, it is commonly acknowledged that the ultimate goal of foreign language education is to develop learners'ICC competence. To achieve this goal, culture teaching should be integrated into foreign language teaching (FLT). So far, research has been done to investigate ICC competence of Chinese foreign language learners, and the objective, the content and the method of culture teaching are proposed by many researchers to improve students'ICC competence. However,research is mostly concerned with middle school students or college undergraduates and seldom with non-English major graduate students.With the expansion of postgraduate enrollment, English teaching for non-English major postgraduates has gain momentum in the recent years. However, Traditional grammar-translation method is still dominant in graduate English education, which can not meet the social need for the talented people with ICC competence. Therefore, to develop ICC competence of non-English major postgraduates, it is necessary and imperative to improve its current syllabus, course arrangement, textbook, evaluation system and teaching practice from the view of integrating culture elements into English teaching for non-English major postgraduates.Based on the commonly accepted belief that language teaching to some extent is culture teaching, the thesis explores the model of systematic integration of culture teaching into graduate English education. In order to put forward the model catering for the needs of non-English major postgraduates, an investigation is conducted to get empirical information on the current status of culture teaching in graduate English education. Since intercultural sensitivity has been regarded as a first step toward ICC competence, Intercultural Sensitivity Scale (ISS) formulated by Chen and Starosta (2000) is used in the investigation to evaluate the current level of intercultural sensitivity of non-English major postgraduates in Kunming University of Science and Technology (KMUST). A survey questionnaire is also used to get the information on non-English major postgraduates'attitudes towards culture teaching and the real practice concerning culture teaching. Based on the findings of the investigation, the author proposes integrating culture teaching into English courses for non-English major postgraduates, both required English courses and elective English courses, to develop students'intercultural sensitivity and ultimately improve their ICC competence.The thesis consists of five parts. Chapter one is the introductory part, covering the background, the purpose and significance of the research and the layout of the thesis. To provide theoretical foundation for the study, chapter two analyzes the definitions of language, culture, communication and their relationships; explores the concept of ICC competence and its components. Also, the history of culture teaching broad and at home is briefly reviewed in this chapter. Chapter three is a case study which attempts to evaluate the current level of intercultural sensitivity of the non-English major postgraduates in KMUST and analyze the existing problems of culture teaching in graduate English education. As the main part of the thesis, chapter four is devoted to suggestions for developing ICC competence of non-English major postgraduates. Two aspects are included: discussing the prerequisites of integrating culture teaching into English teaching for non-English major postgraduates; proposing the model of incorporating culture teaching into English teaching for non-English major postgraduates and the useful techniques of culture teaching in the teaching practice. The last chapter concludes the whole thesis and addresses its limitations and suggestions for the further study.