This book examines the concept of interculturality in English Language Teaching (ELT), using examples from diverse international and educational settings to demonstrate different approaches. Increased contact between multilingual speakers from different cultural backgrounds means that linguistic and intercultural competence must be taught hand in hand, and the approaches featured here will: encourage learners to develop intercultural sensitivity and a critical intercultural attitude; mitigate the limitations of textbooks and extend the learning to global issues, intercultural citizenship, and media literacy; show the potential of telecollaboration and popular culture as pedagogical resources; and demonstrate the value of interculturality in English as lingua franca situations and English for Academic Purposes. The chapters feature empirical studies from around the world, and include questions for reflection and recommended reading so that readers can engage more closely with key concepts, compare and adapt the practices most relevant to them. This book contributes to the literature on (inter)cultural pedagogy, English as a lingua franca, language pedagogy, and teacher professional development, and will be an invaluable tool for English language teachers, teacher trainers and educators seeking to enrich their practice. It will also be of interest to students and scholars of Applied Linguistics, especially language education.

Intercultural language education has redefined the modern languages agenda in Europe and North America. Now intercultural learning is also beginning to impact on English Language Teaching. This accessible book introduces teachers of EFL to intercultural language education by describing its history and theoretical principles, and by giving examples of classroom tasks.

This volume provides a strong theoretical introduction to the field of intercultural communication, offering practical examples of classroom activities, as well as presenting empirical research which demonstrates that intercultural communicative competence (ICC) can be developed effectively in specially tailored courses adjusted to the needs of learners. It presents a novel model of intercultural sensitivity assessment, and outlines the results of research into intercultural communicative competence conducted among the students of English Language Studies in state colleges in Poland. The cultural component in developing ICC as an extra-linguistic determinant is assigned particular prominence in the book. A thorough analysis of the empirical material collected from participant observation, the administered questionnaires and interviews allowed the most common values and attitudes held as components of intercultural sensitivity to be identified. The obtained findings are subsequently analyzed to predict the potential areas of communication misunderstandings and failures between Polish learners of English and representatives of other cultures.

This wide-ranging survey of issues in intercultural language teaching and learning covers everything from core concepts to program evaluation, and advocates a fluid, responsive approach to teaching language that reflects its central role in fostering intercultural understanding. Includes coverage of theoretical issues defining language, culture, and communication, as well as practice-driven issues such as classroom interactions, technologies, programs, and language assessment Examines systematically the components of language teaching: language itself, meaning, culture, learning, communicating, and assessments, and puts them in social and cultural context Features numerous examples throughout, drawn from various languages, international contexts, and frameworks Incorporates a decade of in-depth research and detailed documentation from the authors’ collaborative work with practicing teachers Provides a much-needed addition to the sparse literature on intercultural aspects of language education

Eva Alcón Soler Maria Pilar Safont Jordà Universitat Jaume I, Spain The main purpose of the present book is to broaden the scope of research on the development of intercultural communicative competence. Bearing this purpose in mind, English learners are considered as intercultural speakers who share their interest for engaging in real life communication. According to Byram and Fleming (1998), the intercultural speaker is someone with knowledge of one or more cultures and social identities, and who enjoys discovering and maintaining relationships with people from other cultural backgrounds, although s/he has not been formally trained for that purpose. Besides, possessing knowledge of at least two cultures is the case of many learners in bilingual or multilingual communities. In these contexts, the objective of language learning should then focus on developing intercultural competence, which in turn may involve promoting language diversity while encouraging English as both a means and an end of instruction (see Alcón, this volume). This is the idea underlying the volume, which further sustains Kramsch’s argument (1998) against the native/ non-native dichotomy. Following that author, we also believe that in a multilingual world where learners may belong to more than one speech community, their main goal is not to become a native speaker of English, but to use this language as a tool for interaction among many other languages and cultures.

The history of "language teaching" is shot through with methods and approaches to language learning - most recently with "communicative language teaching" - but this book demonstrates that a more differentiated and richer understanding of learning a foreign language is both necessary and desirable. Languages and cultures are interlinked and interdependent and their teaching and learning should be too. Learning another language is part of a complex process of learning and understanding other people's ways of life, ways of thinking and socio-economic experience

While research into intercultural teaching has grown exponentially during the past two decades, the research has primarily resorted to the use of quantitative data collection instruments and the interpretation of scores calculated through them. As such, studies in the field can seem somewhat decontextualized, ignoring in some cases setting-specific parameters. Therefore, further study is needed to bring together theory, research, and practice demonstrating how this teaching is reflected in research design and how it is undertaken in different settings. Intercultural Foreign Language Teaching and Learning in Higher Education Contexts is an essential reference source that provides a series of rich insights into the way intercultural education is practiced in numerous international contexts and showcases practical examples of teaching situations and classroom activities that demonstrate its impact within the classroom. Featuring research on topics such as higher education, multilingualism, and professionalism, this book is ideally designed for educators, researchers, administrators, professionals, academicians, and students seeking pedagogical guidance on intercultural teaching.

This book explores the decades-long use of the notion of interculturality in education and other fields, arguing that it is now time to move beyond certain assumptions towards a richer and more realistic understanding of the ‘intercultural’. Many concepts such as culture, identity and intercultural competence are discussed and revised. Myths about interculturality are also unpacked and dispelled. Written by one of the leading scholars in the field, this book proposes a very useful framework to address theoretical and methodological issues related to interculturality. This somewhat provocative book will be of interest to anyone who wrestles with this knotty but central notion of our times.

The contributors to this volume have collaborated to present their work on introducing competences in intercultural communication and citizenship into foreign language education. The book examines how learners and teachers think about citizenship and interculturality, and shows how teachers and researchers from primary to university education can work together across continents to develop new curricula and pedagogy. This involves the creation of a new theory of intercultural citizenship and a procedure for implementation. The book is written by teacher researchers who aim to help other teachers, and concludes with reflections on the lessons they have learnt which will help others to implement these ideas in their own practice. The book is essential reading for foreign language educators and researchers, students in pre-service teacher training and teachers in in-service training.

This book views the international university as a microcosm of a world where internationalization does not equate with across-the-board use of English, but rather with the practice of linguistic and cultural diversity, even in the face of Anglophone dominance. The globalization-localization continuum manifests itself in every university trying to adopt internationalization strategies. The many cases of language and learning issues presented in this book, from universities representing different parts of the world, are all manifestations of a multidimensional space encompassing local vs. global, diversification vs. Anglicization. The internationalization of universities represents a new cultural and linguistic hybridity with the potential to develop new forms of identities unfettered by traditional 'us-and-them' binary thinking, and a new open-mindedness about the roles of self and others, resulting in new patterns of communicative (educational and social) practices.