2。 Literature Review

In 1992, UNESCO promulgated the file, The Contribution of Education to the Development of Culture, in the International Conference on education, which pointed out the thought of the cross-culture education。 It hopes that people will be able to absorb the different cultures on the basis of mastering the national culture, and then improve their competence of cross-cultural communication through cross-cultural education。 In English teaching, cross-cultural teaching refers to the combination of language teaching and culture teaching, of which the ultimate aim is to improve students’ competence of cross-cultural communication (Mu  407)。  In  order  to  realize  this  goal,  teachers  should  cultivate  students’ cross-cultural

awareness at first。

2。1 Concepts of cross-cultural awareness 论文网

Cross-cultural awareness refers to the understanding of their native culture and other cultures that influence people’s behavior and ideas, including the understanding of human behavior and the difference of cultural patterns。 Some scholars put the cross-cultural awareness into the scope of cross-cultural knowledge, but some scholars regard it as one of the cross-cultural competence。 Byram regarded the cross-cultural awareness as the scope of knowledge, and then made it independent。 Thus we can see the importance of cross-cultural awareness in cross-cultural competence, and we can also know that there are differences between the cross-cultural awareness and cross-cultural knowledge。 Cross-cultural awareness is not an understanding of the specific facts or information of the native culture and other cultures, but rather an insight and a critical understanding of the relationship between cultural phenomena, patterns, characteristics, and different cultures。 Therefore, cross-cultural awareness is not only external knowledge, but also an inherent ability and quality (Feng 65)。 Cross-cultural awareness in the book, Cultural Awareness, covers British and American life and institutions, beliefs, and values, as well as everyday attitudes and feelings conveyed not only by language but also by paralinguistic features such as dress, gesture, facial expression, stance and movement ( Tomalin and Stempleski 10)。

2。2 Elements of culture teaching

In foreign language education, the importance of teaching of foreign culture has been widely recognized。 How to teach culture in foreign language education is a problem faced by language educators all over the world。

Gail Robinson (1985), an American researcher in the area of cross-cultural education, reports that when teachers are asked, “ What does culture mean to you?”, the most common responses fall into three interrelated categories: products ( literature, folklore, art, music, artifacts), ideas (beliefs, values, institutions), and behaviors (customs, habits, dress, foods, leisure)(Robinson 10)。

In Teaching Culture, Ned Seelye (1988), provides a framework for facilitating the development of cross-cultural communication skills。 His “seven goals of cultural instruction” requires teachers to help students to develop an understanding of people’s culturally-conditioned behaviors and to help students become more aware of different meanings of common behavior or words in target culture。 In Cultural Awareness, the authors recommend that we keep these “seven goals of cultural instruction” in mind as we do our lesson planning, and that we incorporate them into the following practical teaching principles:

1) Access the culture through the language being taught。文献综述

2) Make the study of cultural behaviors an integral part of each lesson。