On College English Teaching in the New Era—A Cross-cultural Perspective

Wang Yao

College of Foreign Studies,Qilu Normal University,Jinan,China

Email:12417575@qq.com

[Abstract] Having strong cross-cultural communication ability has become the requirement for all kinds of professionals in the era of globalization.It is of great importance to cultivate students'awareness and ability of cross-cultural communication.Language and culture are inseparable.College English teaching is not only the teaching of language knowledge,but also the teaching of cultures.College English teachers should do a good job in cross-cultural education from the aspects of paying attention to cultural differences and the cultivation of Chinese traditional culture,facing up to cultural conflicts,encouraging the combination of learning and research and improving their own cross-cultural competence.

[Keywords] College English teaching;cross-cultural communication;cross-cultural education;native culture;cultural mutual understanding and learning

Introduction

In January 2017,Xi Jinping delivered a keynote speech at the headquarters of the United Nations in Geneva,and put forward a plan to build"a Community of Shared Future for Mankind"(Xi,2017).Nowadays,it has become a common understanding to recognize the rights of others and respect different values.Cross-cultural exchanges aimed at maintaining and promoting exchanges between different cultures and with peace,equality and consultation as the main contents are becoming more and more important.From this point of view,it is of great significance to cultivate global citizens with cross-cultural awareness.

The purpose of English teaching is to finally realize that people from different cultural backgrounds can communicate and learn from each other.College English education not only aims to help students master the English language itself,including pronunciation,vocabulary and grammar,but also aims to help them realize successful crosscultural communication.Therefore,to teach foreign language from the cross-cultural perspective has become an important task of College English teaching.

Besides,in the new era,today's College English teaching and learning in China should not only focus on introducing the culture of English-speaking countries to help better master the target language,but also emphasize that language learners have the ability to tell Chinese stories and spread Chinese culture in the target language,so as to realize the mutual interaction in cross-cultural communication.

Language and Culture

"Culture includes all products shared by human society and refers to the whole way of activities of a nation."(Deng&Liu,2014,p.3)Language is a part of culture and plays an important role in it.Languages vary in forms and rules as well as in pragmatic functions,that is,they express different communicative meanings in different cultural backgrounds.If the cultivation of cross-cultural awareness is ignored in English education,the development of students'language ability and social and cultural ability will be separated.It also leads to communication obstacles and misunderstandings due to the differences in semantics,pragmatics,thinking habits and cultural habits.Therefore,language learning and teaching should not be limited in the systematic laws and foundation of the language,but should cover the cultural background and social customs of English-speaking countries.

The culture of a country is refined by the people of the country in long-term practice.It can represent the excellent soft power of a country.It is a kind of life value and attitude.Therefore,in College English education,paying attention to the cultivation of cultural awareness and allowing students to understand and learn a country's culture is to learn a life attitude and lifestyle,which plays an important role in the cultivation of students' values,world outlook and outlook on life,and shaping talents with diversified characteristics.Relevant practice shows that through longterm cultural exchange,students'personality shaping process can be more accurate.Learning from domestic excellent culture and foreign culture will make students'character more and more perfect and cultivate the ability of communication between people.Of course,this kind of communication is based on the real love of the excellent culture of one's own country.Only with this foundation can it be meaningful to shape one's personality by learning foreign culture.

Cross-cultural Communication

Cross-cultural communication refers to the communication between people with different cultural backgrounds.Hymes first put forward the concept of"communicative competence"in the 1960s and classified it later in 1972 into four aspects:grammatical competence,linguistic competence,sociolinguistic competence and linguistic strategy competence.One's language competence is not equal to his/her communicative competence.Communicative competence is a complex concept,which involves many factors such as language,rhetoric,culture,psychology and so on.Therefore,the cultivation and improvement of communicative competence depends on the gradual accumulation of linguistic knowledge and various nonverbal knowledge.The integration of communicative competence and language competence is an important basis for the effective formation of cross-cultural communication competence.Successful crosscultural communicators can not only speak fluent and correct English,but also understand the rules of English use.College English teaching should not only teach students relevant English language knowledge and grammar rules,but also teach students the cultural background knowledge and language using rules,cultivate students' awareness of cross-cultural communication,enhance their sensitivity to cultural differences,and enable them to communicate effectively with people with different cultural backgrounds on different occasions.

