A Study On Cultural Content Of Reading Sections In Textbooks From The Perspective Of Intercultural Communication

National English Curriculum Standards for Senior High School(Ministry of Education,2018: 4)has been released,which clearly states that intercultural communication competence is one of the cultivation essentials among students.Meanwhile,Cultural Awareness has been emphasized again as a core disciplinary literacy in Chinese English learning likewise.In other words,culture instruction does deserve long-term attention throughout Sinic English learning process.Throughout the entire period,English textbooks have become the primary platforms for both English learning and instruction,in which they play a significant role in cultural transmission and civilization inheritance.Thus,advanced and competent English textbook editors ought to integrate language with culture,but also cultures at home with those abroad.In this way,readers could dialectically appreciate and respect cultural contents but also draw cultural essences from English textbooks.With this,the tenet of intercultural communication throughout Sinic English instruction would be finally actualized.This thesis intends to take macro culture(common cultural knowledge)and micro culture(attitudes or values related to cultures)as the main lines for respectively evaluating their components(source culture,target culture and interculture),aiming at constituting a planar textbook evaluation framework for the prevailing ones applied in Jiangsu Province.The research questions to be answered in this article are:(1)What are the distributions of macro culture and micro culture in Reading sections of Advanced with English(Module 6-11)?(2)What are the reasons for the distribution disparities of macro culture and micro culture in Reading sections of Advanced with English(Module 6-11)?(3)As high school students,how could they utilize the cultural contents in Reading sections of Advanced with English(Module 6-11)?(4)As textbook editors,how could they optimize the cultural contents in Reading sections of Advanced with English(Module 6-11)?This thesis then bases on both textbook evaluation theories and Risager’s(2007)theory titled as language and culture pedagogy from a national to a transnational paradigm to appreciate target culture,source culture and interculture in each passage of Advanced with English(Module 6-11).The thesis also intends to comprise dimensions of macro culture and micro culture to evaluate the cultural specialties in Advanced withEnglish(Module 6-11)on the other hand.Besides,with the questionnaires and data analysis by SPSS,this thesis also endeavors to gain an insight into both students’ intercultural communication competence levels and their opinions concerning cultural activities designed by Advanced with English(Module 6-11).With these insights,the author hopes to offer some advice for students to comprehend textbooks and for editors to conduct textbook revisions rationally for the future.In general,the analysis indicates that each passage of Reading sections in the elective modules is centered on a single motif with cultural implications from three perspectives:source culture,target culture and interculture,and it also covers macro culture and micro culture likewise.Videlicet speaking,its cultural contents almost agree with the new curriculum standards while source culture is spare and not systematic;in detail:(1)Compared with micro culture,macro culture in Reading sections of these six modules occupies a more significant proportion.To the other extent,target culture serves as a mainstream,followed by intercultural elements while source culture occupies least under the perspective of macro culture.Meanwhile,as for the dimension of micro culture,intercultural content takes up the most,followed by target content while source culture still occupies the least.(2)With the analysis of textbooks,questionnaire feedbacks,and SPSS,various cultures have disparate distributions in Reading sections among these six modules and there are mainly two reasons.On the one hand,the disparities in distributions are mainly owing to the lack of advanced intercultural communication competence from both textbook editors and readers.In other words,within the noncommittal cultural subjectivity,it fails to zealously activate source culture exportation,but to chooses to be westernized.On the other hand,shallow macro cultural knowledge cannot effectively encourage students to surmount lofty deliberateness(e.g.,micro cultures at an attitude level),gradually hindering the exchange of source cultures in especial.This is also traceable from the misty cultural subjectivity and insufficient cultural confidence,which coincides with the questionnaire feedbacks.(3)With the analysis of textbooks,questionnaire feedbacks,and SPSS,students’ intercultural communication competence is definitely inseparable from interlanguage activities via Sinitic English textbooks.Knowing this,students then could sublime themselves with Chinese cultural excellence by the splendid English textbooks.That is,the more profoundly students can interpret their own culture and history,the more flexible theywill be in intercultural communications for consolidating their cultural subjectivity,ideology and identity.(4)With the analysis of textbooks,questionnaire feedbacks,and SPSS,editors should timely and consistently conduct investigations among targeted students to explore more attractive reading topics generating from Sinic source culture.This is for the sake of enriching source culture in learning materials,narrowing the gap between editors and young generations when facing cultural phenomena or cultural shocks.At length,it could scientifically and duly help editors themselves promote English textbook revisions with sufficient confidence in source culture as well.In summary,according to studies on textbook evaluation and cultural language instruction,the cultural contents in Advanced with English(Module 6-11)are worthy of further improvements or insights.Whereas this research also has some shortcomings,such as the number of research samples is limited and the localized textbook evaluation system yet needs perfecting.Therefore,these would be the breakthroughs in the future.