Teaching Culture through Language: Suggestions for the Italian Language Class

Abstract

One of the major difficulties experienced by language teachers, especially at the beginner's level, is that of introducing the subject to the students as a discipline that requires a new approach on their part. Students, in fact, often regard the study of a foreign language as a relatively easy subject that does not require serious thinking or deep understanding but merely memorization and translation into one's own language; they rarely consider the that lies beneath the target language. The students' attitude may then result in memorizing words, phrases, and rules, all the while comparing them to a context-their own-which does not correspond to the one in which those words, phrases, and rules were forged. This approach is particularly common at the college level, where students often identify their language requirement as the easiest or the most relaxing of their classes.1 To these psychological problems, of course, one can add the practical difficulty of presenting new and complex material at the fast pace required during the academic year. These pragmatic needs frequently run counter to the goals of familiarizing the students with the aspects embodied in the language and, ultimately, of stimulating them to pursue the study of the expressed in and by that language.2 I should immediately mention that although the study of the language of a usually precedes the study of its literature, art, and history, this in no way changes a fundamental truth: that the study of language itself is (Freddi 1987, 46). As Wierzbicka notes, language, besides being part of culture, reflects as well (1986, 368n1).3 The word culture today is certainly not confined within the boundaries of the liberal arts; rather, it embraces everything not biologically foreseeable and predetermined, following Levi-Strauss's well-known distinction between nature and (for an application of this distinction within an Italian context see Freddi 1987, 45-46, and De Mauro 1987, 5-11). We accept, in sum, the anthropological definition of cultural relativity, which does not discriminate among different cultures or among different manifestations within the same culture.4 Since it is the main vehicle of communication