Obviously,"successful cross-cultural communication requires knowledge and skills." (Zhang,2007,p.5)Knowledge includes the cultural knowledge of students'mother tongue as well as of the target language.Its connotation includes the awareness of cross-cultural communication,the knowledge and ability to identify different cultures,and the ability to deal with specific scenes in cross-cultural background.Cross cultural communication is not to give up one's own cultural background and abide by the cultural conventions of the target language.It requires communicators to have good background knowledge of their native culture and the target language culture,and have the ability of dual cultural understanding.Most of the mistakes in cross-cultural communication are caused by the lack of awareness of the cultural differences between the native culture and the target language culture.Therefore,the quality of mother tongue communicative competence has a direct impact on foreign language communicative competence.

Current Situation of College English Teaching

College English teaching reform has been implemented for many years,however,the current situation in China is not satisfactory.The prominent problem is that College English teaching has adopted the traditional teaching model for a long time,which emphasizes the importance of English language knowledge,pays too much attention to the form,grammar and skills of English language,cultivates students' basic language ability,but ignores the interpretation of English cultural knowledge and students' cross-cultural education.As a result,even though college students have been learning English for a certain period of time and have mastered a certain amount of English vocabulary and grammar knowledge,their English is not qualified,especially their communicative abilities.This is because they lack clear understanding of foreign language communication rules and communication modes,as well as the awareness and sensitivity of differences between their native culture and target language culture.

Actually,one's English language level is related to his/her cross-cultural competence.(Kang,2010,p.86) It is found that the higher the students' English level is,the stronger their awareness of cross-cultural differences,their self-confidence in cross-cultural communication and their cross-cultural willingness are.In the practice of crosscultural communication,the wider the students'vision and the stronger their speculative ability are,the more flexible,more inclusive and more open they are,and the better they are at using code switching,discourse communication strategies and so on.

Since most College English teaching still follow the traditional foreign language teaching based on the language itself,with more training in listening,speaking,reading,writing and translation,but lacking participation in cross-cultural practice,most students believe that they have insufficient understanding of foreign cultural knowledge,including foreign history,social norms,values,cultural taboos,speech act knowledge,basic knowledge of cross-cultural communication,strategies and skills of cross-cultural communication,etc.Most students believe that they have weak sensitivity to crosscultural differences and lack the ability,methods,skills and strategies of cross-cultural communication knowledge.The ability to reflect and learn in cross-cultural conflicts and misunderstandings and to find appropriate solutions and the ability to use foreign languages for successful cross-cultural communication need to be improved.

Besides,College English teaching now in China ignores the creation of English classroom cultural situation because of large multilevel classes,which seriously affects the cultivation of students' cross-cultural communication ability,resulting in students'ignorance of how to organize language for English expression and communication.

Profession Sun Youzhong (Sun,2016,p.21) insisted that "Foreign language classroom teaching is essentially cross-cultural teaching,and foreign language education is essentially cross-cultural education".How to effectively carry out cross-cultural education,how to reform the traditional college English teaching model,and how to organically integrate the cross-cultural teaching model with college English teaching are important topics that must be paid attention to and considered by the foreign language education circle in the new era.

Enlightenment to Cross-Cultural Education in College English Teaching

Build a curriculum with cross-cultural education

In order to effectively improve college students' cross-cultural competence,College English teaching should build a curriculum with cross-cultural education as the core,which should run through the whole curriculum system and every teaching part.While learning English language and culture,one should strengthen the reflection of native language and culture in order to enhance cross-cultural sensitivity.Cross-cultural text interpretation,cross-cultural interpersonal communication and cross-cultural critical reflection should be involved in the whole process of language skills courses and professional courses.Students should be cultivated with cross-cultural communicative competence while learning the knowledge structure of the target language.

Pay attention to cultural differences

Culture has the characteristic of diversity.Therefore,foreign language teaching should pay attention to cultural differences to avoid students' mistakes due to cultural transfer.Any culture in this world is created by people and constantly shapes generations.They are shared by all members of society,and can be inherited,evolved and developed with society.With the development of society,people's ideas are constantly updated,and new vocabulary is constantly produced in the language which reflects its social culture.It can be seen that culture has the characteristic of evolution.Therefore,language teaching should also show students fresh language and culture in accordance with the times.Teachers should pay attention to the language application in different backgrounds and cultivate students'practical language application ability.

