A Cross-Cultural Analysis of a Turkish EFL Textbook: Hu and McKay's Analytic Framework

Abstract

Due to rapid globalization, culture is an essential element of foreign language pedagogy. Cross-cultural communication and foreign language learning have become increasingly important since it provides the common basis for intercultural contact. Textbooks are crucial pedagogical resources in the EFL context since they are the primary sources of building intercultural understanding. The main purpose of this study was to explore how a local Turkish EFL textbook presented interlingual and intercultural diversity in Turkish EFL classrooms. Hu and McKay's (2014) analytic framework was adopted to investigate the linguistic and cultural contents of the textbook. The findings revealed that the textbook needed more group work activities, which does not promote communication enough. In addition, the cultural content was dominated by the native culture (Turkish). In the textbook, mainstream contexts (i.e., family, school, holidays) along with local Turkish cultural elements formed the majority of the settings. In addition, places, names, and events were mainly from Turkiye, while these elements from other cultures, including Anglo-American, were limited. Finally, cross-cultural conversations were included; however, the topics chosen were about Turkiye and popular culture. These findings were discussed regarding cross-cultural communication, EIL and practical ELT pedagogy.