Learners’ Cultural Awareness in College English Teaching

Abstract

This paper mainly discusses the relationship among language, culture and intercultural communication, expounds the significance of the cultivation of English learners’ cross-cultural awareness and feasible strategies to help learners to develop their cross-cultural communication. With the the global economic integration and the increasingly frequent exchanges between China and western countries, effective communication has become high-profile topic in cross-cultural communication. Foreign language teaching is no longer a simple language knowledge impart, but it also should develop the students’ English cultural awareness, that is, the communicative ability in different cultural background. Language is the carrier of culture, which is deeply rooted in a language, and there are differences between any two languages. Cultural knowledge is an indispensable and integral part of language learning, so language learners must master the culture of a country of the target language. However, many English teachers in college English lectures often ignore the cultivation of the learners’ cross-cultural awareness and ability. With the acceleration of globalization process and the increase of international communication, the cultivation of cross-cultural awareness is becoming more and more important, especially for foreign language learners, which is a new challenge for foreign language teaching in China.