Pay attention to the cultivation of Chinese traditional culture

The cultivation of cultural awareness mentioned here primarily refers to the cultivation of national cultural awareness,which is not only the way to spread China's excellent traditional culture,but also the bounden responsibility of every Chinese.(Wang,2019,p.47)The purpose of learning English is to communicate with foreigners,and the purpose of communicating with foreigners is naturally to carry forward China's traditional culture,to let more people know China.Because we represent China,no matter how the English education curriculum is arranged,the cultivation of Chinese traditional cultural awareness must be put in the first place.Before understanding foreign culture,we must put the culture of our motherland in our heart and remember that the purpose of learning English is to vigorously carry forward Chinese culture.

Face up to the phenomenon of cultural conflict

Covid-19 pandemic in America uncovers its deep-rooted racial discrimination.Misunderstanding,national superiority,stereotype and prejudice can cause cultural conflict.Changing the attitude towards different cultures and increasing the understanding of different cultures can avoid the occurrence of cultural conflicts.To enhance our understanding of different cultures is not to lose our cultural identity,but to recognize cultural differences.Teachers should help students understand other cultures.Due to the continuous development of social multiculturalism,learners should understand the role of culture,such as age,gender and social class.Otherwise,they neither have or have little systematic knowledge of their members in the relevant social or cultural background,nor can they fully understand the target language culture and the comprehensive cultural phenomenon.Therefore,the teaching of culture should be a means of cultivating consciousness and cultivating people's tradition and consciousness sensitivity in the target language culture.

Encourage the combination of learning and research

The overall development trend of modern higher education is that the cultivation of college students has changed from knowledge-based to quality-oriented.(Deng &Wang,2020,p.135) Whether we can cultivate a group of research talents with real scientific research consciousness,scientific research ability and innovative spirit will be directly related to the all-round promotion of the education in China.Therefore,English teachers should not only impart English cultural knowledge to students,but also actively guide them to carry out scientific research,which can change students' learning from being passive to active and improve students' ability in learning.More importantly,students can use their English language and cultural knowledge to explore ways and means to solve practical problems,so as to achieve the purpose of applying what they have learned.For example,teachers can guide students to conduct research by themselves on"the cultural differences between China and the west from the point of languages".College Students'scientific research training program is an effective form and important way to cultivate college students' innovation ability,scientific research ability and practical ability.College English teachers can guide college students to apply for and participate in scientific research and training programs related to the cultivation of crosscultural communication awareness.

Enhance teachers'cross-cultural competence

According to Byram's cross-cultural competence model (knowledge,skills,attitude and awareness),a qualified English teacher should not only master the language knowledge,but also master the social,geographical,political,economic,values and other cultures behind the language at home and abroad,as well as understand the characteristics and similarities and differences between their own culture and the target language culture.(Byram,2014,p.23)In terms of attitude,we should have the courage to face challenges,study and explore foreign culture,understand and respect foreign culture,be tolerant of cultural differences,overcome ethnocentrism and seek common ground while reserving differences.In terms of ability,we should be able to effectively use the target language to communicate in real cross-cultural communication occasions,be good at observing and listening,form the habit of thinking about some cultural issues,be good at summarizing our own cross-cultural communication experience,and actively explore effective learning methods.

Conclusion

The highest goal of language learning is to learn how to think the way native speakers do.It is to deeply understand the culture and ideas behind the language.In the future,we should use this set of ideas to deeply communicate and cooperate with others.The trend of internationalization and globalization puts forward new requirements for college students' cross-cultural communicative competence.College foreign language teaching should pay more attention to cross-cultural teaching for foreign language education is essentially cross-cultural education.

Acknowledgements

This paper is a phased achievement of the 2019 Shandong Social Science Planning Fund Program"Research on the Integration of Qilu Culture and College English Teaching"(approval No.:19CWZJ16)and the 2020 Teaching Reform Project of Qilu Normal University"Research on Ideological-political Construction of Foreign Language Courses"(approval No.:jg202012).