A Contrastive Study Of Cultural Content In The 2019 Editions Of High School English Textbooks By People's Education Press And Foreign Language Teaching And Research Press

The General High School English Curriculum Standards(2017 Edition)emphasizes that school education should enhance students' cultural self-confidence,and should enable students to have the ability to spread Chinese culture and have intercultural communication competence.However,it is the textbook that plays a guiding role in the entire teaching activity.Therefore,studies of culture in textbooks in the literature are also increasing.Aiming at the new curriculum standards,scholars have analyzed the shortcomings of the old textbooks and made corresponding suggestions for editors.In 2019,new textbooks were published.Therefore,this study uses text analysis and data analysis methods to analyze the selection of cultural goals and cultural contents contained in the 2019 PEP and FLTRP high school English compulsory textbooks and to compare the similarities and differences between the two versions of the textbooks in terms of cultural goals and cultural content choices,so as to make suggestions on the selection and use of textbooks.This study mainly answers the following three questions:(1)What are the similarities and differences between the cultural awareness goals in the two editions of English compulsory textbooks?(2)What are the similarities and differences between the choice of cultural content in the two editions of English compulsory textbooks under the dimension of cultural structure?(3)What are the similarities and differences in the choice of cultural content in the two editions of English compulsory textbooks under the dimension of regional structure?Through the comparison of the two textbooks,it is found that: first,in terms of cultural goals,both English textbooks emphasize the cultivation of students' intercultural communication competence.However,the PEP textbooks emphasis more on the inheritance and spread of Chinese culture,and the FLTRP textbooks are more inclined to compare different cultures.Second,based on the comparative analysis of cultural content under the dimension of cultural structure,it can be concluded that the types of culture presented in the two editions of textbooks cover most of the types of culture proposed in the new curriculum standards.But the two editions of the textbook lack the introduction of the cultures of politics and system.In addition,in terms of material selection,the content of the articles selected in the two editions of the textbook is relatively new.The passages of FLTRP are closer to the original English materials,and it is more difficult for students to understand.The selection of passages in the PEP textbooks and the design of activities are mostly injected into Chinese cultural content,which is closer to the lives of students.Third,through the comparative analysis of cultural content based on the regional structure dimension,it is concluded that the distribution of target culture,source culture,international culture,comparative culture and other cultural topics in PEP textbooks is more evenly distributed than FLTRP.And the proportion of the input of contrastive culture and source culture is relatively large.FLTRP textbooks account for a large proportion of cultural topics.Regarding the distribution of Chinese culture,although the distribution of culture in the two editions of the textbooks is relatively scattered,they all fit the theme of each unit.In terms of the number of countries and the number of appearances involved in cultural content,the countries covered by the two editions of textbooks are relatively wide,which is conducive to the development of students' international perspectives.The proportion of Chinese cultural content appearances in both editions of textbooks is very high,which is beneficial to students' in-depth understanding and dissemination of Chinese culture.However,the distribution of the countries in the inner circle in the FLTRP textbook is more balanced than in the PEP textbook,which is more conducive to the learning of English and the in-depth understanding of English national culture.Finally,for the use of textbooks,each region should choose textbooks based on regional characteristics and the overall level of English.For teachers,the teaching content presented in the textbooks should be appropriately deleted and supplemented according to needs of the specific teaching,so that the textbooks can be fully utilized.